Those of you who have ever been or in love know that it’s a feeling so pure and divine that makes you cry, laugh, dance of for that matter, scream many a times in ecstasy. A thousand feelings in an interval of seconds and you feel nothing short of flying and touching horizons and waking up in seventh haven. However, the question is whether its fate that makes you fall in love with a particular person or as we call it the science behind falling in love. Anyone who has ever fallen in love knows that the feeling is like being dizzy and crazily happy at the same time. However, this feeling might not be because the head over heels love you have for someone but it may be hormones in your body, which make you feel that way.
The law of attraction
Do you think it is true that opposites attracts? Well some recent surveys and psychologists may say otherwise. According to survey by Rice University, people with same political views are more likely to fall in love. It seems little unromantic does it? Another study suggests that men fell in love with women with a smaller waist to hip ratio while women tend to fall love with men having a symmetrical faces. So yes, more and more we can say that love at first sight may just be a trick of your brain.
Psychologists say that apparently, we have a subconscious checklist of the kind of person we want to fall in love with like his skin color or similar taste in music. When we meet the person who excels in all the things on the checklist, we realize that we might be in love, also known as love at first sight.
The hormonal play
Hormones play a very big role in all the various stages of love. From the time we meet our love to the duration of our love affair, all depends on not just one hormone but a mix of few hormones. Adrenaline and dopamine are, released in the initial stages of love and they give you a sense of pleasure.
They give you an uncomfortable sweaty feeling in front of your lover and making your heartbeat raise. Serotonin is the hormone that will make your lover’s face pop into your mind time and again. Oxytocin, also called the cuddle hormone, released during orgasm, makes the feeling of attachment deeper and stronger. Vasopressin is also another hormone, which effects the commitment and duration of a relationship. The very much known sex hormones, estrogen and progesterone, are the most influential hormones in a long lasting love affair.
Some baffling findings
In few studies, the results why we get attracted to a person were quite amusing and interesting. Like one of them from the journal ‘Current Anthropology’ states that people with similar faces fall in love with each other since we find the person with a resembling face more trustworthy. Other states that the men tend to fall in love with women with large eyes, small nose, and other such attractive features. The men tend to fall in love with a female whose body can bear his offspring in a healthy way.
A few psychologists suggest that people may also fall in love according to social pressure and some fall in love according to the region, they are living. As men fall in love with skinny women in countries with a good amount of resources while men in poor countries fall in love with healthy women. A research by British Psychological society after examining brains of people in love, found that they were very similar to the brain scans of a person in state of illness. One more study suggests that love can be divided into two main categories compassionate and passionate. Compassionate love is caring and affectionate one while passionate love starts from physical attraction and has intense sexual feelings.
Summary:
Even with all these known scientific facts and statistics, we still cannot say we have figured out love. There many human related feelings which science does not consider while carrying out its study and there are things, which are unexplained with science. Therefore, love, still remains to be a complicated feeling that sends you into frenzy every time you look at the one you love.
