The Molecule of More: How a Single Chemical in Your Brain Drives Love, Sex, and Creativity―and Will Determine the Fate of the Human Race

by Daniel Z. Lieberman

They include serotonin, oxytocin, endorphins (your brain’s version of morphine), and a class of chemicals called endocannabinoids (your brain’s version of marijuana).

When the H&Ns take over in the second stage of love, dopamine is suppressed. It has to be because dopamine paints a picture in our minds of a rosy future in order to spur us on through the hard work necessary to make it a reality. Dissatisfaction with the present state of affairs is an important ingredient in bringing about change,

which is what a new relationship is all about. H&N companionate love, on the other hand, is characterized by deep and enduring satisfaction with the present reality, and an aversion to change, at least with regard to one’s relationship with one’s partner.

In fact, though dopamine and H&N circuits can work together, under most circumstances they counter each other. When H&N circuits are activated, we are prompted to experience the real world around us, and dopamine is suppressed; when dopamine circuits are activa...

It’s not easy to say farewell to the dopaminergic thrill of new partners and passionate longing,

but the ability to do so is a sign of maturity, and a step toward long-lasting happiness.

He’s not ungrateful to see the masterpieces of Michelangelo. It’s just that his personality is primarily dopaminergic: he enjoys anticipation and planning more than doing. Lovers experience the same disconnect between anticipation and experience. The early part, passionate love, is dopaminergic—exhilarating, idealized, curious, future looking. The later part, companionate love, is H&N focused—satisfying, peaceful, and experienced through bodily senses and emotions.

Vasopressin acted like a “good-husband hormone.” Dopamine does the opposite. Human beings who have genes that produce high levels of dopamine have the highest number of

sexual partners and the lowest age of first sexual intercourse. Most couples have sex less frequently as obsessive dopaminergic love evolves into companionate H&N love. This makes sense, since oxytocin and vasopressin suppress the release of testosterone. In a similar way, testosterone suppresses the release of oxytocin and vasopressin, which helps explain why men with naturally high quantities of testosterone in their blood are less likely to marry. Similarly, single men have more testosterone than married men. And if a man’s marriage becomes unstable, his vasopressin falls, and his testosterone goes up. Do human beings require long-term companionship? There’s good evidence that the answer is yes. Despite the superficial appeal of having multiple partners, most people eventually settle down. A United Nations survey found that more than 90 percent of men and women marry by the age of forty-nine. We can live without companionate

love, but the majority of us arrange a good portion of our lives around trying to find it and keep it. The H&Ns give us the ability to do that. They allow us to find satisfaction in what our senses deliver—what is right in front of us, and what we ca...

On average, women have the highest levels of testosterone on days thirteen and fourteen of their menstrual cycle. That’s when the egg is released from the ovary, and they are most likely to get pregnant.

Testosterone can even be administered as a drug. When scientists at Procter & Gamble (the maker of Old Spice cologne and Pampers diapers) applied a testosterone gel to women’s skin, the women had more sex.

Unfortunately, some of the women developed facial hair, low-pitched voices, and male pattern baldness, so the “female Viagra” gel never

received Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approval in ...

Neither is it an overwhelming desire. People don’t die from sexual hunger. Testosterone doesn’t drive them to commit suicide or murder—unlike the dopaminergic experience of being overwhelmed by love.

DOPAMINE GETS YOU INTO BED . . . AND THEN GETS IN THE WAY From eager anticipation to the physical pleasures of intimacy, the stages of sex recapitulate the stages of love: sex is love on fast forward. Sex

begins with desire, a dopaminergic phenomenon driven by the hormone testosterone. It continues with arousal, another forward-looking, dopaminergic experience. As physical contact begins, the brain shifts control to the H&Ns to deliver the pleasure of the sensory experience, mainly with the release of endorphins. The consummation of the act, orgasm, is almost entirely a here-and-now experience, with endorphins and other H&N neurotransmitters working together to shut down dopamine.

