Love on the brain

Biological anthropologist, Helen Fisher, has used evolutionary neurology to identify four broad personality styles that are linked to different chemical systems in the brain.

• Explorer = Risk taking and impulsive. Artisitic - Artisan temperament. Neurotransmitter – Dopamine (orange). Looking for a playmate. Loves exploring/ having adventures and needs someone to share it with.
• Builder = Cautious and loyal. Sensible - Guardian temperament. Neurotransmitter – Serotonin (gold). Looking for someone to help them. Help them build a home, a family, a social network.
• Negotiator = Imaginative and compassionate. Intuitive - Idealist temperament. Neurotransmitter – Oestrogen (blue). Looking for a soulmate. Wants to know how you think and feel and vica versa.
• Director = Analytical and decisive. Reasoning - Rational temperament. Neurotransmitter – Testosterone (green). Looking for a mind mate. Someone to share their ideas with.

I know what you’re thinking… it’s like those love quizzes that you come across in girly magazines like cosmopolitan etc. Yet Fisher has some serious data to back up her theory. By working with Match.com, she produced a questionnaire to assess people and their dating habits. 7 million people in 39 countries took the quiz and she found that the results followed a pattern. Explorers go for explorers, builders go for builders but the director goes for the negotiator and the negotiator goes for the director - regardless of whether they were male or female. Fisher also conducted other experiments such being able to tell whether a group of people were in love or not just by analysing their brain activity via a brain scanner.

Fisher states that Mother Nature has patterns for choosing a mate; the differences in brain make up lead to different partners. She also acknowledges that other factors such as intelligence, looks, religion, social background and so on also play a role in choosing a partner. Even though biology is the starting point, Fisher believes that understanding these patterns can also help with relationship psychology. People have slipped into clinical depression and have even killed themselves and others for love. Now there is a genuine biological basis to explain the extreme behavioural patterns of people. Love is a powerful mating system and this evolutionary theory is supported by literature. Poets have often stated how romantic love is truly an addiction and it seems that science has proved this to be true.

Sceptical me is not afraid to admit that I actually signed up to Match.com just to take the test and satisfy my curiosity... and I deactivated the account straight after, lol. I re- took the test a few times to see what the results would say but each time I put my myself into the mindset of friends that I know quite well. The results were interesting :) I wondered if that’s how people really see me. My problem now is that I want to compare everyone’s brain activity to see if this corresponds to Fisher’s theory. I guess that’s the problem with being a science person, lol.

By the way - my result – I was a negotiator :)

UPDATE:

I found this link on Twitter and I suppose it ties in with my blog post above. Fisher strikes again with a complex kiss.