Ever since the beginning of recorded history, humans have been trying to understand and explain the mysteries of love and sex. Over the past few decades, scientists started using specialized equipment to measure physical arousal by attaching devices to private parts. More recently, they’ve been observing the most important romantic organ in the human body—the brain.
Forbes wrote about the research of Andreas Bartels, Ph.D., at the Imperial College of London. Bartels used a functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) machine, which can capture images of brain activity, to pinpoint the areas of the brain that are activated by love.
Bartles did a study of 17 people who were madly in love. He had the test subjects look at photos of platonic friends and of their loved ones while he observed activity in their brains. The resulting images clearly showed that certain sections of the brain are stimulated by love.
The scientist then did another study to observe the brains of mothers looking at their infants. The images showed that exactly the same areas of the brain were stimulated by maternal love, except for an area in the hypothalamus in the base of the brain that seems to be linked to sexual arousal.
The conclusion, therefore, is that specific areas of the brain light up at the prospect of love.
Bartels also noticed something else: When the test subjects were feeling love, certain areas of the brain were turned off. The scans showed that three regions of the brain generally associated with moral judgment go dim.
Chemistry of love
Then there’s the chemistry of love. Helen Fisher, Ph.D., a professor at Rutgers University, has written that three networks in the brain, and their associated neurotransmitters, are associated with love. They are:
- Lust—the craving for sexual gratification, which is linked to testosterone in both men and women.
- Romantic attraction—the elation and yearning of new love, which is linked to the natural stimulants dopamine and norepinephrine, and low activity in serotonin.
- Attachment—the calm emotional union with a long-term partner, which is linked to oxytocin and vasopressin.
Fisher also did a study using fMRI technology. She scanned the brains of 40 men and women who were wildly in love. When these people gazed at photos of their beloved, the scans showed increased activity in the areas of the brain that produce dopamine. This neurochemical is associated with feelings of excessive energy, elation, focused attention and motivation to win rewards.
Dopamine, by the way, is also the neurotransmitter associated with addiction.
Effects of arousal
Research has also proven what we’ve probably all experienced—sexual arousal can make us throw caution to the winds.
In another study using fMRI technology, Dr. Ken Maravilla of the University of Washington found that sexual arousal dims down the parts of the brain that control inhibition and, perhaps, moral judgment.
“These are things that keep you in line, and in arousal they may become less active, allowing you to become more aroused,” Maravilla said, as quoted by Wired Magazine.
In a paper called, The Heat of the Moment: The Effect on Sexual Arousal on Sexual Decision Making, Dan Ariely, of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and George Lowenstein, of Carnegie Mellon University, documented that being sexually turned on affected the judgment of college-aged men. (Well, duh ”¦)
Specifically, Ariely and Lowenstein found that, “the increase in motivation to have sex produced by sexual arousal seems to decrease the relative importance of other considerations, such as behaving ethically toward a potential sexual partner or protecting oneself against unwanted pregnancy or sexually transmitted disease.”
But another of their findings was, “people seem to have only limited insight into the impact of sexual arousal on their own judgments and behavior.” In other words, most of us don’t appreciate how strong the sex urges are, and how they can make us do things that perhaps we shouldn’t be doing.
Sociopathic seduction
So let’s look at all this information in the context of our relationships with sociopaths.
Two of the main strategies that sociopaths use to snare us are love and sex. They emphatically proclaim their love and consciously seduce us into having sex. So what happens?
- Love causes specific areas of the brain light up, and at the same time, areas associated with morals and judgment go dim.
- The areas of the brain that produce dopamine become active, and dopamine is related to addiction.
- Sexual arousal dims the parts of the brain responsible for inhibition and judgment that might prevent us from making bad choices.
- We don’t recognize the impact that sexual urges have on our judgment and behavior.
Dr. Helen Fisher writes that the three primary brain systems associated with love evolved over the ages to play different roles in courtship, mating, reproduction and parenting. They are Nature’s way of ensuring the survival of the human species.
Sociopaths convincingly proclaim their enduring love and their sexual desire for us. Not realizing the pervasive deceit of these predators, we believe that they love us. We have sex with them, and the sex is great. Many Lovefraud readers have been amazed at the sociopath’s sexual appetite and prowess.
Therefore, sociopaths hijack our brain through our feelings of love and the bonds of sex. In their seductions, they turn the natural psychological and chemical functions of our brains against us.
i dont see how it is odd. like i said yetserday im reading gift of betrayal and the book ( i havent finished it) is a lot about learning to feel/trust/listen to your intuition and not listen to other people ( int his case a psychopathic ex) telling me things that SEEM to be logical but at the same time giving me a funnny feeling. How does one balance these things. Just listening to my feeling may make me some kind of trippy new ager but not listening to it at all will make me become an emotional cripple and i dont want him to have done that. that would just be the bow on his work ( is that even a pharse?!)
pharse was meant to spell PHRASE
May I make a suggestion…
If anyone of us is feeling uncomfortable about a poster, please contact the owner of the site Donna Anderson.
