The DOI matches its Crossref record; 16 of the 16 references it cites were found in a registry or an index.
The neural basis of romantic love
Abstract
The neural correlates of many emotional states have been studied, most recently through the technique of fMRI. However, nothing is known about the neural substrates involved in evoking one of the most overwhelming of all affective states, that of romantic love, about which we report here. The activity in the brains of 17 subjects who were deeply in love was scanned using fMRI, while they viewed pictures of their partners, and compared with the activity produced by viewing pictures of three friends of similar age, sex and duration of friendship as their partners. The activity was restricted to foci in the medial insula and the anterior cingulate cortex and, subcortically, in the caudate nucleus and the putamen, all bilaterally. Deactivations were observed in the posterior cingulate gyrus and in the amygdala and were right-lateralized in the prefrontal, parietal and middle temporal cortices. The combination of these sites differs from those in previous studies of emotion, suggesting that a unique network of areas is responsible for evoking this affective state. This leads us to postulate that the principle of functional specialization in the cortex applies to affective states as well.
Overview
Integrity signals
Registry
Cites
Statistics
Verification
Claims the paper makes
Claims other papers make about this one
Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?
In the citing paper
“In particular, the initial stage of a romantic relationship has been associated with greater neural activity in the left posterior cingulate cortex and caudate regions (Aron et al., 2005; Bartels and Zeki, 2000; Kim et al., 2009) as compared to later stages of the relationship.”
From Oxytocin during the initial stages of romantic attachment: Relations to couples’ interactive reciprocity (2012) · cites this paper as Bartels and Zeki, 2000
In the citing paper
“On the other hand, activations of cortical regions including the anterior cingulate, insular cortex, and ventral pallidum were increased in long-term pair-bonds (Aron et al., 2005; Bartels and Zeki, 2000; Kim et al., 2009).”
From Oxytocin during the initial stages of romantic attachment: Relations to couples’ interactive reciprocity (2012) · cites this paper as Bartels and Zeki, 2000
In the citing paper
“Interestingly, individuals in long-term romantic relationships show similar activation of DA-rich rewards and social regions when viewing pictures of their partner [46,47].”
From The Neurobiology of Love and Pair Bonding from Human and Animal Perspectives (2023) · cites this paper as [47]
In the citing paper
“The caudate and putamen also show activation upon exposure to partner stimuli, and these regions are involved in emotional processing, motivation, and reward, as well as the execution of movement.”
From The Neurobiology of Love and Pair Bonding from Human and Animal Perspectives (2023) · cites this paper as [47]
In the citing paper
“Other regions involved in emotional processing are activated when viewing or thinking about a long-term partner. These include the IC and ACC, which are both associated with complex social processes such as empathy and in integrating social, sensory, and emotional information [46,47].”
From The Neurobiology of Love and Pair Bonding from Human and Animal Perspectives (2023) · cites this paper as [47]
In the citing paper
“Additionally, the CP is activated in humans when viewing the faces of loved ones, and this activation is correlated with romantic love and passion scores (Bartels and Zeki 2000; Aron et al 2005; Acevedo et al 2012).”
From The behavioral, anatomical and pharmacological parallels between social attachment, love and addiction (2012) · cites this paper as Bartels and Zeki 2000
In the citing paper
“The Social Rejection task was modeled after ( i ) fMRI research that used photographs provided by participants to elicit powerful emotions, including maternal love, romantic love, and rejection (8, 44 -46), and ( ii ) behavioral research indicating that cueing people to recall autobiographical rejection experiences is an effective way of reactivating social rejection-related distress (e.g., refs.”
From Social rejection shares somatosensory representations with physical pain (2011) · cites this paper as [45]
In the citing paper
“Neuroimaging studies showed that brain regions implicated in feelings of reward, such as the VTA, NAcc, and caudate that were previously documented in pair bond formation in animal species, are activated during the perception of romantic partner’s face (Acevedo et al. 2012; Aron et al. 2005; Bartels and Zeki 2000; Scheele et al. 2013).”
