Hug the Monkey

Hug Your Monkey Even If You Don't Want Sex

I thought this was a good column from the Times Online: Touching Shouldn't Always Mean Sex.

Relationship expert Pam Spurr points out how hard it can be for male/female couples to send and understand signals about touching. Sometimes, you don't want sex, but you need to be touched and held. She points out:

When our skin is touched, our bodies produce various responses including producing oxytocin, the emotional bonding hormone. This makes us feel good around our loved one. That heart-warming feeling means that we want more of their company. And so the cycle goes on bonding us together.

Interesting that most of the comments are very hostile. I agree it's a bit of a stereotype that he wants sex, she wants to cuddle, but certainly mismatches in how much sex people want are not uncommon.

Oxytocin Hype and Backlash

I read New York magazine, and they have a regular item called something like "We ride the shifting curve of expectations." They chart where cultural events like books and films fall on the cycle from hype to backlash against the hype.

In the past couple of weeks, I've watched oxytocin follow a similar path. Because I look at every news article and study regarding oxytocin, as well as all the blog posts discovered by a couple blog search tools, I can see what studies spark news coverage, and what kinds of memes spread.

Oxytocin hype has been rampant for the past three weeks. As far as I can tell, it got started with study led by Thomas Baumgartner at the University of Zurich showing that inhaling oxytocin increased people's willingness to trust other players in an economic game, even after they'd been shafted once. This is the team at the University of Zurich that did the very first human oxytocin studies showing that oxytocin increased trust. (Read my blog post about the previous research here.)

In this study, "We find that subjects in the oxytocin group show no change in their trusting behavior after they learned that their trust had been breached several times while subjects receiving placebo decrease their trust."

Some genius copywriter translated this to, "Oxytocin Makes Us Trust after Betrayal," leading to a spate of stories about how "Spray Said to Turn People into Pushovers." And it also led to my appearance on the Fox Morning With Mike and Juliet show.

Not to be outdone, Markus Heinrichs, who leads the Zurich team, talked to reporters (but did not, I believe, actually publish anything new) about their work using oxytocin to treat social anxiety disorder, which has been under way for several years. That sparked another news rush.

They mostly followed the lines of this one, Scientists Find Childbirth Wonder Drug That Can Cure Shyness, kindly sent to me by Blaine. Is that a sexy headline or what? The articles finally recognized the work of Paul Zak, who has been giving oxytocin to humans for several years, without a lot of notice. I didn't blog all these articles, partly because they were so ubiquitous and partly because I was finishing the manuscript of my book, ta daaa!

Already, though, oxytocin hype has faded into the final cycle, backlash. In part this is simply because news reporters have to come up with new stories every day. Once you've written a story hyping the prospects of oxytocin -- or worse, when your competitors have and you haven't -- where do you go from there but to write another one decrying the first. Ideally, at least in the olden days when I started my career as a journalist, you were supposed to find naysayers to quote in every story. But that was then.

The Neurocritic links to an ABC News story now insisting, "Researchers Balk at Media Reports Hyping 'Love Drug' Hormone's Effects."

And Paul Zanucci of American Sentinel calls it, "The Oxytocin Nightmare to Come -- Drugging America." I agree with his premise, and have been saying for a while that oxytocin will be the next Prozac. That is, while oxytocin-based or oxytocin-like drugs will be developed for social anxiety disorder and ASD, it will eventually be prescribed for much milder psychological situations. Zanucci writes,

Every time someone blows their nose, there’s a new prescription written for nasal sprays and antihistamines even though products like Zyrtec can now be bought OTC in generic form.  Every time someone is stressed out by work, another prescription is written for anti-anxiety medication.  People are happy as clams to pay $30 to $50 for the latest in pharmaceutical living, not considering that their insurance is paying another $300 behind the scenes and that their cost for insurance is going to go up again next year.

Nevertheless, I think calling this a nightmare is way too anti-hyperbolic. I'd much rather we revise labor, birth and parenting practices to allow individuals to form a healthy oxytocin response naturally. But our society is probably too sick and mechanistic for that. In which case, a nation of loved-out citizens who inhale oxytocin several times a day would be preferable to our extant war-mongering, paranoid, crabby society.

At any rate, I think we can shortly expect oxytocin to fall off the news cycle for at least a few months.

Partying Hearty on Oxytocin in India

 Oxytocin is the new party drug in India, according to this story from the Times of India.

I've seen previous news stories about police seizing illegal oxytocin or counterfeit versions, and wondered if this was a mistranslation and they meant oxycontin, the pain reliever. And evidently farmers often inject cows with oxytocin to increase milk production, an effect noted by Kristen Uvnas Moberg, the Swedish researcher who was the first to understand this hormone/neurochemical's powerful effects on our moods and ability to bond.

