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I also was particularly interested in the part of our discussion last week addressing whether or not love can be seen as an addiction, which is an idea that has come up in biopsych classes I’ve taken in the past.  I understand the argument that whatever part of the brain lights up in response to pictures of romantic partners, we would come up with some sort of justification for why that is.  However, the fact is that one of the areas that does seem to become active contains reward pathways relevant to addiction.  I know that fMRI technology is far from perfect, and this kind of research of course does not prove that love can be seen as an addiction, but I think it is a valid theory.  I think most people can at least agree on the fact that being in love makes you feel good, and presumably this feeling good is somehow linked to a change in brain chemistry.  It would make sense to me that not just love but any type of emotional experience that affects dopamine levels in reward pathways are in a way mimicking the effects of drug use, and therefore could lead to a type of addiction.

On a totally different note, part of my thesis project this year involves the HPA (stress response) axis, and while doing research for it last semester I remember running across a number of articles discussing how oxytocin seems to have the ability to downregulate HPA axis activity.  In particular, I read one article discussing how species with clear pair-bonds (prairie voles, for example) have lower cortisol levels and apparently a higher threshold for HPA axis activation than non-monogamous animals, and that subjecting the non-monogamous animals to high levels of oxytocin caused their cortisol levels to drop.  I thought that this was interesting in relation to the article we read for class that mentioned how love is thought to decrease stress.