“Love engages very deep primitive reward systems that directly impact on our overall experience of pain,” says Sean Mackey of Stanford University, California, whose team set out to explore the possible analgesic effect of love.
Mackey recruited 15 undergraduates, each of whom described themselves as “intensely in love”. The students were asked to bring along photos of their loved one and of a good-looking acquaintance.
The researchers first asked the participants to hold a block whose temperature could be controlled and report how much pain they felt at different temperatures.
Each person then had their brain scanned while they performed one of three tasks, holding the temperature-controlled block at the same time. For the first two tasks, participants were shown either a picture of their attractive acquaintance or their loved one, and told to think about the displayed person. The final task was a word-puzzle distraction test known to reduce levels of reported pain.
The temperature block was set at levels which caused either no pain, moderate pain or high pain. Each participant rated the level of pain after the task was performed.
Results showed that both love and distraction reduced pain, and by the same amount. The photo of the attractive acquaintance provided much less relief.
However, the brain scans revealed that the two methods worked through different brain pathways. When it came to wordplay, pain relief took place in the cortex. Love, however, reduced discomfort via the nucleus accumbens – the brain’s key reward centre, which is also activated by cocaine, chocolate and some analgesics.
“I’m not at the point where I’m going to prescribe a passionate love affair for my patients every six months,” says Mackay, but he does think that the study could have clinic implications. “The role of a loving relationship when you’re in chronic pain may play a significant role in your experience,” he says.
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