36: Pheromes, part II

While we're on the subject, a recent study from Florida recruited young men to opinionate on t-shirts worn by women while sleeping on three consecutive nights. There were three groups of t-shirts, one set from around the time of ovulation (when there would be an evolutionary advantage to attract sexual partners), a second set from a time distant from ovulation, and a control set.

The men rated the ovulation t-shirts as most appealing. Testosterone levels were higher when the ovulation t-shirts were being evaluated.

An earlier study showed that exotic dancers received more tips around the time of ovulation. Many factors here, visual, auditory as well as olfactory, the t-shirt study being just olfactory, but the conclusion is the same: we can't entirely escape our evolutionary destiny, too much of it is unconscious.