Post by The Big PINK One♥ on Sept 16, 2010 16:39:10 GMT -5
From AOL Health
Despite human evolution, our primal thoughts and instinctive behaviors are still -- though subconsciously -- with us.
New research from the University of Minnesota's Carlson School of Management found that when women are ovulating, they unknowingly buy and dress in more sexy clothing in a survival of the fittest tactic to beat out other women during this highly reproductive period.
Dr. Laura Corio, AOL women's health expert, says that during ovulation several hormones are elevated in a woman's body including estrogen, FSH, LH, as well as testosterone that increases libido.
Corio also explains that there is typically more cervical fluid at this time that can feel like sexual lubrication, making a woman feel more sexually desirable midway through her menstrual cycle.
You might assume eligible and fertile women would be dressing to impress suitable bachelors, but the researchers found it was more about how to look better than the other local, attractive "competitors."
"In order to entice a desirable mate, a woman needs to assess the attractiveness of other women in her local environment to determine how eye-catching she needs to be to snare a good man," Kristina Durante, a post-doctoral fellow at the Carlson School, said in a statement.
"During ovulation there are pheromones," Corio tells AOL Health. "These are scents that are put out by women mid-cycle that attract other women and men. Across the board, women sense a feeling of overall well-being [during ovulation]."
For the study, which will appear in the Journal of Consumer Research, researchers showed ovulating women a series of pictures of attractive nearby women and then tracked their hypothetical spending patterns.
Durante and her teammates discovered that the majority of these women chose sexier items than the participants who were either shown photos of unattractive local women or women who lived farther than 1,000 miles away.
"We found that, when ovulating, women chose sexier fashion products when thinking about other attractive, local but not distant women," Durante said in a statement. "If you are in New York, a woman who lives in L.A. isn't going to be seen as competition."
Women aren't always in a race for the slinky dress and high heels, as results showed that the cat-fight-like ways only came out during ovulation.
The study is one of the first to look at how hormones affect consumer spending habits.
The beauty, fitness, fashion and perhaps even plastic surgery industries have much to gain during these particular 5 to 6 days each month, the researchers say. A subconscious need for self-improvement by these -- more than a billion -- normally ovulating women could mean a big boom in sales for the businesses.
Despite human evolution, our primal thoughts and instinctive behaviors are still -- though subconsciously -- with us.
New research from the University of Minnesota's Carlson School of Management found that when women are ovulating, they unknowingly buy and dress in more sexy clothing in a survival of the fittest tactic to beat out other women during this highly reproductive period.
Dr. Laura Corio, AOL women's health expert, says that during ovulation several hormones are elevated in a woman's body including estrogen, FSH, LH, as well as testosterone that increases libido.
Corio also explains that there is typically more cervical fluid at this time that can feel like sexual lubrication, making a woman feel more sexually desirable midway through her menstrual cycle.
You might assume eligible and fertile women would be dressing to impress suitable bachelors, but the researchers found it was more about how to look better than the other local, attractive "competitors."
"In order to entice a desirable mate, a woman needs to assess the attractiveness of other women in her local environment to determine how eye-catching she needs to be to snare a good man," Kristina Durante, a post-doctoral fellow at the Carlson School, said in a statement.
"During ovulation there are pheromones," Corio tells AOL Health. "These are scents that are put out by women mid-cycle that attract other women and men. Across the board, women sense a feeling of overall well-being [during ovulation]."
For the study, which will appear in the Journal of Consumer Research, researchers showed ovulating women a series of pictures of attractive nearby women and then tracked their hypothetical spending patterns.
Durante and her teammates discovered that the majority of these women chose sexier items than the participants who were either shown photos of unattractive local women or women who lived farther than 1,000 miles away.
"We found that, when ovulating, women chose sexier fashion products when thinking about other attractive, local but not distant women," Durante said in a statement. "If you are in New York, a woman who lives in L.A. isn't going to be seen as competition."
Women aren't always in a race for the slinky dress and high heels, as results showed that the cat-fight-like ways only came out during ovulation.
The study is one of the first to look at how hormones affect consumer spending habits.
The beauty, fitness, fashion and perhaps even plastic surgery industries have much to gain during these particular 5 to 6 days each month, the researchers say. A subconscious need for self-improvement by these -- more than a billion -- normally ovulating women could mean a big boom in sales for the businesses.
