Family conflicts can be solved with the help of a hormone
Last reviewed: 16.10.2021
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Pharmacologists offer married couples in which partners have already cooled to each other and there are constant quarrels, to correct a situation, using a hormonal spray. This is a spray with oxytocin, a "hormone embrace."
As the study showed, this tool makes women more calm and friendly, and men - sensitive, which helps them respond better during quarrels. These findings were published in the journal Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience.
At the University of Zurich, with the example of 47 pairs, scientists specifically investigated how the hormone affects the level of stress and the autonomic nervous system during partner quarrels. The researchers specifically chose a painful topic for the couple. Then a spray with oxytocin or placebo was given and people were left for 45 minutes.
To assess the condition of volunteers, samples of saliva were taken for analysis. It turned out that oxytocin helped men communicate on a complex topic in a more positive way, and women demanded less. In women, the activity of the autonomic nervous system decreased, in men it increased.
Apparently, oxytocin reduced emotional and physiological arousal in women after the conflict. The opposite happened for men. Why the increase of emotionality in men, helped to solve the conflict, scientists do not know. One thing is for sure: a spray with oxytocin improves libido in men.
On a note:
The effect of oxytocin on the psychoemotional sphere of men was found. Oxytocin is supposed to be in love. On women, such experiments, as a rule, are not carried out. It causes a more favorable disposition towards other people, allows you to believe the words of a particular person, but only in certain cases: this applies only to intragroup relations - the relationship of a person to people from other groups does not change either for the better or for the worse (the so-called parochial altruism"). The hormone is involved immediately after birth in the formation of the mother-child relationship. The concentration of oxytocin depends on the manifestation of autism and Williams syndrome