Love REALLY IS The Drug

From yesterday's Washington Post (registration required):

"Love is a drug," says Helen Fisher, an anthropologist at Rutgers University and author of "Why We Love: The Nature and Chemistry of Romantic Love." "The ventral tegmental area is a clump of cells that make dopamine, a natural stimulant, and sends it out to many brain regions" when one is in love. "It's the same region affected when you feel the rush of cocaine."

In her most recent research, Fisher and colleagues gave 32 love-struck subjects an MRI scan while they viewed a picture of their beloved.

Boy, did their brains light up!
There are two shrimp-size things on either side of your brain called the caudate nuclei. This is the gear that operates bodily movements and the body's reward system: "the mind's network for general arousal, sensations of pleasure, and the motivation to acquire rewards," Fisher writes. And when the test subjects looked at their sweeties, these things started singing "Loosen Up My Buttons" with the Pussycat Dolls!
A separate study by Italian researchers several years ago showed something else.
Serotonin, another neurotransmitter in the brain associated with obsession, depression and racing thoughts, was greatly affected -- right down to the molecular level -- by romance and surging dopamine. People newly in love and people with obsessive-compulsive disorder showed the same lowered levels of the "platelet 5-HT transporter." In other words, dopamine appears to suppress serotonin, which in turn triggers obsessive-compulsive thought patterns.

Happy Valentine's Day!