ABSTRACT
Fisher (this volume) argues that the human brain contains three neural systems designed, in part, to adaptively guide individuals through the sociosexual process of courtship and reproduction. Lust functions to motivate the sex drive in general and involves androgenic brain systems. Romantic Love is intended to focus sexual interests on one individual and primarily involves dopaminergic systems. Attachment is designed to maintain sexual interests over time, at least long enough to rear a child, and involves oxytocin and related brain systems. The evidence reviewed by Fisher here and elsewhere (Fisher, 1992, 1998; Fisher et al., 2002) is compelling. These three fundamental systems likely evolved within the human brain (though perhaps not solely for reproduction, per se), and they probably exert the kinds of predictable influences on adolescent sexuality postulated by Fisher and her colleagues.