This transition was caught on camera when men and women in the Netherlands were placed in brain scanners and then stimulated to orgasm. The scans showed that sexual climax was associated with decreased activation throughout the prefrontal cortex, a dopaminergic part of the brain responsible for placing deliberate restrictions on behavior. The relaxation of control ...

person being tested was a man or a woman. With few exceptions the brain’s response to orgasm was th...

That’s how it’s supposed to be. But just as some people have difficulty moving from passionate love to companionate love, it can also be difficult for dopamine-driven people to let the H&Ns take over during sex. That is, highly driven women and men sometimes find it a significant challenge to turn off their th...

While H&N neurotransmitters let us experience reality—and reality during sex is intense—dopamine floats above reality. It is always able to conjure up something better. To add to its seduction, it puts us in control of that alternate reality. That these imagined worlds may be...

Testosterone and dopamine have a special relationship. During passionate love, testosterone is the one H&N that is not suppressed

in favor of dopamine. In fact, they work together to form a feedback loop—a perpetual motion machine that enhances our feelings of romance.

Dopamine responded not to reward, but to reward prediction error: the actual reward minus the expected reward.

That’s why falling in love doesn’t last forever. When we fall in love, we look to a future made perfect by the presence of our beloved. It’s a future built on a fevered imagination that falls to pieces when reality reasserts itself twelve to eighteen months later. Then what? In many cases it’s over. The relationship comes to an end, and the search for a dopaminergic thrill begins all over again. Alternatively, the passionate love can be transformed into something more enduring. It can become companionate love, which may not thrill the way dopamine does, but has the power to deliver happiness—long-term happiness based on H&N neurotransmitters such as oxytocin, vasopressin, and endorphin.

It’s like our favorite old haunts—restaurants, shops, even cities. Our affection for them comes from taking pleasure in the familiar ambience: the real, physical nature of the place. We enjoy the familiar not for what it could become, but for what it is. That is the only stable basis for a long-term, satisfying relationship. Dopamine, the neurotransmitter whose purpose is to maximize future rewards, starts us down the road to love. It revs our desires, illuminates our imagination, and draws us into a relationship on an incandescent...

Wanting, or desire, flows from an evolutionarily old part of the brain deep inside the skull called the ventral tegmental area. It is rich in dopamine; in fact, it is one of the two main dopamine-producing regions. Like most brain cells, the cells that grow there have long tails that wind through the brain until they reach a place called the nucleus accumbens. When these long-tailed cells are activated, they release dopamine into the nucleus accumbens, driving the feeling we know as motivation. The scientific term for this circuit is the

mesolimbic pathway, although it’s easier to simply call it the dopamine desire circuit

This dopamine circuit evolved to promote behaviors that lead to survival and reproduction, or, to put it more plainly, to help us get food and sex, and to win competitions. It’s the desire circuit that’s activated when you see the plate of donuts on the table, and it’s activated not by need, but

by the presence of something attractive from an evolutionary or life-sustaining standpoint.

That is, at the moment such a thing is seen, the circuit is activated whether or not you’re hungry. That’s the nature of dopamine. It’s always focused on acquiring more of everything with an eye toward providing for the future. Hunger is something that happens here and now, in the present. But dopamine says, “Go ahead and eat the donut, even if you’re not hungry. It will increase your chance of staying alive in the future. Who knows when food will be ava...

For a biological organism, the most important goal related to the future is to be alive when it comes. As a result, the dopamine system is more or less obsessed with keeping us alive. It constantly scans the environment for new sources of food, shelter, mating ...

When it finds something that’s potentially valuable, dopamine switches on, sending the message Wake up. Pay attention. This is important. It sends this message by creating the feeling of desire, and often excitement. The sensation of wanting is no...

