Oxytocin nasal spray makes people trusting -- even gullible

By Cory Doctorow at 10:08 pm Wednesday, Jun 1

Researchers have created an oxytocin nasal spray that makes recipients more trusting. Oxytocin is a hormone associated with happiness and reproduction. It's thought that oxytocin causes newborns and mothers to bond. If you squirt oxytocin up your nose, though, it seems you become a patsy, ready for any slick-talking politico or boiler-room dealer to clean you out.

"Of course, this finding could be misused," said Ernst Fehr of the University of Zurich, the senior researcher in the study, which appears in Thursday's issue of the journal Nature. "I don't think we currently have such abuses. However, in the future it could happen..."

Of 29 subjects who got oxytocin, 45 percent invested the maximum amount of 12 monetary units and, in the researchers' words, showed "maximal trust." Only 21 percent had a lower trust level in which they invested less than 8 monetary units.

In contrast, the placebo group's trust behavior was reversed. Only 21 percent of the placebo subjects invested the maximum, while 45 percent invested at low levels.

Overall, those who got oxytocin invested 17 percent more than investors who received a placebo.

Link (Thanks, Tom!)