Love and Sexual Desire activate different but related parts of the brain

[bikiniman]

The University of Concordia has done an interesting study on Love and Sexual Desire which suggests that Love and Sexual Desire stimulate different but related areas of the brain.

See article below.

http://www.concordia.ca/now/what-we-do/research/20120619/i-want-to-know-where-love-is.php

This study rings true to me. My feelings towards men and women are different. I feel only sexual desire towards men but feel sexual desire and love towards women.

Perhaps if I was to have frequent sex with men these feelings of sexual desire could progress to feelings of love?

Interested to here your thoughts?

[pepperjack]

The University of Concordia has done an interesting study on Love and Sexual Desire which suggests that Love and Sexual Desire stimulate different but related areas of the brain.

See article below.

http://www.concordia.ca/now/what-we-do/research/20120619/i-want-to-know-where-love-is.php

This study rings true to me. My feelings towards men and women are different. I feel only sexual desire towards men but feel sexual desire and love towards women.

Perhaps if I was to have frequent sex with men these feelings of sexual desire could progress to feelings of love?

Interested to here your thoughts?


Amative; first thought to come to mind.

[æonpax]

<snip/unsnip>...This study rings true to me. My feelings towards men and women are different. I feel only sexual desire towards men but feel sexual desire and love towards women...<snip>

The same with me.

[darkeyes]

Interesting. I can and do love men quite easily.. yet feel no sexual desire for them.. I did once, but no more.. equally, I can and do love women in just the same way, yet it is only with them that sexual arousal kicks in, and when sexually aroused, very often love plays no part except in a general sense of love of humanity, love of the form which is the object of my desire, not the person, and love of what, were I to pursue this desire, the gay old time that person and I could have...

[Gearbox]

At last, scientist have proven what men have been saying for centuries.lol


Perhaps if I was to have frequent sex with men these feelings of sexual desire could progress to feelings of love?
I think it's all about how you view people. I have loved m&f, but no matter how much sex I have with fuckbuds there's no way I'll compulsively fall in love with them. I love them as fuckbuds, much like loving someone as a friend (although not the same thing).But I could start dating a fuckbud and develop 'romantic feelings' for them. Get more emotionally/personally intimate.

IMO you'd need to at least date a bloke to find out if you can love one. Make them more than just a sex partner.
But whether you can or can't, shouldn't be a problem.

[tenni]

"“Love is actually a habit that is formed from sexual desire as desire is rewarded."

I am capable of loving both men and women. I have been in love habit with both women and men. I fall in love with women fairly easily...well too easy.

With some bi men, it is somewhat different as far as the activities surrounding the "love emotional" feeling. Casual sex is easier with men but I find "love" with men less surrounded with behavioural expectations.

The process that moves sexual desire to a love habit is a confusing part for me but I do develop feelings of love for some men. If it is to be fuck bud scene I usually know the boundaries and never fall in love with them. I mean the sexual desire is rewarded with actual sex acts but it stops there as other behavioural social acts are not part of the relationship. It is when we talk about more than casual sex and consider some social activities where the sexual desire has a door to go through leading to a possible love habit?

If we have a process of conditioning by which things paired with rewards are given inherent value, for me I don't have a structure to process it with men as I do culturally with women.

I find some gay guys "fall in love" far too readily and other bi guys have mentioned the same experience.(not all gay men but enough to be important to notice a difference between bi men and gay men). I wonder if bimen find falling in love /emotional attachment with men more difficult because we are torn by two different constructs about love behaviour with women and men? Gay guys reject the m/f love sexual relationship but some seem to over play it with men to a near obssessive behaviour that some bi men find uncomfortable.(ie. 11 phone messages in one day from another man professing love for him in the early stage of a relationship can make a bi man run away) Some might see it as sophmoric but these are gay men in at least their 30's. Maybe, bi guys need more time to process the sexual desire/reward into a habit than gay men?

Yes, I know such statements are simplistic and we are all individuals but many bi men seem to feel more "awkward"? about loving other men than loving women.

[darkeyes]

"“Love is actually a habit that is formed from sexual desire as desire is rewarded."

I am capable of loving both men and women. I have been in love habit with both women and men. I fall in love with women fairly easily...well too easy.

With some bi men, it is somewhat different as far as the activities surrounding the "love emotional" feeling. Casual sex is easier with men but I find "love" with men less surrounded with behavioural expectations.

