Women's Tears Reduce Sex Drive in Men, Study Hints
Scent of a woman crying may also reduce aggression.
Crying linked to emotions—perhaps a uniquely human behavior—is poorly understood by scientists.
However, previous research has shown that in mice, tears communicate information through "chemosignals," causing scientists to speculate that human tears could serve a similar function.
(See "Mouse Tears Are Aphrodisiacs.")
Such chemical communication would not be a surprise, since humans are already "supremely good" at expressing themselves verbally and via body language, according to study co-author Noam Sobel, a neurobiologist at the Weizmann Institute of Science in Israel.
Though it's too early to know exactly what human tears are saying, one interpretation may be that a woman's emotional tears lower males' testosterone levels, thereby reducing aggression—and by default, sexual arousal.
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