Siblings shape us more than we realize. Armand DiMele traces how sibling bonds affect happiness and brain chemistry, explains the Westermarck effect and genetic sexual attraction, and connects the serotonin boost of sister-talk to why women need groups, gossip, and nail salons. Callers share their own sibling stories.
Oxytocin bonds us to partners and tribes, but new research suggests the same chemical that makes us trust also makes us exclude outsiders. Armand DiMele unpacks this paradox, arguing that deep love can quietly shrink a person’s world, and callers share their own experiences of friendships lost to relationships.
Love means something different to everyone, and Armand DiMele makes the case that it is fundamentally an internal feeling rather than a fixed set of behaviors or rules. He examines love as fear, possession, safety, sex, and even addiction, arguing that your version of love is valid whatever form it takes.
Relationships literally rewire us, and Armand DiMele unpacks why with co-hosts Linda Vanella, LCSW-R and Lisa Arnone, LCSW. Drawing on Norman Doidge’s neuroplasticity research and a Diane Ackerman essay on the brain in love, the conversation covers pheromones, mate selection, physical intimacy, and how what we attend to defines who we become.