Please refrain from endless banter and bickering and subtly attacking anyone. Please let each and every individual form their own opinions. From my experience in life… A Toxic individual will always show their true colors and it is part of lifes lessons and journey to be able to recognize, deal with and turn away from them on our own. Sometimes we actually learn along the way.
I agree we can come up with a covert code name or plan or article…but beyond that the daily jabs and declarations just dont prove beneficial to anyone. In fact it becomes rather confusing. While some are just having conversations that even if a fake were involved — the conversations are benign… I guess what Im saying is to tread a little lighter…and wiser…
There was a suggestion to not even read the posts of bloggers you are uncomfortable with….potted plant…vegetable…whatever works best for you. It always works out in the end…. ALWAYS… remember in real world NC goes best for each one of us who are experiencing a toxic person. If you are having that experience here and someone else is not…then just move on for yourself and eventually the others will too or they will have a different experience and maybe even learn from interactions with others or become friends…
Its not for us to continue to judge others that remain here. Donna removes all intentionally harmful and disruptive posters very effectively and efficiently as possible. Just protect ourselves and give fair warning once we deem whats best way to do so.
i feel like this place has become to hard for me to express myself. i feel like every word is put on a scale. english is not my first language. i refuse to just phrase things and questions in ways that are pleasing to others yet not aimed at understanding and healing. everything here makes me confused. i think i will stick to the books im reading for a while.
i wish everybody peace and bliss. truly.
thank you to the people who chatted with me, it meant a lot. hugs to you!
Dear LTL, GOOD ADVICE!
MariaLisa, I’m sorry if you feel uncomfortable, yuou sort of came at a “bad tiem” here and this is a rare event. SORRY! Hope you will check back in. Godspeed in your healing!
Dear Oxdrover.
Yeah i guess. I will continue the reading and so forth. I suppose the whole thing is more fresh in my memory ( i have only had NC for like a month). Thanks anyhow and goodluck to you too!!!!
( btw i never knew what godspeed in one of the dixie chicks songs meant, but i guess i now know it means something like at god’s pace?)
Dear MariaLisa,
Godspeed is sort of a blessing, with a meaning of “go with God” and “God give you blessings and keep down your troubles”—at least that is the way I define it.
There are SO MANY wonderful articles here, there are links to the archives on the left of the screen by month, and LF is about 4 years old I think, so there are MANY of them. I have been here about two years and have gained so much knowledge and support from people here and from the articles.
My opinion is that we don’t quickly get over this defeat and devestation, it goes deeper than a “normal break up” it is a TRAUMA that crushes our souls. I was born into a family of Ps, and their enablers and dupes that helped them and supported them and punished anyone who didn’t allow themselves to be abused. The abusers themselves were never punished.
That is one of the things that made me vulnerable to being used by these people inside and outside my family.
The more we learn about them, the more we also learn about WHY we allowed them into our lives. Also the more we learn about them, and the more we learn about ourselves, the less likely we are to have another one successfully target them.
LEARN, LEARN, LEARN!!! That is your armor, that will protect you in the future as well! (((hugs))) and God bless.
i feel so helpless. i feel like acting normal but it really feels like my soul was raped…
thanks oxdriver. again. i will read all of the articles….i also read so much…
love.
Dear MariaLisa,
I too feel helpless, though as I have learned and healed I feel less helpless. The knowledge I have gained has helped me to form boundaries in how I allow people to treat me. I have raised my own self esteem and realize that I must take more care of myself and less care of others, especially others who do NOT want to do for themselves, that expect me to “take care of” them and to NOT care for myself. People who REALLY love us do not treat us this way, so WHY do we (victims) allow people to REPEATEDLY treat us poorly?
Now, I am no longer allowing people who treat me poorly to remain in my life. NC…that incluses one of my sons, and even my mother (I call her my “egg donor” because the title MOTHER I think must be EARNED by nurturing your child and she did not nurture me) now that I am out of the chaos on a daily basis I can think better, make better decisions and my life is more peaceful.
You are in the right place ML, hang in here and learn!!! I will be here if you need to “talk.” and there are many others here too who are very supportive and wise. ((((hugs))) and God bless your journey to healing!
MariaLisa, I was just reading back on the thread, and I saw that you came up INTJ on the Myers-Briggs. No wonder the idea of getting so deeply in touch with your feelings seems a little awkward to you. And why you want to understand everything straight off to find closure.
I wonder how in the world you ever got involved with a sociopath. I went over to the INTJ forum to read their thread on sociopaths, and it sounds like they’re pretty good as recognizing them.
Sometime perhaps you’ll tell us your story.
I’m a eNfP. For those who don’t know Myer-Briggs that well, that’s a extrovert, intuitive, feeling, perceiving type. But I’m only slightly extrovert and almost right down the middle between thinking and feeling types. MariaLisa is introverted, intuitive, thinking, judging.
