The Psychology of Love

Songs are written about it. Movies revolve around it. There is an entire day dedicated to it. What am I talking about?

Love. It’s everywhere, in everything, virtually inescapable. And just when you think you may be the last person on earth to find it, it slaps you in the face and you’re swept up in its romantic embrace. Your heart beats faster when your sweetie is around, you can never catch your breath, and somehow that special someone always manages to give you butterflies when they’re near. It is exactly what everyone said it would be.

Along with many people, I’ve experienced love, or at least extreme like, many times. I can remember my first date, when I had the sweatiest palms and driest mouth I can remember. I felt like I had enough energy to run a marathon and somehow couldn’t make my voice sound normal. Even now, when I have a crush on someone, I can’t get my thoughts together. My body makes it impossible for me to act cool, calm, and collected like I want to.

As it turns out, that nervous response that individuals experience on that first date, first kiss, or even just reaching for a hand is actually a result of the sympathetic nervous system, or SNS. The SNS is responsible for regulating heart rate, blood flow, breathing and digestion. It is an “arousing” system, meaning that it can mobilize the nervous system to experience a “fight-or-flight” response. Because the SNS is a part of the autonomic nervous system (or automatic), it’s very difficult for individuals to control their bodily responses around their significant other. Opposite of the sympathetic nervous system and also part of the autonomous nervous system is the parasympathetic nervous system, which calms the body down and allows it to “rest and digest.”

Even though it’s hard to control how you might appear to your crush or sweetheart, it’s also interesting to note that it could be possible to judge whether or not you are liked by the other person. Because the sympathetic nervous system triggers the “fight-or-flight” response, you can watch their eyes to see whether their pupils dilate. You can also keep an eye out for sweaty palms and fidgeting, sure signs of nervousness.

So if you along with so many others are going through the sweaty palms, can’t catch your breath sort of phase, just blame it on your nervous system for sending signals through your body, ultimately triggering your primal “fight-or-flight” response.

One thought on “The Psychology of Love

  1. Kathleen Holman

    My Goodness! I can totally relate! I’ve had the sweaty palms and dry mouth on many a date! I hadn’t really thought about the physical reasons why before, I always just go “Well I’m nervous, so it happens!”. Never pegged it on the Sympathetic “Nervous” System (Get it? Nervous, nervous system? I’ll walk myself out now…)

    I can blame the SNS for other things other than the physical symptoms during dates too… Once I hit someone’s car in the parking lot and panicked and the “fight or flight” went with “DRIVE AWAY NOW! GO GO GO!” (I did go back later and leave a note and insurance information, for the record). At least now I can peg that scenario on the sympathetic nervous system instead of me being a bad person! Thank goodness for the parysympathetic nervous system calmed me down enough to drive back and explain my hasty departure! Now if only it could calm us down a lot quicker on those date nights… that would be lovely!

    I also enjoy your idea of looking for the signs of nervousness based on the physical symptoms of the SNS to see if your partner likes you, sometimes they are more subtle symptoms, but hey! Some boys just don’t communicate, so I’ll take whatever I can get to see if they like me or not!

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