The Biology of Love

We discussed earlier the different kinds of love and, more specifically, the difference between conditional and unconditional love. Because unconditional love accepts us “as is” and is enduring, it provides an unbreakable feeling of connection and belonging that we desperately need to overcome our separateness and the fear associated with our mortality.

According to economic and social theorist Jeremy Rifkin, writing in “The Empathic Civilization,” recent discoveries in evolutionary biology, neuro-cognitive science, and child development research suggest that we are "soft-wired" for sociability, attachment, affection, and companionship. Our first drive is the drive to belong. We have an innate physiological and psychological need for connection and belonging that we strive to meet through various forms of love.

We’re all familiar with the “fight or flight” reaction triggered by physical threat and mental and emotional stressors. We associate this reaction with our survival instinct. When the threat is immediate, the adrenaline that is released increases our heart rate and respiration, activates our muscles, and makes us hyper-alert in order to enable us to respond to danger. Long-term physical stress increases the cortisol level in our bodies, making it possible to survive starvation, long migrations, or critical injury. Non-essential organs and tissues shut down to maintain blood sugar and feed vital organs. When cortisol stays at high levels, bones, muscles and joints deteriorate, blood fats and sugar increase, and hunger is sparked. Most of our long-term stressors today are emotional and mental, not physical. Because cortisol is hard on the body, these threats indirectly become physical.

Dr. Kerstin Uvnas Moberg of the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm, author of The Oxytocin Factor, writes of a second, countervailing response in our bodies, a calm and connection system of rest and recovery essential to human health and well-being. The calm and connection system, like the fight or flight reaction, is also important for survival. The key hormone in this system, oxytocin, is traditionally associated with childbirth and lactation, but is present in both males and females. Moberg calls oxytocin the hormone of calm, love and healing. Her research indicates that the calm and connection reaction results in lower blood pressure, lower levels of stress hormones, increased ability to learn and solve problems, and more effective digestion, nutritional uptake and storage. Oxytocin can lessen cravings and addictions, diminish pain, help wounds heal faster, and promote positive feelings. As a counter to cortisol, it can ameliorate the chronic anxiety and depression, emotional over-reaction, negativity, weight gain, heart disease, and weakened immunity often related to long-term stress.

Oxytocin is secreted by the posterior lobe of the pituitary gland, a pea-sized structure at the base of the brain. It's sometimes called the "cuddle hormone” because it’s released when people snuggle or bond socially. It can also be released through sensory stimulation, including warmth, touch, smell, ingestion of food and certain types of sound and light. Therapeutic touch and psychological support can trigger the release of oxytocin, as can playing with pets.

Next month, we’ll look further at the biology of unconditional love.

Carol Bragg
Seekonk, MA