The Times explains that kids inject the oxytocin.

According to a pharmacy expert, the drug induces a numb state of mind. "After a period of intense activity and enjoyment where the addicts are numb to pain, effect of the drug wears off and the users drop, literally. It leaves the addicts’ nervous system in a mess and the users need time to recover," he said.

I dunno about this numb state of mind. They may, rather, feel very calm and connected to each other, similar to the way people who take ecstasy at raves say they feel. (It's been shown that this drug causes a release of oxytocin in the brain of mice.) Oxytocin certainly does reduce sensitivity to pain, and the "mess" side effects have been seen in people who take ecstasy frequently.

The authorities may be overstating the negative effects, as they sometimes do. Nevertheless, I do NOT advocate using oxytocin recreationally. First, because it acts in so many ways to regulate the body, messing with the natural system could have unforeseen and not pretty consequences. Second, it's dangerous to inject anything into your body if you don't have sterile equipment and know what you're doing -- especially if you can't be sure of what you're injecting.

How to Get Oxytocin Right NOW

The Mike & Juliet Show was mostly an attack on Liquid Trust. The manufacturer refuses to say how much oxytocin is in the product, but it won't get into your body - or anyone else's -- if you spray it on your clothes or even skin.

There are plenty of ways to experience a natural oxytocin release without buying anything. In my book (The Chemistry of Connection, April 2009) I explain the oxytocin response, why we don't all have a healthy one, and talk about ways of building it up.

But all of us do have a hypothalamus and all of us do release oxytocin; without it, we'd die. To get the social benefits, try one or more of the following. If you can, set aside at least 15 minutes to do this and nothing else:

• Cuddle
• Sing in a choir
• Hold a baby
• Stroke a dog or cat
• Perform a generous act
• Pray
• Make love
• Have an orgasm (alone or with someone else)

Tried Oxytocin? Want to Be on TV?

I'm very excited to be a guest on the Morning Show with Mike and Julie on Fox this Thursday. And, while I'll talk about my own experience taking oxytocin, I'll also talk about the research and my book.

The producers hope to find someone who's taken oxytocin on their own, just to see how it feels, solve a social problem or something. If that's you, and you're prepared to show up in New York by Thursday 8 AM (they'll pay travel) email

michelle dot niger at mikeandjuliet dot com right away!

Way to Exploit the News!

Oxytocin was all over the news last week, thanks to the latest study from Zurich showing that inhaling oxytocin increased people's willingness to trust while playing economic games. Those who snorted oxytocin were willing to trust again even after the other player shorted them.

This is one of a series of studies in which people in the lab exchange money in a controlled situation; I think it got so much attention because of the juicy word "betrayal" used to describe a player's refusal to play fair. But it should be pointed out that sitting in a lab engaging in a simple interaction is far from true betrayal -- and it's unlikely that inhaling oxytocin would make you trust someone out in the real world who did something truly mean.

At any rate, a new company has gotten onto the oxytocin bandwagon. HBC Protocols, a ten-year-old Los Angeles company that specializes in wellness and nutritional supplements, has released a new product, Oxytocin Formula Homeopathic Product, that does contain oxytocin. They've backed up the product with a very well-produced website.

The product is designed to be put under the tongue, a good place to absorb chemicals and not as unpleasant or potentially damaging to the mucous membranes as inhalation. I'm going to try to find out more information about the product. The fact that it's "homeopathic" makes me wonder how much oxytocin it contains. The label says "oxytocin 2C," as opposed to other ingredients, which are "6X" or so. I assume this is the homeopathic style of describing formulae.

I have no idea whether there's enough of a dose to do anything, or how well the oxytocin solution would hold up. But it shows the keen interest in oxytocin that's out there.

True Love and Business

I've written several times about the interesting and revolutionary work Paul Zak is doing on oxytocin and its relationship to business and economic exchange. In short, Paul is in the process of proving that the virtues of generosity and trust are crucial for a thriving economy.

Earlier this morning, I had on my other hat: technology journalist. Researching Lotame, a company I'll include in a story about targeting online advertising, I came across this in a great blog post from the company's founder, Andy Monfried (right). He's talking about what companies can do to survive during these .. um .. difficult economic times:

9) rely less on email, and more on good old fashion people skills.  email is NOT people skills.

10) give way more love and good vibes than EVER. passion goes a long way in any business, and it's often under utilized - and, overlooked.

That's good advice for anyone in business at any time -- and maybe should go at the top of the list. Meeting face-to-face, looking into another person's eyes, shaking hands and sharing a beverage or a meal provide an opportunity to build trust, based on spurts of oxytocin from the hypothalamus combined with dopamine tickling the brain's reward centers. Trust and love are different points on the same neurochemical spectrum. When you love someone, you want good for them. And Andy is right, that kind of love impels each of you to help the other succeed.

