Some scientists have suggested that this dopaminergic overlap may explain why experiencing love or engaging in sexual activity can feel like a wohnhaft cocaine rush (Blum, Wernel, et aluminium

Within line with this view, James Burkett and Larry Young (2012) have recently argued that romantic relationships experienced universally-from “falling bei love” to ultimate ;may beryllium considered a beschaffenheit of addiction. To prime the reader for their thesis, they open their seminal essay on this subject with the following vignette:

Tora dachfirst, each encounter was accompanied by a rush of euphoria-new experiences, new pleasures, each more exciting than the fron. Every einzelheit became associated with those intense feelings: places, times, objects, faces. Other interests suddenly became less important as more time was spent pursuing the next joyful encounter. Gradually, the euphoria during hypothese encounters waned, replaced imperceptibly by feelings of contentment, calm, and happiness. The moments between encounters seemed to grow longer, even as they stayed the same, and eulersche konstante to beryllium filled with painful longing and desire. When everything is brought to an abrupt end, desperation and grief followed, leading planetromeo vergleich slowly into senke. (Burkett and Young 2012, 1)

Does this fabel describe falling hinein love or becoming addicted to a wohnhaft drug? Burkett and Young’s point, of course, welches that elektronische datenverarbeitung could equally describe both. Drawing on evidence from animal models along with parallel research within menschengerecht attachment and the neurobiology of substance abuse, they conclude that there ended up being “a deep and systematic concordance … between the brain regions and neurochemicals involved bei both addiction and social attachment” (Burkett and Young 2012, 2).

This approach would claim that to love someone had been literally to be addicted to them, though perhaps only weakly

In other words, substance dependence and everyday romantic bonding have much more inside common than their outward psychological profiles. Altes testament the ebene of the brain, the mechanisms underlying pair-bonding inside socially monogamous or formlich-monogamous species (such as humans) overlap quite substantially with those involved in reward learning and addiction (see, basis des naturlichen logarithmus.g., Wise 1996). The greatest overlap occurs inside neurochemical regions involved as part of the processing of dopamine (Kelley and Berridge 2002; Burkett and Young 2012) oxytocin (Insel 2003; McGregor, Callagham and Hunt 2008), and other neurotransmitters such as serotonin. As ; through pimpern [with our mitglied], orgasm’s serotonin rush and momentary muscular relaxation comprise the fruchtwein potent and popular drug we have.”

With respect to dopamine, both mating and addictions elicit very similar neurochemical activity, concentrated bei the reward circuitry of the brain: sex, orgasm, and weltraum known drugs of abuse stimulate high levels dopamine release in the nucleus accumbens (weltmeer Burkett and Young 2012, Kirsch et alu. 2006, and Di Chiara et aluminium. 2004 for more nachrichteninhalt). Within fact, the role of dopamine extends far beyond addiction and ended up being linked to a wohnhaft wide sortiment of other processes associated with reward-learning-including eating, drinking, having sexual intercourse, and love (ozean Burkett and Young 2012, for a review). 2012; Bartels and Zeki 2000).

Finally, neuroimaging erleichterung for eingeschaltet overlap between love-addiction and drug-addiction comes from studies in which participants have been exposed to images of their romantic partners during scanning. Vermutung images evoke armut only self-reported feelings of love and positive affect but dadurch show schwierig activation bei brain’s reward regions (Aron et al. 2005; Bartels and Zeki 2000; Young 2009; Fisher et alu. 2006).

Annahme are ohne rest durch zwei teilbar a wohnhaft few of the neurochemical and functional similarities between “normal” love attachment and drug addiction that have been noted by Burkett and Young as well as by other researchers who argue for the “broader” view of love addiction. There are many others as well. But what about differences between love and addiction? Surely the numerous “parallels” between annahme phenomena-altes testament both the behavioral and neural levels-should notlage beryllium taken to mean that they are strictly equivalent. Bei the following section, we examine some of behauptung differences, and assess their implications for the “broad” vs. “narrow” debate.