Reason for submission: user claims to "been studied" neuroscience for a while now, cites 0 sources and just names names of hormones to "prove" that polyamory can be cured. Seems to wildly misinterpret the concept of oxytocin bonding.
Also, as far as there is any validity to attachment theory, people don't have a single attachment style. I also can't find any particular research that suggests polyamorous people have been observed to have any unusual propensity towards an avoidant attachment style.
I think it's pretty safe to say this person did no actual research. At best they watched a misinformed youtube video/pseudoscience article, at worst they heard the concept of "avoidant attachment" and ran away with it to use it to suit their own conclusions
The "92 percent of open marriages fail" stat is all over the blogosphere. Often this is spiced up with phrases like "according to a recent study," even though the stat is far older than the article.
I suspect this figure is entirely made up, but if it isn't, the original source must be over a decade old and hard to track down. But it is the sort of thing you would find if looking specifically for therapists explaining why "poly bad."
I looked at OP's comments a bit and that claim was the only one they actually provided a source for when someone asked. Unsurprisingly, it's a blog post that doesn't cite anything, just says the claim out of the blue. So you're right on the money. The only other thing OP reveals is that their ideas on attachment theory come from one Adam Lane Smith, an "attachment theory expert". Googling him tells me he's a pop-psychology media personality and "Formerly a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist" (from his own website), and no actual credentials or links to any of his research (which I doubt exists). This whole thing reeks of a grift for me
If the figure is at all correct, I suspect that most failing open marriages aren't poly people trying to build a sustainable relationship but mono people who want a pass to cheat.
That. Plus there's some people who decide to open their marriage BECAUSE they're in deep trouble. And of course in those cases, they'll usually find that they're *still* in deep trouble.
It's not an entirely implausible figure to be honest. A little higher than I would expect, but reasonable. It's possible it comes from some real study.
I think attachment theory is valid in the case of children with attachment trauma while they’re actually still children and the only significant attachment figure is their parents whom they obviously can’t control lol
It's one of those psychological theories/constructs that does definitely have something going for it, but also gets latched on to by some people as like 'this is the magic key to all human behaviour!'.
Yes lol one of those things where people learned about it and broadly applied it to everything they believe ETA: and obviously in order to do so they have to wildly oversimplify and misunderstand the concept LMAO
This is why ACTUAL psychologists speak in terms of modalities. Some are more geared to certain disorders (ie exposure and response for OCD, DBT for BPD.) But still, any patient can respond to any treatment. Because humans are complex and unique. CBT is the recommended therapy for anxiety disorder, but it made me worse. Did old school talk therapy and got loads better. No psych professional worth their salt believes in any single cure all theory.
Also, as far as there is any validity to attachment theory, people don't have a single attachment style.
This is inaccurate. You should really read more about attachment theory. Attachment styles are frequently consistent across multiple separate relationships, including with parents, friends, romantic partners and offspring.
One thing I learned is that people with avoidant attachment styles (which led me down a rabbit hole of learning attachment theory) are zero oxytocin, and many of them are polyamorous as well.
Zero oxytocin?
I wonder what sort of "research" people like this do. I hear this all the time. They "went down the rabbit hole" doing research and then just announce all these patently false things with zero explanation. Where could they have learned that? Random conspiracy videos?
Attachment theory is also not neuroscience. It's more of a theoretical framework to understand behavior, but most certainly not some highly neuroscientific concept.
They "cited" one of their "facts" in the comments.
The citation is a blog post that throws out some numbers without any support whatsoever. "What's the evidence" the blog post asks, followed by "well, 92% of open marriages fail" and that's... the evidence. The claim itself. That's it.
I think this is partially because high school stresses citing your sources so hard that people sometimes come away with the idea of simply being able to name where they read a thing makes it valid. No, being able to write out in MLA the bs blog you heard about on tiktok means you can't get a 0 due to plagiarism. You can still get a 0 for being an illiterate moron.
I saw a post once that people treat neurotransmitters like they're the four humours. Like replace oxytocin with sanguine humour and replace cortisol with black bile and this could pass for a medieval text.
You're so right, that's exactly what it sounds like. With some gender essentialism thrown in. I mean just look at this comment of OP's:
The way it was explained to me, vasopressin is the "struggle bonding" hormone, as opposed to oxytocin the "love bonding" hormone.
