June 16, 2023 • 23 mins
Why are some men so monogamous and others are complete players? The answer, testosterone! How does testosterone effect a mans willingness to love? We're talking the trouble with testosterone.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
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(00:00):
Why is it that some men areso monogamous and others are complete players.
I'm doctor Wendy Walsh. I thinkit has to do a testosterone. This
hormone can affect a man's ability tofall in love. It might even increase
his death rate. This is MatingMatters. A sound of a deep baritone.
(00:33):
That was Ken Turner of the CrystalRiver Boys. I'm doctor Wendy Walsh.
Welcome to the Mating Matters Podcast.On this episode, the Trouble with
testosterone. How does the amount ofthis male hormone make men more attractive,
less likely to fall in love,and sometimes better fathers? Oh sweet?
(00:55):
The sound. That's the voice ofa man who, according to YouTube,
has the deepest singing voice ever.His baritone makes women shiver. And here's
the speaking voice of Red Pepper,a voiceover artist with over one hundred movie
trailers under his belt. This isgreat, big story. Okay, great,
(01:17):
thank you got it? Yeah,that's great. Cool. You can
still speak about that now, though, what do you mean? This is
how I always speak. All ofthese men carry a male vocal trait that
can be a big indicator of hightestosterone. Testosterone, a hormone found in
both men and women. Is responsiblefor creating long vocal chords that produce deep
(01:38):
sounds. Hello, I'm a humanmale. One way to tell if a
man has high or low or mediumtestosterone is to listen to the pitch of
his voice. Hello, I'm ahuman male. Hello, I'm a human
male. Hello, I'm a humanmale. Hello, I'm a human male.
Hello, I'm a human male.Did you spot the dude with high
testosterone? If you're a woman,you probably had no problem. Women always
(02:01):
find lower voices attractive because it indicatesa higher sex drive and greater sperm production.
My name is Muhammad Ali. Buttestosterone does much more than that.
(02:25):
Testosterone develops masculine traits such as sexdrive, sperm production. It creates a
higher energy level, It can affectbehavior. It grows larger muscle mass and
bone size, and it grows hair. For the most part, testosterone is
well great man evolved to carry lotsof it for reproductive survival. High testosterone
(02:50):
men are like chick magnets. Theytend to be taller, more muscular,
brave, and they grow really greatbeards. Oh and they have lots of
energy. Think professional athlete and hunkyaction hero. Besides vocal tone. There's
(03:10):
another pretty accurate way to tell howmuch testosterone a man has, the size
of his testes. Think about it. We even use the term in common
language. He's got big balls,right. Well, obviously it doesn't make
sense that we could ask the guestsin our studio to show us their scrotum.
Instead, I ask them to doan interesting experiment with their hand.
(03:32):
Can you hold your hand like this, fingers together and looking at the back
of your hand. If you lookat your first finger, your pointer finger,
and your ring finger, describe whichone is longer, shorter? Or
are they the same? They lookalmost the same? What do you say?
Almost? Yeah, they look almostexactly the same. Men who've been
(03:53):
exposed to a lot of testosterone inutero tend to have a ring finger that's
just longer than their pointer finger.Just hand to hand, both my ring
fingers are much longer than my pointerfinger, like almost a niche Yes,
is one longer than the other?Even slightly? Yeah, my pointer finger
(04:15):
or my ring finger. Yeah,my ring finger is a little longer.
It's a lot longer. There's alsobeen some interesting research that associates that longer
ring finger with better music ability.Apparently, music was designed to attract women,
and one study that asked a manto stand on the street in Paris
(04:36):
and simply ask women for their telephonenumber had a terrible time, really bad
odds. Then the researchers asked himto hold a guitar, and holding a
guitar he was able to collect farmore female phone numbers. Thus, musicality
and the testosterone that creates it,we're designed to attract women. They're pretty
(05:00):
close. I would say my ringfinger is a little bit larger. Singer,
I not really anymore. I playedguitar, Yeah, I played alto
sacks for six years, and thenI played bass guitar for about eight Are
you musical at all? Absolutely?You played. Yes. But testosterone also
(05:23):
has a few downsides. It canaffect personality, can actually make men selfish,
and even affect a man's ability tofall in love and in long term
monogamy. A natural lowering of testosteronecan turn a perfectly good husband into a
couch potato. Stick with me untilthe end of this podcast, because I'll
(05:44):
tell you how women can actually helpmen maintain just the right levels of testosterone
to create happier relationships, all withoutpharmaceuticals. But let's start at the beginning.
