If you don’t have anybody to kiss you on Valentine’s Day, you’d better go out and find someone really soon, because it will not only make your day seem sunnier and brighter, but it will also do wonders for your state of mind.

Don’t take it from me, take it from the panel of scientists that have just revealed that kissing unleashes chemicals that relieve stress and also push for bonding where men are concerned, although in women, the urge to bond is not that high.

Wendy Hill, dean of the faculty and a professor of neuroscience at Lafayette College, stated in a meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science that was held Friday, that chemicals in the saliva could serve as as way for people to evaluate their partners.

Furthermore, Hill said that a study involving pairs of heterosexual college students who had kissed for 15 minutes while they had been listening to music had shown major altering in their levels of two chemicals, oxytocin and cortisol, which affect pair bonding and stress, respectively.

For the study, the participants’ levels of the chemicals in the blood and the saliva were measured before and after the kiss and the results were afterwards compared.

The findings showed that in both men and women, the level of cortisol had significantly dropped after having kissed , which translates as a decline in their stress levels.

Moreover, where the women were concerned, their oxytocin levels decreased, whereas for men, they registered an increase, which is a surprising discovery since the chemical affects the feeling and the desire to bond with partners.