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by Are you young and in love? Enjoy it while it lasts because scientists at the Univerisity of Pavia in Italy claim it may only last 12 months. In a recent study, it was shown that a protein called Nerve Growth Factor (NGF) becomes much more abundant when people 'fall in love.' However, once the newness of the relationship wears off, it seems the level of NGF returns to pre-love levels.
'We have demonstrated for the first time that circulating levels of NGF are elevated among subjects in love, suggesting an important role for this molecule in the social chemistry of human beings,' said Dr. Enzo Emanuele, who led the study. Though they don't yet know why NGF levels increase, they believe the correlation between love and NGF is a strong one.
One can only wonder how long will it be before over-the-counter NGF readers are available for women to finally get the true answer to the age old question, do you really love me?
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Love by Brandon :: NR9 :: Show
I wonder what criteria they used in the study to determine which couples were actually "in love" and which ones contained at least one person whose interest was based in the "wrong" reasons - sex, money, prestige, etc. What about the traditional questions such as love vs. infatuation? "romantic love" vs the "real thing"? I also wonder what couples they used as control subjects and how they could tell that they were not in love.
I don't have the answers to these questions, but I'm highly suspicious that the only information revealed by this study is whether or not a person is "excited" by another's presence. And, if most people are like me, they have experienced this feeling when dating many people - both their future spouse, for whom they continue to feel a deeper and more complete love, and those for whom they felt little after a short or long dating period. The NGF-bolstered first year may have made each initially exciting, but only one of the relationships produced enough lasting feeling to warrant the commitment of marriage.
Even if this is the case, NGF readers may still be valuable in determining if someone "really loves" you, but not in the way suggested in the news. Instead of indicating love, positive NGF levels would indicate infatuation. Once this protein returned to pre-infatuation levels and the person's interest in the relationship persisted, their "true love" could be confirmed.