Scientific Love

Does the slipper fit?

Valentine's Day is due. I have always found that the day is far too commercialized for my liking.

Love science has always fascinated me. The BBC have an interesting section on the stages of love. Actually, the Science of Love has baffled scientists for centuries.

Four years ago, Andreas Bartels had just finished a Ph.D. on the neurobiology of vision and had some time to kill. Over dinner and after a few glasses of wine, he decided to use science to tackle a question that has stumped poets for centuries. What, he asked, is love? "We said, 'why not do a fun project?'"

It went on "Bartels reasoned that romance is a physiological phenomenon".

Cornell University economist Robert Frank had pointed out that people would leave their mates the first time a more attractive partner walked by if love were not a pretty powerful force. To find this glue, Bartels and his adviser, Semir Zeki of the Imperial College of London, used a machine called a functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) scanner to peer into the brains of 17 people who had been madly in love for an average of about two years--around when other research had suggested commitment and devotion were at their peak. By comparing the brains of these people as they looked at loved ones and then as they looked at friends, Bartels and Zeki produced what they believe are the first pictures of the brain in love.

The Economist has a different take on all of this. As one person told me "love is free but condoms are expensive".

Anyway, I prefer the Independent's view on love.

"Psychologists have shown for the first time that you are more likely to find a happy-looking face that looks directly at you sexually attractive than the equally smiling face of someone who is averting their eyes. The findings support the theory that both men and women use the direction of a person's gaze as a signal of whether that person finds you interesting enough to look you directly in the face – and that sign of interest is, in itself, seen as attractive to the observer".

Psychologists know what they are all talking about.

ESRC deals further with the Science of Love. They say

"By comparing the NGF levels of the madly in love with those of established couples and singletons, the researchers concluded that romantic love dies within a year". Why we love is even more fascinating. A trio of neurotransmitters - dopamine (also activated by cocaine and nicotine), norepinephrine (adrenalin) and serotonin - are implicated in our behaviour at this stage. While Tallis argues that romantic love is similar to manic depression, Fisher suggests its behavioural patterns are more akin to obsessive compulsive disorder - a condition characterised, like romantic love, by low levels of serotonin, hence the suggestions of drug therapy.

"So far, so good. So, what about affairs and unfaithfulness? Fisher argues that that comes down to the independence of the lust, romance and attachment systems. You can, in fact, feel all three, at the same time, for different people. Not exactly a stable, happy situation. "We are not built to be happy but to reproduce," says Fisher.

For many sociologists, these theories of love from anthropologists and psychologists miss the point. They point out that the definition of love has varied through history and that the concept of falling in love, for example, did not exist until the 16th century.

For sociologist Bernadette Bawin-Legros romantic love doesn’t boil down to timeless brain activation patterns and evolutionary imperatives. Romantic love is a narrative that has long-dominated popular culture. It is fragile in its contemporary form, she argues, because that form involves the impossible union of two ideals - fusion with another and the modern aspiration for autonomy and self-development. Whatever the desires of dreamy romantics for love to last forever, those two ideals are simply irreconcilable"

Pseudoscience of love is a witty blog and worth visiting today. The MSNBC is worth a read as well. He talks about sex of course. The miserable police have launched an operation to prevent teenagers from having sex. Of course, police men ought to first set an example by being celibate.

NY suggests that we all get in shape for Valentines night. Studies show that to most people, confidence is sexier than a perfect body. "When you feel smokin' in your own skin, you'll instantly amp up your sex appeal," says Sadie Nardini, director of East West Yoga near Union Square. Nardini has designed a yoga workout to put you in better shape for great sex. Errrrm yes, I have a better idea - Sexercise.

"The NHS has some new advice for people struggling to schedule a fitness routine into their daily lives - a workout between the sheets. According to the NHS Direct website, "sexercise" can lower the risk of heart attacks and helps people live longer. Endorphins released during orgasm stimulate immune system cells, which also helps target illnesses like cancer, as well as wrinkles, it states. Sexual health experts said such claims could not be scientifically proven.

"It's good to see the NHS are promoting sexual well-being," Dr Melissa Sayer told the Guardian newspaper. "Yes, there is evidence that sex has benefits for mental well-being, but to say there is a link with reduced risk of heart disease and cancer is taking the argument too far." If you're worried about wrinkles - orgasms even help prevent frown lines from deepening" says NHS Direct.

The Daily Mail of course is the best newspaper to read if you want tips on seduction. The Psychology of Seduction is fascinating. It says "

If you want an intelligent partner - seek out a man with body hair. A recent study conducted by psychiatrist Dr Aikarakudy Alias, who has been working on the relationship between body hair and intelligence for 22 years, showed that hairy chests are more likely to be found among the most intelligent and highly educated than in the general population. Excessive body hair could also mean higher intelligence. Dr Alias's research, which focused on medical students in the United States, showed that 45 per cent of male doctors in training were "very hairy", compared with less than 10 per cent of men overall. In a region of southern India, research among medical and engineering students and manual labourers found that both groups of students had more body hair on average than the manual workers. Further investigations showed that when academic ranking among students was examined, the hairier men got better grades. Taking this study one step further, Dr Alias studied 117 Mensa members (who have an IQ of at least 140) and found that this group tended to have thick body hair. Some of the most intelligent men were those with hair on their backs as well as on their chests". I quite like the Nigella Lawson key to seduction. She said "But I know men like the whole strappy thing of suspenders, so I’ll wear them. In fact, thinking about it, I’ve actually worn them with nothing but a pair of shoes in bed before,”

In 2007 there was an interesting study about romantic encounters between doctors and nurses.

"Passionate encounters are inevitable among doctors and nurses working in emergency medicine - or at least that's what romance novels have us believe" said the BBC. "A tongue-in-cheek study of the genre suggests the GP surgery is also a hot spot for romantic escapades"

The books say many things but as we all know, those you may adore the most will almost always walk past you, never notice you then almost always belong to another.

"True love is never selfish, and will die if it is not fed by thoughtfulness, courtesy, kindness, and work" Billy Graham.