How to Boost Oxytocin Naturally: Simple Habits for Stronger Connections and Well-Being
If you've ever felt an overwhelming sense of warmth from a hug or experienced the deep bond that comes from spending time with loved ones, you’ve tapped into the powerful world of oxytocin. Often referred to as the "love hormone," oxytocin plays a crucial role in building connections, reducing stress, and fostering feelings of safety and trust.
In The DOSE Effect, neuroscientist TJ Power explains how balancing the four "happy chemicals"—dopamine, oxytocin, serotonin, and endorphins—can transform our mental and physical well-being.
If you’ve been following this series, you’re already familiar with dopamine, so for part two of this four part series, we’re diving deep into oxytocin.
Oxytocin is vital for bonding, social cohesion, and emotional well-being. In this article, we’ll explore how oxytocin helped our ancestors form strong social connections, how modern life can interfere with its production, and simple habits you can adopt to boost oxytocin and strengthen your relationships.
What is Oxytocin?
Oxytocin is a neurotransmitter that plays a key role in building confidence and forming connections. It’s often called the "love hormone" because it drives our innate desire to bond with others. For our ancestors, oxytocin was essential for strengthening social bonds and cooperation, which were crucial for early human communities.
Oxytocin influences many aspects of human connection, including:
Reproduction: Fostering bonds between romantic partners.
Parent-Child Attachment: Strengthening relationships crucial for offspring survival.
Social Cohesion: Encouraging coordinated actions in larger groups, such as hunting, gathering, and defense.
Stress Reduction: Promoting feelings of safety and connection, which helped reduce stress and anxiety, making it easier to navigate the challenges of early human life.
Without oxytocin, our ancestors would have struggled to form strong social bonds and cooperative groups, leading to weaker parenting and less effective community defense. This lack of cohesion could have made survival and reproduction significantly more challenging.
How Does Modern Society Prevent Us from Building Oxytocin?
Modern life is drastically different from that of our ancestors. In the past, social connection was limited to people in close proximity, social comparison was constrained to the tribe, and one’s sense of contribution was tied directly to fulfilling a role within the community. Romantic prospects were also confined to those nearby.
People spent their days working together, celebrating successes, offering support in tough times, and bonding through storytelling and other intimate activities. This kind of regular, face-to-face connection built oxytocin naturally.
Today, however, we often find ourselves trapped in endless cycles of social media scrolling, comparing our lives to unrealistic standards, and feeling self-conscious from constant video calls. We spend less time in direct connection with our core social groups, leading to increased loneliness, isolation, and self-doubt.
In his book DOSE, TJ Power identifies four main causes of low oxytocin in modern society:
Lack of Social Connection: Especially in-person interactions.
Phone Use During Social Time: Disrupting real-life connections.
Detrimental Online Comparison: Social media sets unrealistic expectations, fueling dissatisfaction.
Self-Criticism: Continually analyzing appearance and worth, leading to negative self-beliefs.
How to Rebuild Oxytocin?
To increase oxytocin levels, we need to reintroduce behaviors that once naturally boosted it. Here are a few practical ideas that TJ offers in his book:
Contribution: Contribution, like making a meal for someone, boosts oxytocin because it taps into our innate drive to connect and nurture. Helping others gives you a sense of purpose and belonging, which naturally boosts oxytocin. It reinforces the idea that you’re valued and needed within your social circle.
Contribution Idea: Help others regularly, like cooking a meal for someone or buying coffee for the person behind you in line, or bringing someone’s garbage bins in from the street after garbage pick up – simple things done regularly will make you feel a sense of belonging and connection to those around you.
Physical Touch, like hugging a person you love or a pet boosts oxytocin because it activates sensory receptors in your skin that send signals to the brain that tell the brain to both lower cortisol levels (reducing stress), and elevate Oxytocin levels (promoting feelings of calm and safety).
Physical Touch Idea: After just five seconds of physical touch, your body releases oxytocin. Make a plan to hug more often—whether it’s people or pets– and with the people you feel comfortable asking to do it with you, tell them you want to hug for five seconds!
Practicing Gratitude, like writing down what you’re grateful for in a journal, boosts oxytocin because it shifts your focus from stress and negativity to positive, heartwarming thoughts, which reduce stress hormones (cortisol) and increases feel-good chemicals (including oxytocin), which promotes a sense of contentment and well-being.
Gratitude Idea: Replace comparison with gratitude by focusing on specific moments. For example, instead of vaguely appreciating family, think of a memory that brings you joy, like a conversation with a grandparent.
Example: “I’m grateful to have a grandmother who is 90 and still sharp. She always shares family stories I didn’t know, and I love how she calls me ‘darling.’ Her dedication to preserving memories has influenced my own desire to do the same.”
Summary
Oxytocin, the “love hormone,” is crucial for forming bonds, reducing stress, and fostering social cohesion. While it naturally boosted survival for our ancestors, modern society often undermines it through isolation, social media comparison, and lack of physical touch.
To rebuild oxytocin, focus on human connection, meaningful contribution, physical affection, and gratitude.