I like the name of his blog, too: You Ain' Gonna Learn What You Don't Want to Know. So true.

Oxytocin Deficit Disorder

Everything that's outside the norm or seems unhealthy is considered a disorder these days. This partly reflects Big Pharma's desire to increase profits by finding new diseases it can treat. Nevertheless, I believe that recognizing some things that used to be considered character flaws or hopeless cases as disorders that might be treatable have benefited millions of people.

Now, instead of being classified as a bad or stupid kid, children who disrupt class and have trouble learning may be given the less pejorative label of ADHD. While how to help them remains controversial, with many people thinking these kids are over-medicated, many others are thankful the drugs are working.

The same thing is true with clinical depression, as well as its cousin, post-partum depression. Selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors, or SSRIs, can alter neurochemistry and help many sufferers lead better lives. Dario Maestripieri of the University of Chicago has shown that the kind of mothering a baby rhesus macaque monkey gets influences the serotonin levels of its brain on into adulthood. Baby rhesus with mean mothers show symptoms of depression.

Evidence is mounting that babies and children who don't get enough or the right kind of nurturing may have abnormal brain development. This can result in an overactive stress response and an under-active oxytocin response. Similarly, some scientists are looking at abnormalities in the oxytocin system as causal factors in autism.

I think the day will come -- in the next three to five years -- when something like "oxytocin deficit disorder" will make its way into the DSM -- and into psychopharmacology. Drugs that introduce an oxytocin-like substance into the body, or increase its production by the hypothalamus or other oxytocin-producing sites, may provide a quicker fix for people who feel they can't connect emotionally with others.

Mommy Your Man or Have a Grown-Up Relationship

There used to be a popular T-shirt that read, "I wanted to have a baby, not marry one!"

In fact, women can easily fall into the trap of mothering their mates. First, women's higher levels of oxytocin make them prone to mothering behaviors. And, let's face it, men who grew up with mommies who took care of them sometimes have a difficult time transitioning to independent adulthood. Finally, many men seem to not care as much as the women in their lives about things like neatness and nutrition.

These factors make it all too easy to fall into mommying him: Picking up after him, reminding him to take care of himself, making doctors appointments for him, etc. According to this article on CNN Living, it's a really bad idea.

Babying the man in your life can mean two things, Tessina says: A. You've been spending too much time being mommy and may need a break from the kids, or B. You need more adult contact, whether it be a weekend away with the girls or a few hours at the mall while the kids are with a sitter.

Tessina says that normal nurturing -- cooking for him, massaging him, tending to him when he's sick -- can feel motherly if you're too controlling about it. "Instead, tell him what you'd like to do to help him, and ask him if he wants that kind of help. This evens the field and makes you equals," she says.

I would add that it can ruin your sex life and your whole relationship. All that oxytocin a woman generates can make sex with him seem unconsciously weird, and oxytocin is not the hormone of desire, it's the hormone of fulfilled desire, aka orgasm. An excess of oxytocin also can damp down the effects of his testosterone -- not a problem when he's a young bull, but increasingly an issue as he -- and the marriage -- ages.

Besides, who wants to make love to a baby?

Read the article for amazing stories of how far some women go.

Do You Mommy Your Husband?

Tend and Befriend during Hurricane Katrina

  Reunion Arena Relief Efforts 
  Originally uploaded by tonguetyed.

You were more likely to survive Hurricane Katrina if you had the benefit of a social network with other women, according to researchers at the University of Missouri.

According to the article,

Jacqueline Litt, associate professor and chair of the Department of Women's and Gender Studies at MU, found that informal family and community networks coordinated by women are vital in emergency situations. More than 50 people were evacuated from New Orleans, La., through the efforts of two "core anchors," a 58-year-old woman and her daughter, who initiated communication and organization using established familial and social relationships.

Litt found that warnings from the government didn't carry as much weight with people as word of mouth from people they already knew and trusted. And women, who tend to be better at communicating and keeping in touch, were better at getting the word out and getting people to act in time.

This finding reflects a reaction to danger or stress that UCLA psychologist Shelley Taylor dubbed "tend and befriend." According to Taylor, while men often go into fight-or-flight mode, women have evolved the tend and befriend strategy because it was more likely to ensure that the children would be safe or at least survive. If a mother stood up and fought -- and lost -- her child might be killed too. If the child wasn't killed, it could only survive if her kin or friend were willing to foster it.

Taylor thinks that oxytocin, the neurochemical of calm and bonding, might be at work in the tend-and-befriend survival strategy. Oxytocin is also the chemical of social connection, helping women to create and maintain the social networks that can help them and their children survive.

The example of these women during the hurricane is an excellent example of this survival mechanism in action.