Oxytocin may not be as critical to monogamous relationships as we once thought.
“Omnia vincit amor,” wrote the poet Virgil over 2,000 years ago at the end of a collection of bucolic poetry, the first recorded instance of the phrase “love conquers all.” Important context is that this moment was not actually triumphant: In the eclogue, the heartbroken speaker is bemoaning an unrequited love.
“We were all shocked that no matter how many different ways we tried to test this, the voles demonstrated a very robust social attachment with their sexual partner, as strong as their normal counterparts,” to snip out a portion of the gene that codes for the oxytocin receptor in vole embryos, rendering it useless. Prairie voles that do not produce this receptor would not be able to recognize and respond to the presence of oxytocin—so if oxytocin was the make-or-break for spousal and parental love, one would expect to see loveless vole marriages and neglected litters.
“For at least the last 10 years, people have been hoping for the possibility of oxytocin as a powerful therapeutic for helping people with social cognitive impairments due to conditions ranging from autism to schizophrenia,” Manoli said. “This research shows that there likely isn't a magic bullet for something as complex and nuanced as social behavior.”
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