Wouldn`t you just love to know that your partner will never
cheat on you? Or, for that matter, that you will never give into temptation to
cheat on your partner? Despite being most sincere in their "I do`s"
some people find it easier to settle
down with one partner for life, than others... Psychologists, being a very
curious type of folk, of course, couldn't have left this topic uninvestigated
and here`s what they found...
Love rats
Well, actually, not rats but voles. The story goes, that far
away in Northern American there live two species of voles - Montane vole
and Prairie vole. Both spend their days making burrows and happily muching on plants and seeds. But their family values couldn`t be more different! While Montate voles are incredibly promiscuous, Prairie voles are known to make a pair bond for life, sharing a nest and raising babies together "until the death does them apart".
With very similar lifestyles, this difference could have only been attributed to "something in the brain". Indeed, it turned out, that monogamous and polygamous voles have different patterns of distribution of oxytocine (OT) and vasopressine (VP) receptors in the brain - neurotransmitters known to be invloved in sexual behaviour, parental care, aggression and territory making. As one example, monogamous voles have overexpression of oxytocin receptors in nucleus accumbens, thought to be important for processing pleasure and reward, meaning that monogamous voles get a real buzz from living with the same partner!
In one particular fun experiment, female prairie voles have been injected with the -antagonist after mating and displayed no affection to the hearbroken male (sweet revenge....:-)))
Calculated love
Now for some fun scientific speculation! Fast-forward 100 years from now and we might see match-making services offering to scan of your potential partner`s brain to assess how likely he/she is to stay faithful. And chemists, along with morning-after pills, might start offering anti-heart-break injections! I am in... :)
Thanks for reading!
References for the curious:
Insel, T (2010) The challenge of translation in social neuroscience: a review of oxytocin, vasopressin, and affiliative behaviour, in Neuron, 65 (768-779)
Insel, T (2010) The challenge of translation in social neuroscience: a review of oxytocin, vasopressin, and affiliative behaviour, in Neuron, 65 (768-779)
Liu, Y and Wang, Z.X. (2003) Nucleus accumbens oxytocin and dopamin interact to regulate pair bond formation in female prairie voles, in Neuroscience, 121 (537-554)
Wang, Z. and Aragona, B.G. (2004) Neurochemical regulation of pair bonding in male prairie voles, in Physiology & Behaviour 83 (319-328)
Wang, Z. and Aragona, B.G. (2004) Neurochemical regulation of pair bonding in male prairie voles, in Physiology & Behaviour 83 (319-328)
Great article! Does it mean that this behavior of voles apply to human beings??? It really would be great to know if you and your partner chemicly are created for one-partner life.. Would safe a lot of nerves :)))
ReplyDeleteAll animal experiments in psychology are conducted in a hope to find out something about human behaviour. Obviously, findings cannot be simply applied to people because we are so much more complex in terms of the variety of influences on our behaviour - from genes to social environment. But certain inferences can be made, for sure. Although in this instance not so easily, as you would only be able to find out receptors density in your partner`s brain after dissecting it, which would make it not suitable not just for one-partner but any kind of life :))
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