Invitation to Psychology

490 Chapter 14 The Major Motives of Life: Food, Love, Sex, and work

Recite & Review

Recite: Is all this information about eating making you hungry for knowledge? If so, say aloud

what you know about the set point, brown fat, leptin, ghrelin, four major environmental reasons for

the rising rates of obesity and overweight and other environmental suspects, cultural influences on

weight, bulimia, anorexia, and other forms of eating problems.

Review: Enjoy a nice apple and reread this section.

Now Take This Quick Quiz:

1. True or false: Most fat people are heavy because their emotional problems cause them to
   overeat.


2. Which hormone stimulates appetite, and which helps regulate appetite by telling the hypo-
   thalamus that the body has stored enough fat?


3. Bill, who is thin, reads that genes set the range of body weight and shape. “Oh, good,” he
   exclaims, “now I can eat all the junk food I want; I was born to be skinny.” What’s wrong with
   Bill’s conclusion?
   Answers:

Study and Review at MyPsychLab

• Bill is right to recognize that there may be limits to how heavy he can become, but he is over3. ghrelin, leptin2. false1.

simplifying and jumping to conclusions. Many people who have a set point for leanness will gain considerable weight on rich

food and sugary drinks, especially if they don’t exercise. Also, junk food is unhealthy for reasons that have nothing to do with

becoming overweight.

You are about to learn...

•    how biology affects attachment and love.

•    some key psychological influences on whom

and how you love.

•    the three basic styles of attachment and how

they affect relationships.

•    how economic concerns influence love and

marriage.

the Social animal:

Motives to Love

In 1875, a teenager named Annie Oakley defeated

Frank Butler, the star of the Buffalo Bill Wild

West Show, in a sharpshooting competition. “The

next day I came back to see the little girl who had

beaten me,” wrote Butler many years later, “and

it was not long until we married.” He became her

manager, and for the next 50 years, they traveled

together across Europe and America, where her

skills with a gun made her the toast of both con-

tinents. They remained devoted until their deaths

in 1926 (Kreps, 1990).

What kept Annie Oakley and Frank Butler

in love for 50 years, when so many other ro-

mantic passions die in five years, five weeks,

or five hours? What is love, anyway—the crazy,

heart-palpitating feeling of longing for another

person, or the steady, stable feeling of deep and

abiding attachment?

The Biology of Love LO 14.4

To begin, let’s distinguish passionate (romantic) love,

characterized by a whirlwind of intense emotions

and sexual passion, from companionate love, char-

acterized by affection and trust. Passionate love

is the stuff of crushes, infatuations, “love at first

sight,” and the early stage of love affairs. It may

burn out completely or evolve into companion-

ate love. Passionate love is known in all cultures

and has a long and passionate history. Wars and

duels have been fought because of it, people have

committed suicide because of it, great love affairs

have begun, and been torn apart, because of it. Yet,

although the experience of romantic love is uni-

versal, many cultures have not regarded it as the

proper basis for anything serious, such as marriage

(Hatfield & Rapson, 2008).

In this era of fMRI, it was inevitable that re-

searchers would seek to explain passionate love by

examining the brain. And if you think that what

scientists are finding about diet and weight is

complicated, their efforts to tease apart the links

between romantic passion, sexual yearning, and

long-term love make the problem of obesity seem,

well, a piece of cake. Olfactory cues in a potential