Tras the questions that concerned the pharaonic Marriage between the founder of Amazon Jeff Bezos and the journalist Lauren Sánchez One has gone in the subordinate, in spite of its plausibility: how long will love last? If it is true, in fact, that navigation in gold avoids the friction (and in the event of the break between the two, you know that she would be a liquidation of 50 million dollars), The world divorce rate is continuously ascent (in Italy for example, according to Istat 2024 data, Over 52 percent of couples with spouses over 50, the constraint melted, editor’s note ). Even couples who seemed stainlessly, like Marion Cotillard and Guillaume Canet, said goodbye after 18 years and two children.
Good news, however, there is: Family with the biological mechanisms responsible for the falling in love can extend the duration of our sentimental relationships. The neurobiologist Lucy Vincent supports him, author of an essay recently released in France, Le cerveau amoreux(The brain in love), born to translate neuroscientific knowledge into couples for couples in crisis.
Vincent understands their difficulties because he knew them in person, having arrived at the second divorce: “I think it could have been avoided, if at the time I had available today’s knowledge” confesses, referring to some preconceptions on the relationships that contrast with biological truth.
The love and idealization of the partner
The first of them is that being in love is equivalent to feeling euphoric at the sight of the partner. Neurobiology instead shows that “passionate love lasts maximum 36 months, which does not correspond at all at what we expect by reading love stories” underlines the expert. «In the initial phase of a relationship we are as” drug addicts “for the intense production in the brain of dopamine and phenylethylaminewhich activate the reward system “specifies Grazia Attili, professor emeritus at the La Sapienza University of Rome and author de The brain in love. Women and men at the time of neuroscience (The mill).
In via with the wind, one of the most tormented passionate passionate loves.
In this phase, The in love thinks about the other on average four hours a day, Literally suffering from an obsessive-compulsive disorder, which according to certain romantic styles is the highest phase of love. Yet it would not be desirable to live for life in the accepting of the early days because Together with the butterflies in the stomach we also hear jealousy and anxiety of losing the other. Also, considering the energies that immobilizes, This love hangover is not functional to the care of the offspring.
Passion does not last, but love is
So, for evolutionary reasons, “Passionate love fades after three years” declares attili. The brain receptors become less sensitive to the recurring stimulus, the initial euphoria attenuates itself and the passionate intensity decreases so that the partners dedicate themselves to the children. “Without this natural decline, couples would be constantly driven by sexual impulses rather than parental responsibilities” The teacher concludes.
As the thrill fueled by dopamine ends, The serenity produced by Ossocin takes overcalled the love hormone to cement the ties, in particular between the mother and the newborn. But the passage of the third year, From the dopamine domain to that of oxytocincan be “cruel”, Vincent notes, because it puts an end to the idealization of the other. And so, that habit or characteristic of the partner who once seemed fascinating to us, suddenly they are irritating. “He has changed,” some complain. “I don’t love him anymore” they conclude others.
On the contrary, Vincent warns, It is a mistake to remain disappointed by the decline in overwhelming sexuality and identify it as the end of the feeling, to look elsewhere looking for new excitement.
“After 36 months, love turns, does not end” remarks attracts, adding for the benefit of the aspiring monogames, which to ensure the thrill of the falling in love again “Just eat chocolate, full of phenylethylamine and valid surrogate of a new story.”
Save-copy tricks in love
Vincent proposes instead A series of strategies to stimulate the same neuronal circuits that made us fall in love. “We know, for example, that passionate love involves the hippocampus (where our common memories are fixed), the hypothalamus (where the hormones of the emotional bond are produced), and the amygdala. While once they taught us that the adult brain does not evolve (if not degenerating for old age), today we know that its plasticity never stops and that our actions can change it».
Here then rethink the first days of the relationship, listen to songs of that period, or revisit the place where we met The hippocampus reactivates and awakens the same sensations as then. “Long It was thought that memory would work like a box of memoriesto which the brain draws from time to time to make us feel good, “Vincent presses. «Instead, the main function of memory is to predict the future, calculating the risks of a situation on the basis of previous experiences.
That’s why, When the couple goes badly, evoking memories allows you to find the emotions of the beginning intact ». Another trick is to rediscover the partner through relatives, colleagues, friends: The external gaze activates neurotransmitters that produce new excitement. The same function of “reactivation” is performed by taking new things together, such as Try a new restaurant or bring the other to a surprise destination: the nucleus accubens, a structure that carries out a key role in motivation and pleasureis very sensitive to novelty and must therefore be solicited.
Curiosity wins over sex in love
Another advice is that of repeat the strengths of the partner, also on the physical aspect: They keep attention alive since they tend to “disappear” over time. Also useful to ask the other “open” questions such as If he still has a dream in the drawer or when he was the last time. «It is magical to see how scientific knowledge work. The partner must be dedicated time and attention, with deep conversations that go beyond children or work “ Vincent abbreviation.
“Often, in the couples started, what in the first phase of love abounds in the first phase: the time dedicated with curiosity to the other, the” significant “exchange” “” agrees Grazia Attili. «Because in its less overwhelming phase the relationship must be carried out on the basis of rationality: That is, the belief of being with the right person must prevail over sexual tension. Forget the 50 shades, in short, if you want to stay happily together: To consider the magic the glue of a couple is the antechamber of bankruptcy “ concludes Attili.
Will Jeff Bezos be able to?
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