Where oxytocin is built up by cuddling, sex, good times in general, etc, vasopressin is built up by common struggle, like building something together, solving puzzles together, surviving danger together, etc.
I remember also seeing a presentation by Adam Lane Smith, and vasopressin bonding was revealed to be how one bonds with a male partner.
If a woman is oxytocin bonded with her partner, she thinks "I'm in love with this person".
If a man is oxytocin bonded with his partner, he thinks "I really like this person and I want to spend time with them". If a man has oxytocin AND vasopressin towards their partner, THEN they think "I'm in love with this person".
novelty dopamine from sex (which results from sexual activity with someone NOT oxytocin bonded) lowers existing oxytocin bonds; this is why cheaters (even those who don't get caught) have strained relationships with their spouses,
Oh wow!! I'd have never thought a person who cheats might not be super happy and in love with their partner otherwise! :)
You’re totally right here though; understanding neuroscience can lead to you being extremely monogamous (what a terrible thing), and they hate that.
The top comment. Ah yes, that is totally how this works. Pseudoscience aside, if having to deal daily with the outcomes of spherical earth isn't enough to change people's minds, how is neuroscience going to cure someone's orientation?
I was shocked to see 180 up votes for something so unsupported and strange. Can't believe there's a whole sub to be critical of poly people. What a strange fixation to have on a life that isn't yours.
Attachment theory is a useful framework, but I am so exhausted with seeing psychological terms used interchangeably with neiroscientific ideas. Attachment theory isn't some hard-core science, and that's OK. I would love to hear where oop heard any of this information.
The sub seems to be a mix of people who are bitter at their poly ex's, some of whom may genuinely have been bad or abusive people, and your standard small-c conservative handwringing about 'cultural degeneracy' dressed up in therapy speak.
If I had a nickel for every time I've come across a new subculture of weirdos using bogus neuroscience to invalidate a part of my identity and lived experience I would, sadly, have considerably more than two nickels.
For any of this to make sense, we have to establish that the majority of poly people have avoidant attachment styles, and that most instances of avoidant attachment styles have something to do with oxytocin, which I think are massive assumptions and I would be very surprised if the most consistent cause cause and destruction of poly relationships is
Poly—> therefore probably avoidant attachment—->therefore oxytocin is somehow a casual factor.
I say this as someone mildly critical of the idea of polyamory.
I mean, anything can be "cured" if you throw enough pills at it. I work with a guy that takes a lot of pills to cure what's wrong with him. He also looks lifeless, asks the same questions every time I see him, and can't take a crap in the men's room without getting it everywhere. I assume that is better than whatever he needs the pills for, I guess.
I guess my point is not everything needs to be cured if it literally hurts nobody.
The funny thing about this is that one of the biggest books in the community rn is about attachment theory written by an actual professional. The community doesn't hate neuroscience. It hates people trying to proclaim people's relationships are invalid.
I keep running into these weird fascist subreddits.
What the hell does "curing polyamory" mean? It's a relationship style! It's not an identity! It's like someone was intentionally trying to reheat homophobia to reuse, and so they pulled things that were just totally irrelevant and that look stupid because they mirror homophobia.
I know that all forms of bigotry are irrational, but getting mad about polyamoury just feels particularly weird. Like with gay or trans people you usually have "muh groomers" but why are people getting pressed about poly people? Are they mad they fuck more or something? I don't get it
They used to shoot Mormons over it. It's an extremely old prejudice and well supported by scripture. It's also pretty normal to be bigoted against people who have sex differently from you in any way.
"One thing I learned is that people with avoidant attachment styles (which led me down a rabbit hole of learning attachment theory) are(have?) zero oxytocin, and many of them are polyamorous as well."
I find it very annoying that people who have no idea what they are talking about ascribe specific and narrow functions to neurotransmitters. I am not a neuroscientist by any means, but it doesn't take a very large leap in logic to realize that it is more nuanced and complicated than that.
Reason for submission: user claims to "been studied" neuroscience for a while now, cites 0 sources and just names names of hormones to "prove" that polyamory can be cured. Seems to wildly misinterpret the concept of oxytocin bonding.
Also, as far as there is any validity to attachment theory, people don't have a single attachment style. I also can't find any particular research that suggests polyamorous people have been observed to have any unusual propensity towards an avoidant attachment style.
