KAGU143 Posted May 31, 2005 Share Posted May 31, 2005 This isn't precisely about asexuality, but I think it's interesting nonetheless.http://www.livescience.com/humanbiology/050531_love_sex.html-Greybird2013 Mod Edit: The above link doesn't work anymore, but the article can be found here. For future reference: Love More Powerful than Sex, Study ClaimsBy Robert Roy BrittLiveScience Senior Writerposted: 31 May 200511:52 am ETSex and romance may seem inextricably linked, but the human brain clearly distinguishes between the two, according to a new study. The upshot: Love is the more powerful emotion.The results of brain scans speak to longstanding questions of whether the pursuit of love and sex are different emotional endeavors or whether romance is just warmed over sexual arousal."Our findings show that the brain areas activated when someone looks at a photo of their beloved only partially overlap with the brain regions associated with sexual arousal," said Arthur Aron of the State University of New York-Stony Brook. "Sex and romantic love involve quite different brain systems."The study, announced today, will be detailed in the July issue of the Journal of Neurophysiology.Left side, right sideThe study was small, however, involving 17 young men and women, all of whom had recently fallen madly in love. They filled out questionnaires while their brains were hooked up to a functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) system.Romance seems to steep in parts of the brain that are rich in dopamine, a chemical known to affect emotions. These brain regions are also linked by other studies to the motivation for rewards."To our surprise, the activation regions associated with intense romantic love were mostly on the right side of the brain, while the activation regions associated with facial attractiveness were mostly on the left," said Lucy Brown of the Albert Einstein College of Medicine.The study also revealed that as a romance matures, so does the mind."We found several brain areas where the strength of neural activity changed with the length of the romance," Brown said. "Everyone knows that relationships are dynamic over time, but we are beginning to track what happens in the brain as a love relationship matures."Love winsThe processing of romantic feelings involves a "constellation of neural systems." The researchers -- neuroscientists, anthropologists and social psychologists -- declare love the clear winner versus sex in terms of its power over the human mind."Romantic love is one of the most powerful of all human experiences," said study member Helen Fisher, an anthropologist at Rutgers University. "It is definitely more powerful than the sex drive."Fisher said the study might suggest some of the physiology of stalking behavior. Other studies suggest that up to 40 percent of people who are rejected in love slip into clinical depression, she said."Rejected men and women in societies around the world sometimes kill themselves or someone else," Fisher said.Animals, tooThere are hints in the study that romance is not a uniquely human trait.Some of the changes seen with mature romances were in regions of the brain also associated with pair-bonding in prairie voles. Other studies have found that expressions of attraction in a female prairie vole are linked to a 50 percent hike in dopamine activity in the brain region that corresponds to the location where human romance is processed."These and other data indicate that all mammals may feel attraction to specific partners, and that some of the same brain systems are involved," Fisher said. Link to post Share on other sites
Silly Green Monkey Posted June 1, 2005 Share Posted June 1, 2005 That one is very interesting, and it provides more evidence to those who demand to know if asexuals cannot love because they don't have sex. One article linking to that one is very interesting from an Aspergers point of view, called Everyone Is A Mind Reader. It explains a lot. Link to post Share on other sites
Qwerty Posted June 2, 2005 Share Posted June 2, 2005 This was on the front page of the newspaper here. http://www.smh.com.au/news/Health/Crazy-fo...7305619365.html (This may ask international visitors to log in. Kez set up an account some time ago. I think it was asexual/asexuality.) It was also on MSN: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/8049664/ (Identical text to the livescience one.) Link to post Share on other sites
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