Michael Liebowitz

Dr. Michael R. Liebowitz is a Columbia University psychiatrist and founder of the Anxiety Disorders Clinic, the first of its kind, at the New York State Psychiatric Institute. In 1985, he researched and highlighted an underrecognized status of Social Anxiety Disorder (SAD). This led to subsequent cognitive research and treatments for anxiety disorders. He created the Liebowitz social anxiety scale, now a widely used primary outcome measure in clinical research on SAD. He is also known for writing the popular 1983 book The Chemistry of Love, and for sparking the "chocolate theory of love," which attributes chocolate's supposed aphrodisiac effects to phenethylamine.