On Thu, 23 Nov 1995 20:23:57 -0800,
Coolray Hollywood <pvollrat at icogsci1.ucsd.edu> wrote:
>>>On 18 Nov 1995, JAppel2188 wrote:
>>> Social interaction must involve brain reward systems in the amygdala,
>> hippocampus and septal regions. Is any one interested in this
>> relationship, or have any information about it?
>>>>>Actually, David Brin asked an audience on Nov 17 at UCSD, for information
>to confirm his suspicions that women goo-gooing a baby in a carriage are
>getting an neurotransmitter fix of some kind or another.
>>How do we go about examining this hypothesis?
>
I don't know specifically about social interaction, but brain reward
mechanisms have been the subject of an enormous amount of research,
with a lot of it taking place in the San Diego area. One important
mechanism is dopamine in the nucleus accumbens, thought to play a
role in cocaine addiction. Bonidng between mother and infant is also
believed to involved the hormone oxytocin.
Floyd Bloom, head of the Neuropharmacology dept. at Scripps, and now
Editor-in-Chief of Science, has published in this area.
AAJR
