Why do brains dance?

Image from my-ballroom-dance-shoes.com

There are many reasons that people might choose to learn ballroom dancing. It is a highly social, physical activity, with the added potential for creative expression. These are all fine reasons, but primarily, I joined the thriving ballroom dance club at UCSD to meet girls.

As a cognitive neuroscience major here at UCSD, I don't find this surprising. Like most processes in the brain, the strong biological drives focusing on romantic partnership (and some of its associates) involve the release of various chemicals called neurotransmitters, which go on to generate meaningful electrical activity in the brain. The intensity of this response can be increased by the close contact and physical exertion experienced during social partner dances.

To name one famous example, dopamine is an important modulatory neurotransmitter. This means that it modifies the behavior of certain brain circuits in more subtle and indirect ways than other neurotransmitters. In addition to other functions, dopamine serves as a primary agent of the brain's broader system of motivation. Experiments have found that dopamine is released into certain parts of the brain when an unexpected reward is received, and the effects of this release tend to promote repetition of whichever recent action seems most responsible for the reward. Further research shows that as an action is rewarded in the same way repeatedly over time, the corresponding dopamine release tends to occur progressively sooner after the action is performed, rather than the after presentation of the reward itself.

If you'd like to learn more about how dopamine functions, how people research it, and what effects it has on people's lives, Scientific American has an interesting article on the subject: The Dope on Dopamine

As for me, I plan to continue dancing--and blogging about it. Thanks to dopamine, I've associated some very nice social rewards with ballroom dance, and thanks to cognitive science, I know something about why!