Bambi Eloriaga-Amago
Remember that commercial where a guy sprays on some cologne and then women who’d get a whiff would just instantly follow him around? Well, perhaps if the cologne company infused their fragrances with oxytocin, they could actually claim their commercials as factual and not merely an exaggeration.
(Spring, painted by Pierre Auguste Cot, dated 1873. Image from Wikimedia Commons.)
Oxytocin is a hormone scientists dub as the human body’s “love drug” because it is associated with cuddles, orgasm, the formation of maternal bond and trust between two people and is even linked to the loss of social inhibitions.
Recently, researchers at the University of Bonn in Germany conducted experiments to see if oxytocin affects how women perceive men to be attractive. The group gathered 40 twentysomething women, all professing to be deeply in love with their partners. The women were separated into two groups, with one group receiving a placebo and the other getting exposed to oxytocin via a nasal spray. They were then shown pictures of their partners and other men and were asked to rank the pictures according to attractiveness. The results showed that the women who took the oxytocin found their partners 15% more attractive.
While further studies are needed to establish the exact health benefits of oxytocin, early research suggests that the hormone could be used to treat a variety of symptoms and conditions, ranging from increasing appetite and reducing anxiety to helping people diagnosed with austism spectrum disorder.
