Attachment and Monogamy as Studied in People and Rodents :: Biology Essays Research Papers

Attachment and Monogamy as Studied in People and RodentsIt had to be you, it had to be youI wandered around, and finally found - the somebody whoCould drive me be line up, and could make me be blueAnd even be glad, just to be sad - thinking of you.-Written by Gus Kahn and Isham Jones (10)The mystery of monogamy has puzzled the clement race for a long time. Monogamy is usually reasoned to be the result of an attachment that is strong enough to make someone be true to their loved one. Writers, artists, great lovers, the broken-hearted, and many different people, gather in entertained the question if there is such a thing as monogamy, what is responsible for it? Recently scientists have started to seriously ponder the same question. Within the past few years exciting studies and experiments have been done with the intent to delve into this complicated question, which ultimately pertains to love. In 1999, scientists at Emory University led experiments with voles and mice to study mo nogamy. (1) In 2000, scientists from the University College of London studied the brain activity in a group of people who were truly, deeply and madly in love entitled The Neural Basis of Romantic Love. (2) Although no conclusions can be reached, many interesting observations argon being made about monogamy and romantic attachment. Prairie voles are monogamous creatures, so much that eighty percent of the time males refuse to mate with any vole other than their first mate, and both parents tend to their offspring. (3) Montane voles, who are a very closely related species to prairie voles, are polygamous. (4) Both female and male montane voles leave each other and their offspring after mating. Prairie voles spend more than 50% of the time in close physical contact with each other, whereas montane voles spend less than 5% of the time in close proximity to other individuals. (5) After studying the social patters of other species of voles, like pine and meadow voles, it is apparent that two neuropeptides are responsible for the difference in social interaction. (4) Oxytocin, in females, and vasopressin, in males are the two chemicals which help prairie voles to be monogamous. (4) These same chemicals are present in montane voles, but do not have the same effect. (5) Oxytocin and vasopressin are released after the prairie voles mate, so that they form an attachment. (1)