Heartache or headache, pain process is similar, studies find

Los Angeles Times:

The brain’s shared pain network illustrates the link between body and mind, and it may help explain how emotional ups or downs affect health too.

Across cultures and language divides, people talk about the sting of social rejection as if it were a physical pain. We feel “burned” by a partner’s infidelity, “wounded” by a friend’s harsh words, “crushed” when a loved one fails us, “heartache” when spurned by a lover.

There’s a reason for that linguistic conflation, says a growing community of pain researchers: In our brains too, physical and social pain share much the same neural circuitry. In many ways, in fact, your brain may scarcely make a distinction between a verbal and physical insult.

Read the whole story: Los Angeles Times