From Earth & Sky.
February 14th is the day we in the U.S. celebrate love.
On this Valentine’s Day, we went searching for a scientific explanation for love. We asked psychiatrists and neurobiologists. They told us scientists have known for centuries that love happens in the brain.
But they reminded us that human love is tough to study with the tools of science. For one thing, our definition of “love” is complex. You might love your child, your cocker spaniel, milk chocolate and the first snow of the season – each in a different way.
Also, scientists can’t cut into or inject things into human brains to look for the chemical changes love brings. It’s true that, over the past decade, research on rodents called prairie voles has shown changes in the voles’ brain chemistry when they form pair bonds. Their brains release high levels of hormones – oxytocin and vasopressin.
Read the full article here.
