How it feels to be in love
If you’ve ever been in love, then you know that you’ve truly been blessed. Only people who’ve experienced love, know just how much joy and happiness it comes along with it. Many of us haven’t even realized they were in love. We just knew we felt happy and fulfilled. Love has the power to make you feel that way! It’s a feeling that all of us deserve to get at least once in our life. Falling in love can be exciting and terrifying at the same time, which makes it all the more exhilarating. And although it all seems so romantic, the scientific facts about love explain why everything occurs as it does.
A few facts about love and the science behind them
Now let’s go through all the facts about love you might not have heard of before. We’ll also try to discover what it is that actually makes us fall in love and what happens to our brain in the meantime. We’ll even have the chance to get a closer look into what actually attracts us to one another, and makes us want to be with each other. So without further ado, here are some scientifically proven facts about love.
Both partners have to have adequate testosterone levels to be sexually attracted to one another
Both men and women have testosterone (women have small amounts of the hormone). Testosterone creates the desire for sex, and that makes you pursue the person who creates this desire in you. This hormone plays a huge role in finding a partner, as its purpose is to alert your body that it is in prime condition and use that as an opportunity to pass on the genetic material. Adequate testosterone levels are what make us more attractive to some then to others, and what make us seem more attractive to some people, but less to others.
We often fall in love with people who look a bit like us
Sounds a bit narcissistic, right? Actually it’s not only people with similar hair and eye color that attract us more. Facial features, ear lobe length, metabolic rates and even lung capacity play a role in deciding who we fall in love with. We, of course, decide on all of this without even thinking.
We are often attracted to people who smell and/or look similar to our parents
Although it sounds a bit disturbing, we often feel an attraction to people who are similar to one of our parents. That’s because the smell seems to be oddly comforting and soothing. And it’s especially soothing when we connect that person’s smell to a comforting and familiar smell, that we have known our whole lives.
We seem to be attracted to people with an immune system that’s different than ours
A study conducted in both rodents and people who had pieces of worn clothing to smell and choose from, showed that people always sense and choose a person with a different immune system than their own.
Falling in love is as addictive as nicotine and cocaine
Dopamine is a chemical that’s released in the initial stages of falling in love, and gives you a rush of happiness and pleasure. The same chemical activates in our body when using cocaine or nicotine. Although we experience a ‘high’ in all of these three situations, love would be the safest drug to choose.
Romantic love and the love a mother and her child share have a similar chemical connection
This might sound weird at first but the trick is actually in the hormone Oxycontin. Oxycontin is released in several situations in life, which include giving birth, nursing your child, and even while orgasming. It’s a hormone that helps with bonding, especially with long-term bonding.
Our nerve growth factor is higher in the first year of romantic relationships
Simply put, this means that our nerve cells are at their best during the first year. The functions of both the sensory and the sympathetic cells thrive in the first year of a relationship, and we also have heightened senses.
Love is blind
Now that we’ve talked about many shocking and unbelievable facts about love, let’s go over to the mostly debated issue of all. The most used, and probably most popular quote on love is that ‘love is blind’. This means that in our eyes, our partner is always perfect. It doesn’t even matter what other people may say about him or her, we will always be blind to our partner’s flaws and imperfections.
Although there are many who disagree, love blindness does actually exist. It even plays a crucial and beneficial role in any relationship. It helps us move to the final stage, known as the attachment stage. This will make the relationship last longer, and eventually even lead to starting a family and repopulating the Earth.
Love is sure great, but it can make us a bit crazy sometimes, and now that we’ve seen the science behind it all, we can know for sure why we act the way we do sometimes.
If you’d like to read more interesting facts about love and dating, you might want to check out our article on the mysteries of online dating.
