Do Gentlemen Really Prefer Blondes?

Zusatztext "Witty! captivating! scientifically sound and great fun. Every curious man and woman will love this book."Louann Brizendine! M.D.! New York Times bestselling author of The Female Brain Answers around 100 questions we've all wondered about or asked. A tremendous amount of potentially useful information in a well-written! entertaining! and easy-to-understand format. Library Journal Playfully written scientific anecdotes. Publishers Weekly ! starred review Informationen zum Autor Jena Pincott Klappentext How do the seasons affect your sex life? Is your lover more likely to get you pregnant than your husband? Are good dancers also good in bed? If you've ever wondered how scientists measure loveor whether men really prefer blondesthis smart, sexy book provides real answers to these and many other questions about our most baffling dating and mating behaviors. Based on the latest research in biology, evolutionary psychology, neuroscience, and cognitive science, Do Gentlemen Really Prefer Blondes? dares to explain the science behind sexand opens a fascinating window on the intriguing phenomenon of love and attraction. Did you know... •When a couple first fall in love, their brains are indistinguishable from those of the clinically insane •You can tell a lot about a person's sexual chemistry just by looking at his or her hands •Your genes influence whose body odors you prefer Viewed through the lens of science and instinct, your love life might be seen in a completely different way. This book provides both an in-depth exploration into our sexual psychesand fresh advice for men and women who want to discover the secrets of successful relationships.Why do people seem more attractive when you are gazing into their eyes? Many years ago the behavioral psychologist Arthur Aron put opposite-sex college students in a room and asked them to reveal intimate details of their lives: their most embarrassing moments, what they'd do if their parents died, and so on. Then he paired them up, man and woman, and told them to lock eyeballs for four minutes. No talking, no smilingjust gazing. Deep gazing, like lovers. Later, Aron quizzed the students on how they felt about their partners. Deeply attracted, most said. So deeply that a couple that were strangers on the day of the experiment allegedly got married six months later. You might open the heart by sharing intimacies, but, evidently, you reach it through the eyes. Looking directly into a lover's eyes is like looking into fire. As Nietzsche put it, "If you gaze for long into an abyss, the abyss gazes also into you." Thanks to a shot of adrenaline, your palms sweat, your breathing gets shallow, your skin feels hot, and your pupils dilate. Your amygdala, the center of the brain that processes emotion, blazes with activity. At the same time you produce dopamine, a "_feel-good" neurotransmitter that is associated with passion and addiction, and oxytocin, a hormone related to bonding. So intense is the mutual gaze that there's only one way to amp it up: deeply penetrate your partner's eyes during slow rhythmic sex, as prescribed in the Kama Sutra (not recommended with a stranger). The most fascinating theory about eye gaze is that just the act of doing it can enhance, or even initiate, a feeling of love. Most of the time we think that our faces reflect what's going on inside our heads, but, for at least some people, the expression on their face becomes a genuine feeling. Psychologists call this facial feedback, and Darwin was among its first believers. The facial feedback hypothesis was borne out in experiments at Clark University and the University of Alaska. At Clark, more than seventy opposite-sex strangers, under the pretext of an ESP study, silently gazed into each other's eyes for two minutes. Participants who were previously assessed and known t...

Auteur

Jena Pincott

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How do the seasons affect your sex life? Is your lover more likely to get you pregnant than your husband? Are good dancers also good in bed?
If you've ever wondered how scientists measure love—or whether men really prefer blondes—this smart, sexy book provides real answers to these and many other questions about our most baffling dating and mating behaviors. Based on the latest research in biology, evolutionary psychology, neuroscience, and cognitive science, Do Gentlemen Really Prefer Blondes? dares to explain the science behind sex—and opens a fascinating window on the intriguing phenomenon of love and attraction. Did you know...

•When a couple first fall in love, their brains are indistinguishable from those of the clinically insane
•You can tell a lot about a person's sexual chemistry just by looking at his or her hands
•Your genes influence whose body odors you prefer

Viewed through the lens of science and instinct, your love life might be seen in a completely different way. This book provides both an in-depth exploration into our sexual psyches—and fresh advice for men and women who want to discover the secrets of successful relationships.

Échantillon de lecture
Why do people seem more attractive when you are gazing into their eyes?

Many years ago the behavioral psychologist Arthur Aron put opposite-sex college students in a room and asked them to reveal intimate details of their lives: their most embarrassing moments, what they'd do if their parents died, and so on. Then he paired them up, man and woman, and told them to lock eyeballs for four minutes. No talking, no smiling—just gazing. Deep gazing, like lovers. Later, Aron quizzed the students on how they felt about their partners. Deeply attracted, most said. So deeply that a couple that were strangers on the day of the experiment allegedly got married six months later. You might open the heart by sharing intimacies, but, evidently, you reach it through the eyes.

Looking directly into a lover's eyes is like looking into fire. As Nietzsche put it, "If you gaze for long into an abyss, the abyss gazes also into you." Thanks to a shot of adrenaline, your palms sweat, your breathing gets shallow, your skin feels hot, and your pupils dilate. Your amygdala, the center of the brain that processes emotion, blazes with activity. At the same time you produce dopamine, a "_feel-good" neurotransmitter that is associated with passion and addiction, and oxytocin, a hormone related to bonding. So intense is the mutual gaze that there's only one way to amp it up: deeply penetrate your partner's eyes during slow rhythmic sex, as prescribed in the Kama Sutra (not recommended with a stranger).

The most fascinating theory about eye gaze is that just the act of doing it can enhance, or even initiate, a feeling of love. Most of the time we think that our faces reflect what's going on inside our heads, but, for at least some people, the expression on their face becomes a genuine feeling. Psychologists call this facial feedback, and Darwin was among its first believers.

The facial feedback hypothesis was borne out in experiments at Clark University and the University of Alaska. At Clark, more than seventy opposite-sex strangers, under the pretext of an ESP study, silently gazed into each other's eyes for two minutes. Participants who were previously assessed and known to respond emotionally to their own facial expressions reported a significant increase in passionate love for the strangers in whose eyes they had gazed. (The gaze must be mutual and nonthreatening.) At the University of Alaska, eye-gazers who scored high on a standard psychological test known as the Romantic Beliefs Scale had the same experience. Men and women who felt strongly about concepts such as a "one and only love," "love at first sight," and "love will find a way" felt a significant surge of romantic love after locking eyes.

According to the facial feedback hypothesis, you migh…