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Well, according to new research from Baylor College of Medicine (BCM) in Houston, Texas, the Texas Children’s Hospital, And University College London, it’s a pretty legitimate one. The recently published article in the journal Pediatrics, states that seeing your own baby’s smile actually lights up the reward centers in the brain, similar to the results observed in another study on drug addiction.

Researchers observed the brains of 28 first-time mothers of babies aged five to 10 months with a functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) scanner while they looked at photos of facial expressions of their own and other babies. Expressions varied from happy smiles to pouty-lipped and neutral expressions.

The results were certainly interesting:

• Certain dopamine-related reward centers in the brain “lit up” when mothers were looking at their own baby’s face. (Dopamine is the neurotransmitter in the brain commonly associated with mood control and emotional processing.)

• The most affected areas of the brain, the ventral tegmental area, the substania nigra regions, the striatum, and the two frontal lobes, are involved in the brain’s reward systems, cognition, and motor functions.

• The two frontal lobe sections that lit up are involved with emotional processing and cognition.

• The areas that lit up are the same that are affected in drug addictions.

The results, researchers say, may be able to help us understand the intricacies of the mother-baby bond perhaps even illuminate how it can sometimes go wrong.

Said Dr. Lane Strathearn, professor of pediatrics at BCM and a research associate at the college’s Human Neuroimaging Laboratory, in a statement, “The relationship between mothers and infants is critical for child development. For whatever reason, in some cases, that relationship does not develop normally. Neglect and abuse can result, with devastating effects on a child’s development.”

“Understanding how a mother responds uniquely to her own infant, when smiling or crying, maybe the first step in understanding the neural basis of mother-infant attachment,” Strathearn added.

As a whole, mother’s reacted most strongly to their own baby’s faces than to unknown faces, with the strongest reactions being to the happy faces. So the next time you’re feeling blue, why not initiate a bit of tickle time with your baby? It may just be the natural high you need.