I think it's pretty safe to say this person did no actual research. At best they watched a misinformed youtube video/pseudoscience article, at worst they heard the concept of "avoidant attachment" and ran away with it to use it to suit their own conclusions
The "92 percent of open marriages fail" stat is all over the blogosphere. Often this is spiced up with phrases like "according to a recent study," even though the stat is far older than the article.
I suspect this figure is entirely made up, but if it isn't, the original source must be over a decade old and hard to track down. But it is the sort of thing you would find if looking specifically for therapists explaining why "poly bad."
I looked at OP's comments a bit and that claim was the only one they actually provided a source for when someone asked. Unsurprisingly, it's a blog post that doesn't cite anything, just says the claim out of the blue. So you're right on the money. The only other thing OP reveals is that their ideas on attachment theory come from one Adam Lane Smith, an "attachment theory expert". Googling him tells me he's a pop-psychology media personality and "Formerly a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist" (from his own website), and no actual credentials or links to any of his research (which I doubt exists). This whole thing reeks of a grift for me
[removed]
It's always the same story, isn't it...
If the figure is at all correct, I suspect that most failing open marriages aren't poly people trying to build a sustainable relationship but mono people who want a pass to cheat.
That. Plus there's some people who decide to open their marriage BECAUSE they're in deep trouble. And of course in those cases, they'll usually find that they're *still* in deep trouble.
It's not an entirely implausible figure to be honest. A little higher than I would expect, but reasonable. It's possible it comes from some real study.
I think attachment theory is valid in the case of children with attachment trauma while they’re actually still children and the only significant attachment figure is their parents whom they obviously can’t control lol
It's one of those psychological theories/constructs that does definitely have something going for it, but also gets latched on to by some people as like 'this is the magic key to all human behaviour!'.
Yes lol one of those things where people learned about it and broadly applied it to everything they believe ETA: and obviously in order to do so they have to wildly oversimplify and misunderstand the concept LMAO
This is why ACTUAL psychologists speak in terms of modalities. Some are more geared to certain disorders (ie exposure and response for OCD, DBT for BPD.) But still, any patient can respond to any treatment. Because humans are complex and unique. CBT is the recommended therapy for anxiety disorder, but it made me worse. Did old school talk therapy and got loads better. No psych professional worth their salt believes in any single cure all theory.
This is inaccurate. You should really read more about attachment theory. Attachment styles are frequently consistent across multiple separate relationships, including with parents, friends, romantic partners and offspring.
https://www.xpressitall.in/_files/ugd/67f555_da4d265449564d73a1df727a9616fd67.pdf#page=166
Zero oxytocin?
I wonder what sort of "research" people like this do. I hear this all the time. They "went down the rabbit hole" doing research and then just announce all these patently false things with zero explanation. Where could they have learned that? Random conspiracy videos?
Attachment theory is also not neuroscience. It's more of a theoretical framework to understand behavior, but most certainly not some highly neuroscientific concept.
They "cited" one of their "facts" in the comments.
The citation is a blog post that throws out some numbers without any support whatsoever. "What's the evidence" the blog post asks, followed by "well, 92% of open marriages fail" and that's... the evidence. The claim itself. That's it.
That's how these people do "research"
The more a statistic is reblogged, the truer it becomes.
I think this is partially because high school stresses citing your sources so hard that people sometimes come away with the idea of simply being able to name where they read a thing makes it valid. No, being able to write out in MLA the bs blog you heard about on tiktok means you can't get a 0 due to plagiarism. You can still get a 0 for being an illiterate moron.
I saw a post once that people treat neurotransmitters like they're the four humours. Like replace oxytocin with sanguine humour and replace cortisol with black bile and this could pass for a medieval text.
You're so right, that's exactly what it sounds like. With some gender essentialism thrown in. I mean just look at this comment of OP's:
"the way it was explained to me" lol, clearly an expert
Oh wow!! I'd have never thought a person who cheats might not be super happy and in love with their partner otherwise! :)
The top comment. Ah yes, that is totally how this works. Pseudoscience aside, if having to deal daily with the outcomes of spherical earth isn't enough to change people's minds, how is neuroscience going to cure someone's orientation?
I was shocked to see 180 up votes for something so unsupported and strange. Can't believe there's a whole sub to be critical of poly people. What a strange fixation to have on a life that isn't yours.
