Our primordial drive for sex and love
The unpredictable, delightful, and mystifying force of our primordial romantic motivations
Since the dawn of humanity, sex, and love have captivated our passions and dominated our behaviors. But why? What primordial forces drive our seemingly insatiable desire for physical intimacy and emotional connection?
To understand this primal urge, we must journey back through the eons of evolution to our ancestral origins. Long before the first civilizations emerged, early humans roamed the savannas of Africa in small, nomadic bands. Survival depended on strength, resourcefulness, and social cohesion. Those who worked together and supported each other were more likely to find food, fend off predators, and raise healthy offspring.
Sex was not just about reproduction — it was a social adhesive that bonded couples together to provide stability for their vulnerable children. Love, intimacy, and affection motivated both parents to invest time and energy into their mutual offspring. Monogamous pairs who fell in love and remained devoted to each other increased their chances of successfully raising children to adulthood.
Thus, over thousands of generations, the human brain evolved complex neural circuits to motivate us to fall in love, strengthen our social bonds through sex, and focus our energies on romantic relationships that enhance our reproductive success. Our brains are wired to crave intimacy.
Flash forward to the 21st century. Our ancestral programming to seek sex and love remains, even though modern society differs drastically from the harsh African savannas where it evolved. But while our circumstances have changed, our primal urges have not. Let’s explore some of the key drivers:
The Pleasure Principle
For our ancestors, sex felt good because it led to reproductive success. But modern birth control has uncoupled sex from babymaking. Yet still, the orgasmic experience floods our brain with feel-good neurochemicals like dopamine and oxytocin. Our reward circuits are hijacked by this intoxicating biochemical cocktail, driving the urgent seek-and-find reward behaviors we call ‘sexual motivation.’ Sex literally feels like a drug to our primordial brains.
The Attraction Equation
Beauty and virility signaled genetic fitness to our ancestors, so they became triggers for lust and attraction. Sculpted hips and abs, clear skin, shiny hair, facial symmetry, intelligence, creativity, wit — all indicators of health, vigor, and strong genes. Our brains are still subconsciously dazzled by these qualities, spurring the first sparks of romantic interest even when reproduction is not the goal. We’re helpless to feel the call of our ancient appetites.
The Intimacy Imperative
Social isolation was tantamount to a death sentence on the savage grasslands where humans evolved. But the comforting touch of a mate, the closeness of a romantic bond — this elevated oxytocin levels and activated brain receptors for pleasure and reward. Love built trust and security. Today our brains still crave these intimate bonds, even if our survival no longer relies on them. We seek relationships for fulfillment and meaning, not just reproduction.
The Dating Game
While arranged marriages were once the norm, modern Western society emphasizes free choice in selecting romantic partners. But how to stand out in a vast sea of dating options? Our brains retain their ancestral obsession with beauty, social status, and creative talents — all indicators of genetic fitness or resources to support offspring. We craft online profiles to showcase our fitness, swiping left or right based on superficial compatibilities. The dating game reflects our primordial mating strategies.
The Monogamy Molecule
Early humans who maintained exclusive pair bonds were more successful parents. Evolution favored neurochemical pathways leading to long-term attachments. When two people fall in love, bonding hormones like oxytocin and dopamine flood the brain, imprinting memories of the lover. Contact and sex activate further neurochemical rewards, strengthening the attachment. Though modern relationships face more turbulence, our brains still retain these pathways for monogamy.
The Coolidge Effect
While our neurobiology motivates us to bond monogamously, our male ancestors also evolved strong desires to spread their seed widely. The Coolidge Effect describes the phenomenon where males exhibit revived sexual interest whenever a new receptive mate is available — even if they have just copulated. This may have evolved to encourage men to seek multiple partners, increasing reproductive success. Though no longer evolutionarily advantageous, this primordial urge persists.
Cupid’s Chemical Arrows
Romantic love is forged in a cauldron of brain chemistry. Attraction stimulates dopamine and norepinephrine, excitement mimicking psychostimulant drugs. Kissing and intimacy release oxytocin and endorphins, giving a sense of calm and pleasure. Sexual stimulation spikes testosterone and estrogen. Novelty and uncertainty also amp neural pathways for romantic love, reinforced over time by dopamine. No wonder love can make you literally lose your mind in the most delightful way! Our brains are primed for infatuation — it’s in our evolutionary blueprint.
The Love Hungry Brain
Functional MRI scans show that early-stage romantic love activates reward regions of the brain, releasing dopamine, norepinephrine, and serotonin. But romantic rejection shuts down those pathways, inducing depression. Our primal brains learned that rejection could lead to being alone, dangerously depriving us of social support and protection. Scientists believe this withdrawal of pleasure chemicals may have evolved to discourage us from pursuing unhealthy relationships and focus attention on more promising mates. Our brains still react to modern relationship rejection with strong distress.
Love Potions and Natural Aphrodisiacs
Not content to leave love lives to chance, our ancestors concocted elaborate love potions, elixirs, and aphrodisiacs to spark desire. While many were dubious or even toxic, some actually targeted our primordial mating neurochemistry. Pheromone perfumes and colognes work by enhancing natural scents that signal fertility. Chocolate boosts neurotransmitter activity associated with arousal. Spicy foods and alcohol sensitize nerve receptors. Though merely complement to the brain’s natural lust-stirring capacity, these ancient aids persist because they target our deepest romantic circuits.
Our Primal Romantic Future?
While technology has vastly changed society, human neurobiology has remained largely static since evolving in prehistoric times. We retain the urges, desires, reward pathways, and courtship strategies that worked to mate, bond, and reproduce successfully 50,000 years ago. But where once social survival depended on these primal drives, today we are freer to pursue sex and love in ways aligned with our individual fulfillment, unshackled from solely evolutionary imperatives. Perhaps one day we will even unlock secrets to enhancing lust, attachment, and intimacy at will — quite a steamy thought! For now, we must make peace with the unpredictable, delightful, and mystifying force of our primordial romantic motivations.