From A precision medicine approach to oxytocin trials (2017) · cites this paper as Bartels and Zeki 2000
Citations
Cites
An Information-Maximization Approach to Blind Separation and Blind Deconvolution
Bell, A. J., & Sejnowski, T. J. (1995) · Neural Computation · doi:10.1162/neco.1995.7.6.1129 · Cited by 8,986
Romantic love conceptualized as an attachment process.
Hazan, C., & Shaver, P. (1987) · Journal of Personality and Social Psychology · doi:10.1037/0022-3514.52.3.511 · Cited by 6,247
(1996) · Cited by 3,692
Contributions of anterior cingulate cortex to behaviour
Devinsky, O., Morrell, M. J., & Vogt, B. A. (1995) · Brain · doi:10.1093/brain/118.1.279 · Cited by 3,377
Sternberg, R. J. (1986) · Psychological Review · doi:10.1037/0033-295x.93.2.119 · Cited by 2,614
Interacting Minds--A Biological Basis
Frith, C. D., & Frith, U. (1999) · Science · doi:10.1126/science.286.5445.1692 · Cited by 1,714
Neural mechanisms subserving the perception of human actions
Decety, J. (1999) · Trends in Cognitive Sciences · doi:10.1016/s1364-6613(99)01312-1 · Cited by 925
The retrosplenial cortex and emotion: new insights from functional neuroimaging of the human brain
Maddock, R. J. (1999) · Trends in Neurosciences · doi:10.1016/s0166-2236(98)01374-5 · Cited by 733
Measuring passionate love in intimate relationships
Hatfield, E. C., & Sprecher, S. (1986) · Journal of Adolescence · doi:10.1016/s0140-1971(86)80043-4 · Cited by 712
The architecture of the colour centre in the human visual brain: new results and a review *
Bartels, A., & Zeki, S. (2000) · European Journal of Neuroscience · doi:10.1046/j.1460-9568.2000.00905.x · Cited by 454
Self-citation
Research works printed but not linked: 2
- 1997, J Clin Psychiatry, 58, 4
- 2000, European Journal of Neuroscience, 12, 172
Cited by
Sorted by citations
Items 101–101 of 101
Amantes Sunt Amentes: Pathologizing Love and the Meaning of Suffering
Aurenque, D., & McDougall, C. W. (2013) · The American Journal of Bioethics · doi:10.1080/15265161.2013.839759 · Cited by 4
Metadata
- Authors
- Bartels, A., & Zeki, S.
- Affiliations
- University College London (GB)
- Venue
- NeuroReport
- Published
- 2000-11
- Volume
- 11
- Issue
- 17
- Pages
- 3829-3834
- ISSN
- 0959-4965 (ISSN-L)
- OpenAlex
- W2114251136
- Cited by
- 1,020
- References
- 16
- Citations by year
- 2026: 16 · 2025: 24 · 2024: 22 · 2023: 43 · 2022: 19 · 2021: 34 · 2020: 88 · 2019: 53 · 2018: 52 · 2017: 59 · 2016: 49 · 2015: 51 · 2014: 30 · 2013: 52 · 2012: 55
- FWCI
- 6.76
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Neuroreport (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- UCL Discovery (University College London) (submittedVersion)
- MPG.PuRe (Max Planck Society) (submittedVersion)
- Topics
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Neural and Behavioral Psychology Studies
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Endocrine and Autonomic Systems › Neuroendocrine regulation and behavior
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cellular and Molecular Neuroscience › Neurotransmitter Receptor Influence on Behavior
- Keywords
- romantic love, neural correlates of emotion, anterior cingulate cortex, caudate nucleus, putamen, amygdala, posterior cingulate cortex, hemispheric lateralization, romantic partners, affective states
- MeSH terms
- Adult, Arousal, Attention, Brain, Face, Female, Galvanic Skin Response, Humans, Image Processing, Computer-Assisted, Love, Magnetic Resonance Imaging, Male, Nervous System Physiological Phenomena, Sexual Behavior
About these checks
Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.
Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.
Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.
What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›
Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review
