Oxytocin: The ACTUAL Gift of Love
Do you see Valentine’s Day as a calendar driven, tick in the box exercise for nauseatingly loved up couples? Well maybe science can offer an alternative filter for that.
It’s said that the world is made up of people who are lead by their heads and others who are lead by their hearts. If you work in a corporate environment, it’s likely at some point you will have been subjected to a Myers Briggs personality test. On receipt of some answers to cleverly worded questions, you will get 4 letters that are a window to your work place soul. Among the letters appointed to you will be either an F for Feeling (a heart person) or a T for Thinking (a head person). Go on take the test see which one you are. It’s likely you already know.
Now Valentine’s Day feels like a very heart oriented occasion right? Those of you lead by the more logical way of looking at life might be inclined to think things like – well, it’s a bit commercial; I show my love to my beau all year round, etc. Does that sound familiar? Maybe you are not currently in a romantic relationship and the whole thing just feels irrelevant at best or like fingers down a blackboard at worst.
Well, listen up, because a recent study conducted by Bloom & Wild and the London Metropolitan University has revealed that there could be more in this pink hued day in February than you may think – and it’s back up by science and maths.
The story starts with Oxytocin; the love hormone. Forget the classic red love heart you see on schmaltzy cards. The beating heart is the symptom of love, whereas oxytocin is the cause. I guess a hormone wouldn’t look as appealing on a Hallmark card, (veins and ventricles in actual hearts notwithstanding).
Oxytocin though, is produced when people are in a loving, happy relationship. New mothers get an enormous slug of it in childbirth. It is also known to have anti-anxiety and stress reducing effects. Research suggests that people in the early stages of a love affair have higher oxytocin levels that can last for 6 – 12 months. It’s a pretty nice natural high.
So, in their study, Bloom & Wild wanted to measure the effect of gifting on people’s oxytocin levels. They split 30 volunteers into 3 groups to receive a gift of flowers, chocolate or water and took saliva samples before the gift arrived, 10 minutes after delivery and 40 minutes after receiving the gift.
The results showed increases in oxytocin levels for each gift received in the following amounts: For chocolate (500g Dairy Milk), + 73.36 pg/ml, for the boxed flower bouquets +61.89 pg/ml and for the water +50.7 pg/ml.
What it all nicely concludes is that when we give someone a gift, we are actually, scientifically, giving love. Now whether you’re lead by head or heart, that’s got to be a good thing right?
So, whilst February 14th is just a date (and actually it’s the anniversary of a Roman emperor unromantically executing people if you like facts), why not just give a bit of real life, legal and chemical love to someone, to anyone? What’s not to love about that?
