I saw this on the Daily Telegraph website today. Very cool!
Some couples really do live happily ever after
By Matthew Moore, 16 Dec 2008
The study found that couples married for more than 20 years showed similar brain activity to lovers in the throes of a new relationship, when shown pictures of their partners.
The photos stimulated the area of the brain associated with euphoria and addiction in both mature couples and young lovers.
People in long-term relationships also showed higher levels of activity in a part of the brain associated with calmness, suggesting that their passions had become more serene over the years.
Those in love for shorter periods had higher activity in a region associated with obsession and anxiety.
The study, carried out by anthropologist Helen Fisher, of Rutgers University in New Jersey, United States, used MRI scans to compare the brain activity of 17 married people aged between 40 and 65 who had been married for at least two decades, with those of a group of younger people who had been in relationships for less than six months.
“We now have physiological evidence that romantic love can last,” Prof Fisher said. “It now appears from this study that romantic love exists not only to initiate pair-bonding but to maintain and enhance long-term relationships.”
Discussing the slightly different brain patterns of the older couples, she said: “The difference is that in long-term love, the obsession, the mania and anxiety has been replaced with calm.”
6 and a bit years to go until the 20!