AI Article Synopsis
- Neuroimaging studies indicate that the anterior insula is linked to feelings of love, while the posterior insula is associated with lust.
- A case study of a male patient with a specific lesion in the anterior insula showed that he performed well in tasks related to lust, but struggled with tasks related to love.
- This evidence suggests that the anterior insula is critical for processing love, but not for lust, supporting a gradient from physical to emotional evaluation in relationships.
Article Abstract
Neuroimaging studies have found a correlation between activation in the anterior insula and love, and a correlation between activation in the posterior insula and lust. The present control-case study describes a neurological male patient, with a rare, circumscribed lesion in the anterior insula, whom we tested using a decision task that required he judge whether each of a series of attractive individuals could be the object of his love or lust. The patient, in contrast with neurologically typical participants matched on age, gender, and ethnicity, performed normally when making decisions about lust but showed a selective deficit when making decisions about love. These results provide the first clinical evidence indicating that the anterior insula may play an instrumental role in love but not lust more generally. These data support the notion of a posterior-to-anterior insular gradient, from sensorimotor to abstract representations, in the evaluation of anticipatory rewards in interpersonal relationships.
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| http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4222039 | PMC |
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