The Science of Love, Desire & Attachment | Huberman Lab Essentials
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Welcome to Huberman Lab Essentials, where past episodes are revisited for the most potent and actionable science-based tools for mental health, physical health, and performance. Andrew Huberman is a professor of neurobiology and ophthalmology at Stanford School of Medicine. Today covers the psychology and biology of desire, love, and attachment.
One of the most robust findings in psychology is attachment styles, discovered through Mary Ainsworth's studies in the 1980s using the strange situation task. This involves a parent or caregiver bringing their child into a lab room with a stranger and toys. The mother and stranger talk, the child explores. The mother leaves, then returns at a designated time. Measures include the child's reaction to separation and reunion.
Toddlers fall into four attachment style categories:
- Secure attachment: Child engages with stranger while parent present, gets upset on separation, expresses happiness on return. Feels confident caregiver is available and responsive. Good at exploring novel environments.
- Anxious-avoidant (insecure): No distress on separation, approaches caregiver on return without joy.
- Anxious-ambivalent/resistant (insecure): Distress even before separation, clingy, hard to comfort on return.
- Disorganized/disoriented (D): Unclear reaction to separation, manifests unusual behaviors and emotions.
Categorization as toddlers strongly predicts romantic attachment styles later in life. Templates can shift over time, powerfully through knowledge of their existence and malleability.
Neural circuits for child-caregiver attachment are repurposed for romantic attachment. No single brain area controls love, desire, or attachment; multiple areas coordinate in sequences and intensities to create these states. Beneath is autonomic arousal.
Autonomic nervous system is like a seesaw: alert-calm to panic, or sleepy-calm to fast asleep. The hinge tightness is autonomic tone. Child-caregiver interactions move each other's seesaw, e.g., from alert play to soothed sleep.
Studies during World War II bombing showed children's physiologies mimic mothers': stressed mothers led to prolonged child stress; mothers framing sheltering as a game prevented child stress/trauma.
Reflect on your attachment style (secure, insecure, etc.). Recognize autonomic state with/without others: can you self-soothe when apart? Healthy interdependence: feel great with others but adjust autonomic state independently.
Dopamine associates with desire (motivation, craving, pursuit), not just reward; universal for pursuing anything.
Three neural circuits for desire, love, attachment:
- Autonomic nervous system.
- Empathy circuits (match emotional/autonomic tone).
- Positive delusion circuits (belief only this person makes you feel this way).
Empathy involves matching seesaws. Key structures: prefrontal cortex (perceives externally, decides, organizes) and insula (interoception inside body, exteroception outside; splits attention between self and other).
Positive delusions critical for relationship stability: belief only this person can make you feel this way.
Gottman (husband-wife team, University of Washington) identified four horsemen predicting relationship failure:
- Criticism (frequency/intensity matters).
- Defensiveness (lack of empathy).
- Stonewalling (cuts off emotional response).
- Contempt (strongest predictor; "sulfuric acid of relationships"; feeling other is worthless, deserving scorn; antithesis of empathy, positive delusion, autonomic matching).
2015 New York Times article on 36 questions divided into three sets, progressing from ordinary to deep:
- Set 1: "What would constitute a perfect day for you?" "What in your life do you feel most grateful?"
- Set 2: "What is your most treasured memory?" "Worst memory?"
- Set 3: "Most embarrassing moment?" "When did you last cry in front of another/by yourself?" "Something too serious to joke about."
Claim: Exchanging questions (one asks all 36, other answers; reverse) leads to love. People report knowing each other well, feeling attachment/desire. Establishes synchronized personal narrative; heart rates synchronize to shared narratives.
Autonomic coordination hallmark of desire, love, attachment.
Study in Frontiers in Psychology: "Manipulation of self-expansion alters responses to attractive alternative partners." Used neuroimaging on couples.
Self-expansion: Perception of self enhanced through relationship (feels good, more capable; healthy interdependence).