So, here are a few things that might help you on your way of healing.
The n/s/p types generally project a false front to mask an interior that lacks mature personality formation. There is a lot of research linking these types to genetic inclinations and also serious trauma, which is typically in early childhood, but can be later. Both components play out in affective (bonding) disorders, unusual appetite for risk and novelty, and difficulties with social and affectionate feelings and contact.
So how that works for anyone who interacts with them is that we are interacting with a manufactured shell, designed to protect the damaged interior personality and to attempt to “restore” missing components, like a clear sense of identity and a sense of being socially connected. However, their understanding of both of these things is limited to what they can observe around them. Except for the drive to survive (and how they frame that in their own lives), their urges tend to be immature and transient (because nothing they attempt really works to solve the chronic problems of disconnection from themselves and the social world).
It’s not surprising that they tend to be addicts. They also tend to be needy and demanding in relationships, but in a totally selfish way. They don’t understand reciprocity, except at the same under-developed level that they understand most social issues — as a ploy to get what they want, rather than as a long-term strategy to build community and lasting relationships.
Instead, what they are good at is immediacy. Being charming. Being charismatic. Identifying what people want and giving it to them on a short-term basis. Seeking novelty, adventure and thrills. Getting some kind of fix that will shift their mood. They typically have difficulty thinking too far ahead, because their need to correct their feelings of emptiness or dislocation override their longer terms intentions.
Because they feel like they are missing something, and they are aware that other people have different resources, their position with the rest of the world of a sense aggrievedness, envy and anger. They feel ripped off. And this feeling puts them in a position that could be described in class terms or spiritual maturity (in this case, both agree) of “survivor.” Which means that they are outside the rules of society and entitled to do whatever it takes to get what they need or want.
In terms of relationship, they may feel fleeting affection (for someone who gives them what they want and so relieves their desperation) or a form of attachment (with someone who is a necessary source), but neither of these equate to anything like love, because they are incapable of ever abandoning their loner status. They cannot trust. Even in a situation where they have another person essentially backed into a corner, emotionally or in legal terms, they have to keep winning over and over, both to ensure their dominance in the situation and secondarily to get the thrill of winning to counteract their feelings of nonentity.
The tragedy with these people is that they are unreachable. The protective and manipulative shell around the damaged center of their identities operates on the premise that they are totally dependent on themselves. Any input that contradicts that survival strategy is rejected. There is a terrible irony in this because the interior identity is excruciating alone, and a great deal of the work of the exterior shell is to ameliorate the pain of the inner personality. So it provides “triumphs” to prove to the inner personality that it is real in the world. But it cannot provide true social connectivity. So the relationship between the shell and the inner personality is something like a strong nurse who provides every sort of luxurious treat to a child kept locked in a closet.
It is no wonder that feeling people get drawn into these relationships because of a subtext of pity. We “hear” their sadness and desperation, and we are inspired to help. But we are hearing the cries of the closeted child and interacting mainly with protective shell. For us, one of the most difficult and heart-rending aspects of these relationships are our memories of occasional interaction with a sweet, tender and open aspect of their characters, only to discover that aspect has no power when it comes to the decisions they make. All the real decisions are made by this ruthless shell that navigates the world as a robotic, emotionless (except for anger and hunger) survivor.
MariaLisa, this is only my view of their psychology. But it draws from my observation and research. In terms of bias, I tend toward emphasizing “nurture” over “nature” in seeing the cause of these personalities. I think there is some pre-disposition in terms of intelligence and type of nervous system (and possibly people who are born with too many genetic strikes against them). But there is so much evidence of anti-social behavior emerging from childhood trauma and inter-generational transmission of emotional and behavioral dysfunction that I tend to think it is the larger factor.
Finally, from our perspective, what this adds up to is this. First, we are deal with people who project fictional “fronts” in order seduce us into giving them what they want. Second, if we are dealing with them from a feeling perspective and/or operating socially with a long-term orientation, we are at a huge disadvantage with them, because their short-term perspective and addictive-style flight to novelty/relief will consistently sabotage our efforts and goals. And finally, we have no tools to influence them or penetrate their fronts, except either giving or withholding what they want (or creating so much personal risk or unpleasantness for them that they leave to seek easier hunting grounds).
That, essentially, was what you were dealing with. In some ways, it’s easier to think about them as robots programmed to just wander the landscape, consuming whatever isn’t protected or tied down.
I don’t know if this helps, but it might give you some perspectives to analyze your memories.
When we’re early in recovery, as you are, the first big challenge is to understand (and believe) that this was not our fault. We didn’t choose it. We were operating on a different set of values and objectives. The pain we endure is a direct result of our bad luck in getting involved with these people. And to understand that we have a right to feel angry.
If you are questioning your own involvement, you can get to that later. First you need to understand that none of this would have happened if this person had not come into your life. None of us are perfect. But also, we are not people who remorselessly use other people without caring what happens to them. That is what you were dealing with.
Congratulations on going NC.
Kathy