Science vs. Religion (When It Comes to Love)

Some very heated discussion on the Ave Maria Gratia Plena blog following author Michelle's comments about oxytocin, bonding and premarital sex. It shows how attempts to understand how our biology affects our emotions gets mired in emotion.

In Why I disagree with promiscuity and fear for the FLDS kids that will be taught modern sex ed, she writes that she's worried that the children removed from the Fundamentalist Latter Day Saints camp will be taught modern society's ways, including acceptance of premarital sex. She goes on to make some statements about how the bonding effects of oxytocin following sex and orgasm can cloud a woman's judgment about a man.

I think she makes some very valid points; I do agree with this:

Ever wonder why so many women are "in love" with total losers and won't end the relationship? O-x-y-t-o-c-i-n...
~ This is why so many marriages fail when the couples have slept together before being wed: a woman that is chemically bonded to a man is in danger of settling for a husband that is totally not compatible with herself. She can't see this because she is trapped in a bond she probably knows nothing about. (When do they teach girls about oxytocin in sex ed classes??)

However, framing these ideas with this really tragic situation makes it a lot harder to examine what she says. As commenters rightly point out, surely the situation these women, and especially the very young girls who were married to older men who had multiple wives, were in a worse situation than someone who finds herself "bonded to a total loser."

Still, many comments accuse her of ranting and twisting science. One wrote,

You made the claim that a woman is bonded to her sexual partner against her will by oxytocin. That a woman falls in love with a "loser" because of oxytocin. You cannot ask me to offer counterproof until you offer some credible evidence - other than a reference to Wikipedia - to support your statements. Then you'll get your "argument".

I really wish it weren't so, but there is plenty of credible evidence that both men and women become bonded to their sex partners -- and women more so than men. I wish we humans were able to create new forms of relationships and new societies based on our ideals, not our biology. But we remain deeply influenced by our animal natures.

It's completely proven that men and women release oxytocin during  orgasm. Following are some studies that, taken together, make a very strong case that oxytocin creates the bond of human love, and that estrogen increases oxytocin's effects:

Bale, Tracy L.; Davis, Aline M.; Auger, Anthony P.; Dorsa, Daniel M.; and McCarthy, Margaret M. 2001. CNS Region-Specific Oxytocin Receptor Expression: Importance in Regulation of Anxiety and Sex Behavior. The Journal of Neuroscience 21(7):2546-2552.

Bales, Karen; Lewis-Reese, Antoniah; Pfeifer, Lisa; and Kramer, Kristin; and Carter, C. Sue. 2007. Early Experience Affects the Traits of Monogamy in a Sexually Dimorphic Manner. Developmental Psychobiology 49:335-342

Carter, C. Sue; DeVries, A.C.; and Getz, L.L. 1995. Physiological substrates of mammalian monogamy: the prairie vole model. Neuroscience and Biobehavioural Reviews 19(2): 303-14.

Carter, C. Sue. 2007. Sex differences in oxytocin and vasopressin: Implications for autism spectrum disorders? Behavioural Brain Research 176(1):170-86.

Chung, Wilson C. J.; De Vries, Geert J.; and Swaab, Dick F. 2002. Sexual Differentiation of the Bed Nucleus of the Stria Terminalis in Humans May Extend into Adulthood, The Journal of Neuroscience 22(3):1027–1033.

Cushing, B.S. and Carter, C.S. 1999. Prior Exposure To Oxytocin Mimics the Effects Of Social Contact and Facilitates Sexual Behaviour In Females. Journal of Neuroendocrinology 11(10):765–769.

Georgiadis, Janniko R.; Reinders, Simone A.A.T.; Van der Graaf, Ferdinand H.C.E.; Paans, Anne M.J.; Kortekaas, Rudie. 2007. Brain activation during human male ejaculation revisited. Neuroreport 18(6):553-557.

 

Young, Larry J. and Wang, Zuoxin, The neurobiology of pair bonding (Nature Neuroscience Vo. 7. No. 10, October 2004)

Zak, Paul J.; Kurzband, Robert; and Matzner, William T., Oxytocin is associated with human trustworthiness (Hormones and Behavior 48 (2005) 522 – 527)

 

Comments

[Renee]

Being now a practicing Catholic, I get in discussions about the morality of pre-marital sex with others. It's a difficult subject, because I was sexually active with 'total losers' and also with my husband prior to marriage, and it was easy to confess the sin of sexual activity in a poor situation, but harder to reconcile sexual activity that was indeed an expression of love outside marriage. Even though it may of been in the expression of love, engaging in sexual activity postponed what I really wanted which was full commitment of my husband, yet at the time marriage was something one did after college/graduate school which was years away for us.

