Pricing Emotions

British & Hong Kong students chose how much they'd spend (£10 - £150), for 1 hour, to enjoy positive emotions or avoid negative emotions.

British students paid more for positive emotions: love was most valued (£95), then happiness, then avoiding sadness ... disgust was the least valued emotion to avoid (£43). Hong Kong students valued experiencing positive emotions = to avoiding negative. Head-to-head, Brits paid more for "happiness, delight and calm"; Hong Kong students paid more to "avoid regret, embarrassment and frustration."

Researchers noted, "By putting price-tags on emotions we might come closer to understanding the value of human experience in order to aid policies at enhancing well-being."

Arranged Love Lasting, "Real" Love ... Not so Much

Research found that arranged marriages can surpass love marriages in regards to long-term contentment and love.

For example, a study compared love in love marriages vs. arranged marriages in India. Love in the love marriages starts out very high but decreases over time. In arranged marriages, the love starts out relatively low (people often don't know each other well before marriage) and increases gradually. In fact, it surpasses love marriage love in 5 years. In 10 years, its double.

Motion Affects Mood

A study shows that in speed-dating, those in stationary positions are more picky than those who move around the room. When men moved around the room they were more open and women, as expected, were more picky. But when men sat and women moved, women became more open and men were more picky. Scientists have yet to explain why.

Sick For Love

PLoS One reports that staring at your beloved’s face can reduce pain.

The study found that college students who looked at pictures of their partners felt less pain than those who were given something distracting to think about. fMRI scans revealed that love-induced pain relief was linked to activity in the brain's reward centers (e.g. amygdala) and in the limbic areas that affect emotion. Distraction-induced pain relief, however, mostly occurred along cognitive pathways.