The process that moves sexual desire to a love habit is a confusing part for me but I do develop feelings of love for some men. If it is to be fuck bud scene I usually know the boundaries and never fall in love with them. I mean the sexual desire is rewarded with actual sex acts but it stops there as other behavioural social acts are not part of the relationship. It is when we talk about more than casual sex and consider some social activities where the sexual desire has a door to go through leading to a possible love habit?

If we have a process of conditioning by which things paired with rewards are given inherent value, for me I don't have a structure to process it with men as I do culturally with women.

I find some gay guys "fall in love" far too readily and other bi guys have mentioned the same experience.(not all gay men but enough to be important to notice a difference between bi men and gay men). I wonder if bimen find falling in love /emotional attachment with men more difficult because we are torn by two different constructs about love behaviour with women and men? Gay guys reject the m/f love sexual relationship but some seem to over play it with men to a near obssessive behaviour that some bi men find uncomfortable.(ie. 11 phone messages in one day from another man professing love for him in the early stage of a relationship can make a bi man run away) Some might see it as sophmoric but these are gay men in at least their 30's. Maybe, bi guys need more time to process the sexual desire/reward into a habit than gay men?

Yes, I know such statements are simplistic and we are all individuals but many bi men seem to feel more "awkward"? about loving other men than loving women.
I wonder how much it can be said that the condition u describe is down to our more primitive instincts and child bearing, Tenni? Where women prefer to choose the best of the gene pool (as we think of it now) to provide their children with the best chance of good health, strength, survival and for the good of themselves and the tribe, whereas men just have the urge to spread their seed as far and widely as possible at every opportunity to ensure they have the maximum chance of having their genes prevail, be strong and survive? Women can only have a finite number of children in a lifetime and normally only one a year at best, whereas men may not be able to father an infinite number of children but they are able to do so much more easily and if not quite at will..in theory can do so every day of their lives once puberty is reached....

I have noticed that for all we women are often filled with romantic "nonsense" as some would put it, and I am myself a great romantic, this is as much an ideal and a dream, and if we search for it, we seem less easily to fall in love and fight much harder for the unity of our families than men often do. Men on the other hand appear to fall in love more easily more often and are the more likely to stray the nest and settle their heads down on the breast of another and more often stay there. The fact that men are bisexual does not seem to alter these basic premises, nor does the fact that women are, for whatever their sexuality they still have an eye for what they perceive as the best of their own gender as well as the best of men.

Men seem to be less choosy... In respect of gay men and women the fact that they focus on their own gender only does not seem to alter this state of affairs a great deal either. Gay men and women are nowadays equally promiscuous until such time as love enters the equation, and as with other genders gay men seem to fall in love more easily than lesbians.. then women seem far more committed to retaining and fighting for the relationship than do gay men and promiscuity appears to fall off much more sharply than for men in the immediate, medium and longer terms....what goes for heterosexual and bisexual men and women does appear to be less marked among the gay and lesbian populations but to what degree is unclear.. but not enough to entirely eliminate the reasons our ancient ancestors, in common with many animals then as now, acted as they did or do, or the reality that they do still act just so...

The fact that in the modern era we are far more liberated sexually and many women in particular, myself included not so long ago, are as promiscuous quite happily as any man is as much to do with contraception and the release from ancient over-proscriptions mostly dictated by men than from what our genes and instincts tell us.. Women still do not appear to fall in love as easily as men or as frequently whatever the gender of their love interest, whereas the ancient instincts of the male and his genes tell him to go forth and multiply even although he is sexually attracted to his own sex... in both instances I suspect the primeval and animal instincts remain in play...

Love, or at least romantic love, as we understand it today, is a relatively recent innovation in our kind.. first articulated by medieval French poets and minstrels and first took root in the nobility of Europe, and only as prosperity and literacy began to be shared with the great mass of people did it truly take root in society as a whole. This is not to say romantic love did not exist prior to that time, and was not written of, but not in the way we think of it, for the great mass of people were too busy with survival and their next meal to concern themselves greatly with the concept of romantic love and it was something only the wealthy and nobility could afford.

We may be less controlled by our genes and instincts, and by the need to have our genes carry on after us, but each factor and probably more still play a huge part in how each of us, man and woman, relates to and deals with love and sex..