h day – have similar communities of mouth bacteria. Apart from microbiota, kissers also share viruses, which is what has prompted Zika-hit Brazil to advise pregnant women against sharing tongue and saliva with others.
When in doubt, reach out. Hugs and touch buffer against infection, reported a study in Social, Psychological and Personality Science, which found that people who were embraced and felt needed were less likely to catch a cold. Getting hugged also makes symptoms milder, with people who were hugged frequently – at great risk of hugger catching the cold virus – feeling less ill and recovering faster.
Apart from boosting immunity, touch and bonding buffers against depression, anxiety and substance abuse that protects against depression, high blood pressure, heart disease and stroke.
Mom loves you, but differently
Romantic, sexual and maternal love trigger similar, but not identical, brain activity. In all forms of love, the reward-related brain system (subcortical dopaminergic) gets activated and the cortical areas responsible for judgment get suppressed. Among moms, brain areas linked with face recognition are more strongly activated because she needs to quickly read and react to her baby’s facial expressions. Another region activated only moms is the periaqueductal gray matter, which suppress pain and make her go the extra mile for her baby. She also has higher levels of the hormone oxytocin, which boosts the mother-child bond.
Touch and skin contact with newborns lowers infections, boosts growth and pain tolerance in healthy babies and lowers the chance of premature, underweight babies dying after birth, report researchers in Pediatrics.
Food for love
Is the way to the heart through the stomach? Much like illicit drugs and other psychoactive substances, some foods directly influence the reward pathways of the brain by triggering an interplay between neurochemicals and hormones such as dopamine, opioids, endocannabinoids, leptin, and insulin. Substances in chocolate, for example, affect opioid and endocannabinoid neurotransmission, while nutmeg, alters the working of dopamine in the brain.
But there’s little biological proof that aphrodisiacs work just on men. in fact, studies show that women are more sensitive than men to the marijuana-like eeuphoria triggered by endocannabinoids found in chocolate.
Together or apart
If you want to know whether your relationship is likely to last or not, don’t trust your gut. You’d think that couples would do a better job of assessing their own emotions, but a study in the journal Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin found couples always get it wrong when it comes to predicting the future of their relationship. They tend to focus on its strengths and think things are going right even when they’re not. Parents and friends are more objective and far more accurate at predicting how long a relationship will last, the study found, so it may be a good idea to listen to your pals for once.
First Published: Feb 13, 2016 16:23 IST