Study Finds Men Not So Naughty – Women Not So Noble
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Think that men first notice a woman’s bodacious bod, and women the man’s face? Think again.
When men look at pictures of women in the buff, they’re more likely to look at a woman’s face before fixating on the rest of the body, according to a new study by researchers at Emory University.
Also surprising, when men and women look at pictures of heterosexual sex, women look longer at the photos than men do, according to the study published in the journal Hormones and Behavior.
Psychologist Kim Wallen of Emory and graduate student Heather Rupp, illustrated photos of couples having sex to both men and women, each hooked up to a high-tech eye-tracking gizmo to measure where their gaze went first, and how long it remained there.
Atlantic Journal reports that men went straight to the face and lingered. But the majority of the women were more interested in the sex acts in the photos.
Wallen said women on hormone-filled birth control pills were interested in the overall view of the photos and ‘background items like jewelry. But women not on the pill were more interested in areas of both men and women normally covered by clothing.
Rupp, from Indiana University’s Kinsey Institute for Research in Sex, said the “eye-tracking data suggested that what women paid most attention to was dependent on their hormonal state.”
The scientists traced the findings to a brain region called the amygdala, which processes emotional information and excitement.
In an earlier brain-scanning study, Wallen found more activation in the amygdala of men than women in response to sexual stimuli. But the cause of the increased activity was unclear, and Wallen and Rupp’s latest study suggests higher amygdala activation in men may be related to their increased attention to faces.
They’ve also concluded there are biological and evolutionary reasons for what they found.
Women can blatantly tell by looking at naked men whether the guys are in the mood, Wallen said, but women’s bodies don’t reveal much, which is why men zoom in on their faces.
“It’s cryptic, but facial expression is one way of showing an indication of interest in and enjoyment of sex.” Wallen said.
Related stories:
The Face – Not the Body – Attracts a Mate
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This is a weird study. People need to cure stuff. I hope tax money didn’t fund it.
No idea Funny Guy, but it seemed to me to be a private study. But you never know, the government sometimes sponsors some pretty crazy things in the name of research.
very interesting… always know that there’s more that meets the eye…
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Hey Ev, what they’re saying is, women are more visual and sexually stimulated by the body than men are, based on their study. Men focus more on the face first.
There’s so much more that could be said, but I’m leaving it alone, haha!
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You’ve got a very valid point Ev. Many of these studies often use a limited number of people for their testing as well. Rarely is it repeated to compare differences either.
The one thing that they were saying about the women though, was that it was when they were looking at nude photos and pics of people performing sex acts. So taking your perspective a little further, women could be looking more in the aspect of possibilities of using the methods themselves, looking at them longer studying them.
Nothing revealed in the report that any particpants were asked anything about their own reasons.
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I can’t say I am surprised by these findings but don’t think they are a new discovery. Desmond Morris was discussing the erogenous appeal of a woman’s face and lips back in the 60′s – he also talked a lot about apes’ bottoms if I recall.
Things have a way of being rehashed over the years don’t they Sue? But ape’s bottoms? That would have been an interesting analysis, haha!