Irina Shlionskaya

Many are familiar with the term “oxytocin”. It is called the “love hormone”. It is usually generated when we are around a loved one or someone we have sympathy for. However, recently, employees of the University of Bonn in Germany found that oxytocin performs another curious function - it makes a person fearless in the truest sense of the word.

There are cases when people went to meet danger, despite the fact that it could cost them their lives. This happened, for example, during military battles or in situations when something threatened the life of a loved one. So scientists have long suspected that this behaviour has hormonal reasons.

The German researchers assembled a team of 62 male volunteers with no health problems. During the study, the subjects were first shown pictures of various people, while scanning their brains with the help of special devices. When viewing some of the photographs, participants received a low power shock. In this regard, they had a negative reaction to these images.

At the next stage, the volunteers were divided into two groups. One of them received injections of oxytocin, the second received a placebo instead of the drug. Then they were again asked to view the same photographs as before. It turned out that people who were injected with oxytocin ceased to experience anxiety when viewing certain pictures, which was previously observed.

The study authors believe that this effect is due to the loss of fear. A surge of oxytocin leads a person to a state where, allegorically speaking, he is ‘knee-deep’. It must be for this reason that lovers so often commit reckless acts - for example, a young man can climb through a drainpipe to his girlfriend's window. And the girl, in turn, can run away from home, abandon a well-established life for the sake of a dubious future with her lover.

Perhaps this explains the relationship with unsuitable partners: for example, an educated, intelligent girl from a prosperous family on an "oxytocin drive" can contact an uneducated bully and even a criminal.
Of course, over time, this "drive" passes, and the feeling of fear and anxiety returns. People stop "throwing themselves into a whirlpool" for the sake of partners, and they often open their eyes to the shortcomings of the latter.

It is possible that such a quality as courage is also associated with high levels of oxytocin. And cowardice - with insufficient production of this hormone. However, it is not for nothing that they say that our behaviour is largely determined by hormonal status, and only partly by moral attitudes and life experience.
-- Pravda.ru