Under more normal conditions, though, dopamine activation in the desire circuit triggers energy, enthusiasm, and hope. It feels good. In fact, some people spend the majority of their lives pursuing this feeling—a feeling of anticipation, a feeling that life is about to get better. You’re about to eat a delicious dinner, see an old friend, make a big sale, or receive a prestigious award. Dopamine turns on the imagination, producing visions of a rosy future.

What happens when the future becomes the present—when the dinner is in your mouth or your lover is in your arms? The feelings of excitement, enthusiasm, and energy dissipate. Dopamine has shut down. Dopamine circuits don’t process experience in the real world, only imaginary future possibilities. For many people it’s a letdown. They’re so attached to dopaminergic stimulation that they flee the present and take refuge in the comfortable world of their own imagination. “What will we do tomorrow?” they ask themselves as they chew their food, oblivious to the fact that they’re not even noticing this meal they had so eagerly anticipated. To travel hopefully is better than to arrive is the motto of the dopamine enthusiast.

The future isn’t real. It’s made up of a bundle of possibilities that exist only in our minds. Those possibilities tend to be idealized—we usually don’t imagine a mediocre outcome. We tend ...

that makes the future more ...

WANTING VERSUS LIKING The transition from excitement to enjoyment can be challenging. Think of buyer’s remorse, the sense of regret that occurs after making a big purchase. Traditionally it has been attributed to the fear of having made the wrong choice, guilt over extravagance, or a suspicion of having been too

influenced by the seller. In fact, it’s an example of the desire circuit breaking its promise. It told you that if you bought that expensive car you’d be overcome with joy, and your life would never be the same. Except, once you became its owner, those feelings were neither as intense nor as long lasting as you had hoped. The desire circuit often breaks its promises—which is bound to happen, because it plays no role in generating feelings of satisfaction. It is in no position to make dreams come true. The desire circuit is, so to speak, just a salesman.

Buyer’s remorse is the failure of the H&N experience to compensate for the

loss of dopaminergic arousal.

If we made a wise purchase, it’s possible that strong H&N gratification will make up for the loss of the dopamine thrill. Alternatively, another way to avoid buyer’s remorse is to purchase something that triggers more dopaminergic expectation, for example, a tool, like a new computer that will boost produc...

Thus we see three possible solutions to buyer’s remorse: (1) chase the dopamine high by buying more, (2) avoid the dopamine crash by buying less, or (3) strengthen the ability to transition from dopamine desire to H&N liking. In no case, though, is there any guarantee that the things we so desperately want will be things that we will enjoy having. Wanting and likin...

The therapist recommended that Andrew try it for thirty days so he could experience what it was like to be sober. The therapist knew that if a heavy drinker can do this, he usually feels better—clearheaded, full of energy, better able to enjoy the simple pleasures in life—and that this feeling increases motivation for long-term sobriety. On the other hand, if a drinker can’t achieve thirty days of sobriety, it’s an indication that he no longer has full control of his drinking. That can be an eye-opening experience that may persuade a drinker to get alcohol out of his life.

Brain circuits that evolved for the crucial purpose of keeping us alive are taken over by an addictive chemical, and repurposed to enslave the addict that gets caught in its net.

Was he making rational choices? From the outside it doesn’t look like it. But from the inside, where we see dopamine in action, it makes perfect sense. The dopamine system evolved to motivate us to survive and reproduce. For most people there is nothing more important than staying alive and keeping their children safe. These are the activities that produce the largest dopamine surges. In a very literal way, large dopamine surges signal

the need to react to life-and-death situations. Take shelter. Find food. Protect your children. These are tasks that hit the dopamine system hard. What could be more important?

To an addict, drugs are more...

At least that’s the way...

When we’re starving, there’s nothing more motivating than getting food. But after we eat, the motivation for getting food declines because satiety circuits become active and shut down the desire circuit. There are checks and balances in place to keep everything stable. But there’s no satiety circuit for crack. Addicts take drugs until they pass out, get sick, or run out of money.