Surveys also show that whom we fall in love with is largely influenced by who we are; our personality traits and values drive our choices.
Here are some facts scientists have recently uncovered about love, a few hunches about how it works, and some new survey data that may help you see your selection of a mate in a different light.
The death of dating
Today’s young people have sex first, and date later, says Justin R. Garcia, an evolutionary biologist with the Kinsey Institute for Research in Sex, Gender and Reproduction at Indiana University. “I went to lunch with someone when I woke up next to them - that’s what dating is today,’’ said Garcia, also a scientific adviser to the online dating service Match.com.
Sex before love can be a particular problem for young people, who are still forming their identities, are prone to depression and self-esteem problems, and are surrounded by tremendous drug and alcohol use. That combination added to the biochemical reaction triggered by sexual intimacy can lead to coercion and sexual assault, he said.
Baby talk
In recent research spurred by an overheard conversation, Justin Garcia of the Kinsey Institute discovered that two-thirds of all couples speak “romantic baby talk’’ to each other. This chatter is often kept a secret within the couple.
“It’s about having something that’s playful and unique to the couple, like a little secret language,’’ he said. Previous research has suggested that sharing fun activities within a couple floods their brains with the chemicals dopamine and serotonin - heightening the pleasure of the activity, he said.
This romantic baby talk usually happens early in a relationship, before there are actual babies around, Garcia noted.
Romantic myths
New polling data from Match.com suggests that we have a lot of misconceptions about what single men and women want from a relationship.
Only 3 percent of men and 1.4 percent of women just want to date lots of people - the rest hope to form a real relationship. “We’ve got this myth that people go onto these dating sites to have a lot of rolls in the hay and it is apparently not true,’’ said Helen Fisher, a biological anthropologist at Rutgers University in New Jersey, who was a consultant on the poll.
