Reward, Addiction, and Emotion Regulation Systems Associated With Rejection in Love
Abstract
Romantic rejection causes a profound sense of loss and negative affect. It can induce clinical depression and in extreme cases lead to suicide and/or homicide. To begin to identify the neural systems associated with this natural loss state, we used functional magnetic resonance imaging to study 10 women and 5 men who had recently been rejected by a partner but reported they were still intensely “in love.” Participants alternately viewed a photograph of their rejecting beloved and a photograph of a familiar, individual, interspersed with a distraction-attention task. Their responses while looking at their rejecter included love, despair, good, and bad memories, and wondering why this happened. Activation specific to the image of the beloved occurred in areas associated with gains and losses, craving and emotion regulation and included the ventral tegmental area (VTA) bilaterally, ventral striatum, medial and lateral orbitofrontal/prefrontal cortex, and cingulate gyrus. Compared with data from happily-in-love individuals, the regional VTA activation suggests that mesolimbic reward/survival systems are involved in romantic passion regardless of whether one is happily or unhappily in love. Forebrain activations associated with motivational relevance, gain/loss, cocaine craving, addiction, and emotion regulation suggest that higher-order systems subject to experience and learning also may mediate the rejection reaction. The results show activation of reward systems, previously identified by monetary stimuli, in a natural, endogenous, negative emotion state. Activation of areas involved in cocaine addiction may help explain the obsessive behaviors associated with rejection in love.
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The Social Rejection task was modeled after prior fMRI research using photographs to elicit powerful emotions and behavioral research indicating that cueing recall of autobiographical rejection experiences effectively reactivates social rejection-related distress.
“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 [8]
Romantic love, both while someone is actively in love and after they have experienced rejection from a break-up, but not sexual arousal, involves ventral tegmental activation, whereas sexual arousal, but not love, involves ventral striatal activation.
“For example, romantic love, both while someone is actively in love and after they have experienced rejection from a break-up, but not sexual arousal, involves ventral tegmental activation (generally associated with pleasure, focused attention, and motivation to pursue rewards), whereas sexual arousal, but not love, involves ventral striatal activation (associated with motivation and predictive”
From Becoming a sexual being: The “elephant in the room” of adolescent brain development (2017) · cites this paper as Fisher et al., 2010
Both romantic love and sex are goal-oriented motivations accompanied by strong emotional responses, by activating dopamine-rich, reward processing and motivational systems.
“By activating dopamine-rich, reward processing and motivational systems, both romantic love and sex are goal-oriented motivations accompanied by strong emotional responses (Aron et al., 2005, Fisher et al., 2010).”
From Becoming a sexual being: The “elephant in the room” of adolescent brain development (2017) · cites this paper as Fisher et al., 2010
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- Authors
- Fisher, H. E., Brown, L. L., Aron, A., Strong, G., & Mashek, D.
- Affiliations
- Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey (US)
- Albert Einstein College of Medicine (US)
- Stony Brook University (US)
- Corresponding author
- Brown, Lucy L.
- Venue
- Journal of Neurophysiology
- Publisher
- American Physiological Society
- Published
- 2010-07
- Volume
- 104
- Issue
- 1
- Pages
- 51-60
- ISSN
- 0022-3077 (ISSN-L)
- 1522-1598
- OpenAlex
- W2159246984
- Semantic Scholar
- a82b5038ef6791731d01465495e5435e63655eb9
- Cited by
- 328
- References
- 94
- Citations by year
- 2026: 12 · 2025: 12 · 2024: 7 · 2023: 19 · 2022: 16 · 2021: 31 · 2020: 103 · 2019: 11 · 2018: 15 · 2017: 7 · 2016: 11 · 2015: 19 · 2014: 20 · 2013: 16 · 2012: 15
- FWCI
- 5.82
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Journal of Neurophysiology (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Topics
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cellular and Molecular Neuroscience › Neurotransmitter Receptor Influence on Behavior
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Neural and Behavioral Psychology Studies
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Social Psychology › Neuroendocrine regulation and behavior
- Keywords
- romantic rejection, love, reward systems, addiction, emotion regulation, ventral tegmental area, ventral striatum, orbitofrontal cortex, cingulate gyrus, cocaine craving, mesolimbic system, loss, obsessive behavior
- MeSH terms
- Adolescent, Brain, Brain Mapping, Emotions, Female, Grief, Humans, Image Processing, Computer-Assisted, Love, Magnetic Resonance Imaging, Male, Obsessive Behavior, Pair Bond, Photic Stimulation, Rejection, Psychology, Reward, Time Factors, Behavior, Addictive, Young Adult
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