How brain chemicals determine whether your love will last

LONDON - An eminent U.S. anthropologist claims to have found why some relationships are a smooth sail while others are a little trickier.

Dr Helen Fisher, who has studied romantic love for 30 years, believes that that attraction is closely linked to the chemistry of your personality type and how it matches - or clashes - with that of your chosen partner.

Fisher’s research indicates we can be divided into four very different personality types - explorers, builders, directors and negotiators - based on the way our body produces and reacts to the brain chemicals dopamine and serotonin, and the hormones testosterone and oestrogen.

If dopamine tends to dominate your personality, you belong to a group termed explorers and people in this group have a tendency to seek novelty.

If it is erotonin that dominates, the guiding personality traits tend to be calmness, loyalty, a fondness of rules and facts, and order. Because this group tend to be skilled at building social networks, she calls this group builders.

Those with high levels of testosterone (whether male or female) fall into a section called directors because they are direct, decisive, tough-minded, exacting and good at strategic thinking.

Finally, personalities dominated by the hormone oestrogen (again, this affects men and women) are dubbed negotiators because they are highly imaginative and empathetic, with great verbal and social skills as well as being adept at connecting disparate facts.

“There will always be magic to love, but knowledge is power. If you know who you are, what you seek and how you and others love, you can capture that magic, find and keep real love, and make your dreams come true,” the Daily Mail quoted Fisher as saying.

Extracted from ‘Why Him? Why Her?’ by Helen Fisher. (ANI)