The words love and sex are common terms in modern society, but their definitions elude clear distinctions.
Some think sex is just an act, but others think it can mean much more.
“Sex is the highest level you can reach concerning your experience of love with someone else,” said Sarah Ricau, an English freshman.
Conversely, according to Stephen Lancaster, a liberal arts sophomore, sex has nothing to do with love.
“Sex is two people looking to express themselves physically,” Lancaster said.
Love is often associated with a much deeper feeling or a much deeper action.
“Everyone should experience love,” said Ross Ulowetz, a mechanical engineering freshman. “It’s like the old cliche saying, ‘better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all.”
“Love is more emotional than sex,” said Wesley Boudreaux, a mechanical engineering freshman. “It affects who you are.”
To Ricau love is not just a feeling.
“Love is a choice, not a euphoric feeling,” Ricau said. “It’s an active choice to show someone you love them.”
Students are not the only ones with contestable definitions of love
and sex.
Scientists and psychologists both have difficulty defining the terms.
“[Attempts] to define love are not very successful,” said James Geer, psychology professor emeritus. “To say the field is unanimous is not true.”
Romantic love is often associated with monogamy.
According to an article in “The Economist” published in Feb. 12, humans are part of the only three percent of mammals who are monogamous.
Geer said that just because humans are supposedly monogamous does not necessarily mean they always behave that way.
“There are lots of humans that do not have monogamous relationships,” Geer said.
Humans seek mates, and that concept is, of course, associated with love.
Many psychologists associate love with sex.
According to Geer, love has a notion or component of attraction, specifically sexual attraction, much like Freudian psychology.
Freud viewed love as a product of sexual instincts through learning that a certain sexual partner provides sexual satisfaction accompanied by sexual attraction. He believed that almost all types of love contained some sexual connotations.
But Yoshinori Kamo, a sociology professor, disagrees and does not believe sex is involved in each kind of love.
“Not all love is a twisted form of sexual drive,” Kamo said. “You need basic affection for someone you can trust. You need to feel secure through someone else’s approval and affection by somebody else.”
However he does agree that romantic love has sexual connotations.
If sex is associated with love, then sex goes beyond just a means of human reproduction.
According to the book “Society and Sex in Sweden” by B. Linner, 98 percent of all sex acts are for pleasure as opposed to for procreation, and American statistics would seem to pose a similar number.
To some students sex is a human need.
To Ulowetz, sex is not necessary for human life.
“It is not a need of humans, but I tend to need it,” Ulowetz said.
But Lancaster thinks humans need sex to survive.
“It is definitely a need,” Lancaster said. “It is a natural compulsion.”
Psychologically, this pleasurable sex act is not necessary according to Geer.
“[Sex] is not a need that is required,” Geer said. “To say it is a need and you cannot live without it is not true. Most priests do not have sex and you do not see them dying off because of it.”
Pleasurable sex is not a requirement of life, but once the brain feels the pleasure associated with this act, it can change its structure.
According to Dr. Alan Baumeister, a psychology professor, the brain works on a reward and pleasure circuitry.
“The whole purpose of the system is to create approach behavior,” Baumeister said. “The organism needs, in order to survive, to approach certain things in the environment. If stimulation is pleasurable, the system is going to approach it again in the future.”
Baumeister said he would not be surprised if sex was similar to some drugs, which when entered into the pleasure system, change the brain’s workings permanently, causing them to crave this stimulus throughout their life.
According to the textbook for Geer’s psychology class “Psychology: the brain, the person, the world,” there are four motives in humans for having sex falling under the dimensions of self or social.
In a social sense, sex could be used as an escape, to avoid or minimize negative social experiences, or in other situations sex could be used to enhance social connections.
When pertaining to the person’s sense of self, sex could be used to enhance positive emotions or experience, or conversely to escape, avoid or minimize negative emotions or threats to self-esteem.
However, to many, sex is a manifestation of love.
“Sex is a bond between a couple,” said Helen Nguyen, a dental hygiene freshman. “It’s with someone you love and care about.”
Love and sex also have scientific ramifications in the brain.
The brain houses several complex components, and love, like all other brain functions occurs chemically.
“Love absolutely has to be something that happens in the brain, where else would it be?” Geer said.
The brain is constantly releasing chemicals and sex is no different.
During the point of orgasm, the brain releases the hormone oxytocin.
Dr. Alan Baumeister, a psychology professor, said that oxytocin is a chemical often associated with bonding behaviors.
Oxytocin according to Geer is released in several situations when attachments occur, besides sex it is also released in breast feeding. In some cases, scientists have even referred to the hormone as the “cuddle chemical.”
According to Helen Fisher, a researcher for Rutgers University, the behavioral patterns of those in love resemble obsessive compulsive disorder.
In “The Economist,” Fisher suggests that drugs such as Prozac could keep levels of serotonin in the brain long enough to inhibit the feelings of love. This could potentially mean that people on Prozac and other antidepressants could be harming their potential ability to fall in love.
Geer explained that serotonin is a neurotransmitter which stimulates nerve cells related to mood regulation. Prozac is a SRI, a serotonin re-uptake inhibitor which blocks reabsorption of chemicals in the brain.
Geer said that it is possible that SRI drugs like Prozac could dampen the effects of love.
“It could have that kind of effect but also so could sticking a knife in your brain,” Geer said.
Almost all professionals interviewed said research in the fields of sex and love are lacking. People fear the subject and often it is hard to rationalize funding for research.
Even if scientists solidify the chemical processes of the brain during sex, its results would be contested.