A few years ago, researcher Lucy Brown, professor of neuroscience at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York, used magnetic resonance imaging to study the brains of 17 young people who said they were "newly and madly in love." He observed that looking at the photo of the loved one activated both the neurons of the caudate nucleus and those of the ventral tegmentum, two brain areas linked to pleasure. And he found that both areas were flooded with the hormone dopamine in the brain in love .
The result: a sensation very similar to the "high" that drugs cause. That, in addition, helps lovers feel charged with energy, much more motivated and willing to take risks.
