by In the euphoric haze of the new romance, it might be easy to believe that two strangers can fall in love on first meeting. But is love at first sight real?
Physiologically, there’s a lot going on that can make the early stages of romance feel like love – from causing a hormonal influx to activating areas of the brain that correspond to addictive behaviors. However, some researchers argue that love at first sight is just lust and that real love comes later once the partner bond is formed.
love or lust?
So what is love? Aside from one chart-topping Haddaway song, there can be several different definitions of love. According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary (opens in new tab)Their love is a “strong affection for another arising out of kinship or personal ties,” according to a team of researchers from Rutgers University (opens in new tab)New Jersey, suggested that love can be broken down into three categories: lust, attraction, and attachment.
Attraction, pleasure, and attachment are interconnected and mutually reinforcing, according to a 2016 review in the Indian Journal of Endocrinology and Metabolism (opens in new tab). However, they are distinct processes in the brain, “each mediated by its own neurotransmitters and circuits,” the researchers write in the review. While the hormones testosterone and estrogen are responsible for pleasure, regulated by the amygdala – the area of the brain that regulates emotions – attraction is determined by the stress and reward centers – the nucleus accumbens and the ventral tegmentum. The neurotransmitters dopamine, norepinephrine, and cortisol are all used when a person is attracted to someone. When it comes to bonding, oxytocin and vasopressin are more dominant.
So initial attraction to someone is probably not love, said Dr. Deborah Lee (opens in new tab), a reproductive health specialist and medical editor for Dr. Fox Online Pharmacy in England. “Psychologists dispute that it’s possible to experience true love by seeing another person for the first time,” she told Live Science. “That’s because love develops over time, when you start loving the other person’s mind, values, and abilities. True love is not just about sexual attraction and passion.”
When it comes to love at first sight, the feeling is more of a feeling of lust, Eric Ryden said (opens in new tab), PhD in Clinical Psychology and Couples Therapist at Couples Therapy Clinic in England. “[And] Those beautiful, heady feelings don’t last,” he told Live Science. “Even if you are looking for a long-term partner, love at first sight is not a sign that you have found the right one. [It] has more to do with physical attraction and lust than with long-lasting romantic love.”
Eric Ryden is a Doctor of Clinical Psychology and has spent his career studying, researching and practicing what works best for couples therapy. He is a British Psychological Society Licensed Consultant Psychologist with ten years experience working for the UK National Health Service and as a private practitioner.
chemical love
Much of what people perceive as love is a cocktail of hormones released to make their nervous system feel happy and safe.
“Love affects both the mind and the body in dramatic ways,” Ryden said. “Along with euphoria and obsessions is an increased secretion of feel good hormones, principally dopamine – associated with reward and pleasure – and oxytocin – sometimes called the love hormone because it is associated with warmth, love and trust.” As we have already seen, these hormones tend to be higher during the bonding phase than during the initial pleasure or attraction.
love or addiction?
The early stages of love can resemble an addiction, Lee said: Similar areas of the brain are activated during both early love and cocaine addiction.
“When a lover focuses on their partner, they feel insane, experience mood swings with bouts of euphoria, act obsessively and/or compulsively, live in a distorted reality, and often become dependent on the other person in the same way a person behaves when she’s addicted to cocaine,” Lee said.
However, these feelings diminish as the relationship ages, and the later stages of romantic love no longer mimic drug addiction, according to a 2016 study in the journal Frontiers in Psychology (opens in new tab).
Distorted memories
According to a 2012 article in the Journal of Neuroscience, (opens in new tab) Memories can be altered as people remember them, often influenced by the emotional state someone is in when they remember. The next time someone recalls the same memory, it will be more distorted from the previous time. Thus, one’s perception of one’s partner and how one initially feels about them can be distorted by current feelings for them. While people might think it was love at first sight, it might not have been.
In addition to the distorted memory, a person’s perception of their partner is generally in a positive light or biased due to a phenomenon known as “positive illusion”. A 2018 study in the journal Frontiers in Human Neuroscience (opens in new tab) suggests that the happiest couples are those who see each other through “rose-colored glasses,” experience less conflict and doubt, and experience greater relationship satisfaction. Positive illusions can also trick people into thinking they were in love from day one, when it actually took a little longer to get there.