Design: Categorized on self-expansion potential. Primed with significant other's narratives:
- Exciting, novel, challenging relationship (focus on individual).
- Or past strong love feelings (relationship-focused).
Then imaged brain while rating outsiders' attractiveness. High self-expansion priming reduced activation in attractiveness areas.
Takeaway: Self-expansion gestures (esp. praising individual as vital to exciting/dynamic relationship) reduce perceived attractiveness of alternatives.
Interactions shape autonomic arousal, self-perception, perception of others. Stable internal autonomic representation aids stable partnerships.
Testosterone (and dihydrotestosterone) strongly relates to libido, sex drive, mating. Estrogen also strongly associated with libido and mating behavior, not just blunting it. For people that either chemically or for
For people with very low estrogen, either chemically or for some other reason, libido can severely suffer. Estrogen and testosterone in both males and females coordinate in a dance that leads to libido or sex drive. Things can shift libido in both men and women toward more desire to mate, either to seek mates or mate with existing partners.
A common misconception is that increasing dopamine through any mechanisms will increase libido, but that's not the case. Some level of dopamine or increase is required for increases in libido. However, due to dopamine's relationship to the autonomic nervous system, which is intimately involved in sexual activity, seeking, and mating behavior, driving dopamine too high creates states of arousal where people seek and want sexual activity but can't engage the parasympathetic arm sufficiently to become physically aroused.
Many think driving up testosterone, increasing dopamine, and getting into high autonomic arousal will increase libido, but that's not how the system works. It's the seesaw back and forth—the arc of arousal—that matters.
Legal over-the-counter supplements can increase libido and arousal, but they are not required. Many have healthy libidos for their life and needs. Always check with a physician before supplementation, as everyone is different, and health depends on doing certain things and avoiding others.
Studies show statistically significant increases in libido measures with:
- Maca (m a c a), a root
- Tongkat Ali (also called Longjack)
- Tribulus (Tribulus terrestris)
Maca
Studies on maca (2-3 grams per day, powder or capsule, early in the day as it can be stimulating and interfere with sleep if taken late) are convincing. Durations of 8-12 weeks in athletes and non-athletes, various forms (black maca, red maca, yellow maca), increase subjective reports of sexual desire independent of hormone systems. It does not increase testosterone or change estrogen based on existing literature.
Tongkat Ali
Tongkat Ali, an herb (Malaysian and Indonesian versions; Indonesian most potent for libido), increases libido across populations. 400 mg per day capsules increase free (unbound) testosterone. Testosterone has bound form (to albumin or sex hormone binding globulin, inactive at cells) and unbound free testosterone (most potent effects). Some bound is needed for time release and distribution. Tongkat Ali lowers sex hormone binding globulin, increasing free testosterone, with other mechanisms likely. Reports show libido increases.
Cycle supplements? Determine via blood work: monitor liver enzymes, hormone levels. Tongkat Ali and maca typically not cycled regularly, but check with doctor and monitor blood work, subjective measures for safety and efficacy.
Tribulus Terrestris
Tribulus terrestris (T R I B U L U S T E R R E S T R I S), sold over-the-counter for testosterone and fitness. Unclear if it meaningfully increases testosterone, but four peer-reviewed studies on males and females (18-65+ years):
- One study: post-menopausal women, 750 mg/day divided into three doses or placebo for 120 days. Per female sexual function index questionnaire, no significant libido difference, but free and bioavailable testosterone increased (total testosterone not statistically significant).
- Separate double-blind study (1-6 months): 6 grams (6,000 mg) tribulus root for 60 days increased libido and sexual function aspects.
More studies needed, but maca, Tongkat Ali (especially Indonesian), and Tribulus create significant increases in sexual desire, sometimes by adjusting testosterone/estrogen, sometimes not, highlighting complexity of neurochemicals and features adjusting libido.
Covered much material on desire, love, and attachment, not exhaustive of the psychology and biology landscape. Hopefully interesting and actionable for past, present, and future relationships. Thank you for joining and for interest in science.
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