We live in a society that postpones marriage, not only in age but also in courting process, my older female relatives married in their late teens/early twenties, while my peers marry in their late 20s/early 30s. It seems decades ago, a woman could decide if a man would make a good husband within six months to a year, now people date/live-in together for 3-4 years prior to marriage.

I remember you writing that oxytocin levels off within a few years after a relationship. Is there a natural biological time frame in courting/decision making, prior sexual activity? I just can't imagine staying celibate/chaste for years with someone you truly love. I'm not saying that every 18 year old should marry at that age or the relationship one has at 18 is the right spouse, but if the circumstances are right maybe we should make it more socially acceptable for young adults to be married, support their decision, and embrace their commitment rather then tell them they're too young or to wait until after college graduation. They're probably going to have sex and even get pregnant, all we are doing is leaving the level of commitment in the relationship in limbo and sending mix messages. We can easily become sexually active in mature relationships as young as 16, but as a young woman or man seeing that marriage isn't viable until you're are 26 what will they do with their sexuality in the mean time, if it is not to be advanced into a commitment relationship?

[Susan Kuchinskas]

Renee, your thoughtful and insightful comment really gets to the heart of the clash between culture and biology.

First, let me say that I haven't written that oxytocin levels off a couple of years into the relationship. A theory going around is that the elevated neurochemicals of romance go back to normal within a couple of years. That's when, if an oxytocin bond has not developed, people "fall out of love." The idea (evolutions, god's, the goddesses', whatever) seems to be that a couple is highly rewarded by each other long enough to get pregnant and bear the first child; after that, the oxytocin bond keeps them in a mellower but stronger bond.

Back to the question at hand: Should couples remain chaste as they wait years for marriage? I agree with you that many parents are sending a probably unintended message when they caution their kids to wait until after graduation to get married, that commitment is something you can "put off," like you can put off buying a car.

Clearly, it's a case of economic concerns taking precedence over emotional ones. In many cultures, when people marry, they move in with one of their families, so there's plenty of financial and emotional support for the marriage, as well as help with childcare. And, in our parents' day, young couples expected to struggle financially for a while, and this struggle brought them closer -- if it didn't kill the marriage altogether.

And, of course, being such a mobile society makes it harder. Parents who hope their children will go to college know it will be harder for them to leave if they have a serious love at home. A couple graduating from college may be offered jobs in different cities. And the luckier college students may still be supported financially by their parents, who might be uneasy having their children enter into a legal relationship in which they own assets in common.

I think my life would have been very different -- and much better -- if I had had the love and partnership of a mate from my earliest adulthood.

So, how do you balance the economic and social pressures of our society with our need for intimacy and commitment? You're right, people will have sex and even get pregnant. Maybe parents need to talk about this stuff with their kids, really openly and honestly, including the part about premarital sex. I wonder if a lot of parents who counsel their kids to wait to get married leave out the discussion of what to do in the meantime.

You also raise the question, "What exactly is commitment?" There's socially recognized commitment, that is, marriage, as well as biological and emotional commitment via the oxytocin bond. In your case, with your husband to be, you had the biological and emotional commitment, but weren't sure he would take the step. Is that true?

I don't have any answers. But it's clear our culture does not support marriage -- defined as the commitment of two people to stay together for the long haul -- while it does support casual sex. That can't be good for the children that will inevitably come.

[Renee]

Religious conservatives are not helping when they solely preach abstinence, because they never clearly answer why someone shouldn't be having sex. While it is important to be financial stable before getting married, we aren't asking is the relationship emotionally healthy for sex. Like with issues of domestic violence we want to teach women and men discernment, and not wait until then warning signs of controlling jealousy and isolation become physical and controlling and difficult to leave.

There is a difference between a couple who moves in to 'try it out', and a couple who moves in with the full intention that it's for better or for worse, the problem is as a family member or a friend or even the couple, their intentions are unclear. The marriage ceremony is the psychological aspect that clearly makes vows that they are going to work it out, and everyone is on notice. More religious conservatives need to make a stronger effort to support co-habitating couples or couples with a children to re-evaluate the relationship and help them decide it is healthy enough to be married at the local level. They would be helping them and helping their children, rather then sitting back and complain about what should of happened.

[Susan Kuchinskas]

I agree -- and that goes for everyone, not just religious conservatives. Maybe it's human nature, but we often just complain about what happened instead of grappling with understanding what is happening.