Attachment theory is a useful framework, but I am so exhausted with seeing psychological terms used interchangeably with neiroscientific ideas. Attachment theory isn't some hard-core science, and that's OK. I would love to hear where oop heard any of this information.
The sub seems to be a mix of people who are bitter at their poly ex's, some of whom may genuinely have been bad or abusive people, and your standard small-c conservative handwringing about 'cultural degeneracy' dressed up in therapy speak.
A bunch of people there seem to be conflating polyamory with cheating too…
For every sub that celebrates something or someone, theres a sub thats solely for hating it or the community. Theres some odd af hate subs...
r/doghate and simmilar pet hate subs are particularly bad ones.
I'm a poly person with a neuroscience background. I very much don't hate neuroscience.
As a queer who’s dated a lot of poly ppl if anything I’ve run into neuroscience on the first date as a common issue
What is that sub lmao
A crab bucket
If I had a nickel for every time I've come across a new subculture of weirdos using bogus neuroscience to invalidate a part of my identity and lived experience I would, sadly, have considerably more than two nickels.
Not poly, but in the same boat of bogus science used to invalidate my identity.
Keep on doing you. You're just too awesome and this
faketotally real science just can't handle how great you are.For any of this to make sense, we have to establish that the majority of poly people have avoidant attachment styles, and that most instances of avoidant attachment styles have something to do with oxytocin, which I think are massive assumptions and I would be very surprised if the most consistent cause cause and destruction of poly relationships is Poly—> therefore probably avoidant attachment—->therefore oxytocin is somehow a casual factor.
I say this as someone mildly critical of the idea of polyamory.
I mean, anything can be "cured" if you throw enough pills at it. I work with a guy that takes a lot of pills to cure what's wrong with him. He also looks lifeless, asks the same questions every time I see him, and can't take a crap in the men's room without getting it everywhere. I assume that is better than whatever he needs the pills for, I guess.
I guess my point is not everything needs to be cured if it literally hurts nobody.
Rule 1 of the sub is satisfied.
Vasopressin is also released post orgasm. So one should go to orgies and have as many as possible to cure polyamory by this person's logic.
Holy hell, that sub. 😬
Any and all subs that follow the pattern <minority>critical are dumpster-fires of hatred and barely coherent rants.
The funny thing about this is that one of the biggest books in the community rn is about attachment theory written by an actual professional. The community doesn't hate neuroscience. It hates people trying to proclaim people's relationships are invalid.
Right? I only know about avoidant attachment styles because my girlfriend's partner was recommended Polysecure... by one of our other metas.
They really created a sub to hate on a sexuality damn don't like it don't do it
Pseudoscientific explanations or not, I really don't want dating advice from someone who thinks polyamory needs to be cured.
I keep running into these weird fascist subreddits.
What the hell does "curing polyamory" mean? It's a relationship style! It's not an identity! It's like someone was intentionally trying to reheat homophobia to reuse, and so they pulled things that were just totally irrelevant and that look stupid because they mirror homophobia.
I love the top comment, from a person who says they’re against celebrity crushes. What a fun new moral panic.
damn, I can’t believe my partner and I are both cheating on each other with anne hathaway…
Whats more interesting is mentioning how oxytocin reduces free will.
I know that all forms of bigotry are irrational, but getting mad about polyamoury just feels particularly weird. Like with gay or trans people you usually have "muh groomers" but why are people getting pressed about poly people? Are they mad they fuck more or something? I don't get it
They used to shoot Mormons over it. It's an extremely old prejudice and well supported by scripture. It's also pretty normal to be bigoted against people who have sex differently from you in any way.
https://youtu.be/ENnAa7rqtBM
People are so quick to try to leverage science to dismiss things which are non traditional or queer.
i stopped reading after he said:
"One thing I learned is that people with avoidant attachment styles (which led me down a rabbit hole of learning attachment theory)
are(have?) zero oxytocin, and many of them are polyamorous as well."For a second I thought it said "oxycotin", like the painkiller
Blocked this user and muted this sub pretty fast. And I'll be the first to say that the main poly sub is an elitist cesspool.
I find it very annoying that people who have no idea what they are talking about ascribe specific and narrow functions to neurotransmitters. I am not a neuroscientist by any means, but it doesn't take a very large leap in logic to realize that it is more nuanced and complicated than that.