Around the world, slightly more babiesare born than female that's because boy
babies don't always get to grow upto be men. Young males are biologically
(06:06):
weaker sorry guys, and more susceptibleto diseases and premature death. And then
there's that pesky testosterone that makes youngmen more likely to die from violent causes
than women. Won a lot offights, maybe because I knew if I
didn't then they would come back.Bullies tend to want to pick on only
(06:27):
kids, but my dad had taughtme a long time ago as an only
child that I would have to standup for myself, and he never ever
wanted to see me start a fight. But he never ever wanted to see
me high tailing away from a fight, because if that happened, then I'd
have to fight him, and Icertainly didn't want. This is how men
(06:47):
teach masculinity. Yeah, but itwasn't about exerting dominance. It was just
a function of responding to bullying selfprotection. Sometimes buble finds you even though
you're not looking for it. Duringpuberty, when testosterone levels rise, suddenly
well boys become men, and formany this is a shocking transformation. It
(07:11):
was a little strange. It wasa little strange. I remember seeing my
female classmates a little bit differently.Well. I remember it as a time
of a lot of confusion. Idon't think I was prepared for it.
I don't think I was warned aboutjust how weird puberty would feel. It
hit when I was in middle school, seventh to eighth grade, probably if
(07:35):
I can remember correctly, And thebiggest thing I remember was the desire to
be closer to girls more than ever. Kind of notice, you know,
little girls a little bit more didn'twant to punch him as much. Probably
I wanted to spend more time huggingon them. I noticed a girl in
(07:57):
my sixth grade class. She hadbreasts, and she was far more mature,
if you will. I noticed thatI was having erections every five minutes,
and I didn't understand what was goingon with my body. A lot
of it is mental. You startedthinking about sex a lot, which feels
weird or even feels like a littlebit dirty. I don't remember exactly how
(08:18):
old I was. I felt likeI was older than a lot of those
around me. I remember them likeI remember getting like feeling like I got
armpit hair later on than everyone elsedid, and being like kind of self
conscious about that. Probably around twelveor so, my voice started to change.
I started picking up a little bitmore weight. I started seeing more
(08:41):
definition in my arms and then myneck, my back. Even my friends
joked with me about it. Researchshows that it's advantageous to be an early
maturing boy. They have better sociallives and even better grades, and that
effect of high testosterone can be lifelong. Here's the really good news about how
high testosterone. Men with it havebetter health. But is their health related
(09:05):
to the amounts of testosterone circulating intheir system or the increased energy caused by
testosterone that makes them work out somuch? Take, for example, clearly
high testosterone to Wane the rock Johnsonnamed by Muscle and Fitness magazine as Man
of the Century. I see everytime I travel internationally. Their weights are
(09:26):
in kilos, and I don't knowhow to convert kilos to pounds. Yeah,
so here's the thing I do.So I just look down here,
and you know what I do.I grab the heaviest shit possible. All
right, It's very kane man like, but it works for me. Men
with higher levels of testosterone are fortyfive percent less likely to have high blood
pressure, seventy two percent less likelyto have experienced a heart attack, eight
(09:48):
percent less likely to have three ormore colds in a year, and forty
five percent less likely to rate theirhealth as fair or poor. Oh and
by the way, men with hightestoster may also be smarter, at least
in terms of nonverbal intelligence, spatialreasoning, hand eye coordination, art and
music. I don't like to askfor directions. I like to reroute,
(10:16):
and I would call it improvising.Do you know why men don't ask for
directions? Well, partly it's maleego, but a big piece has to
do with visiospatial reasoning. We carrya map around in our heads. Men
are natural map makers. In fact, words don't help them as much as
reading a map or spotting a landmark. In one study, lower testosterone men
(10:39):
showed deficits in this mapping ability comparedwith a control group. This seems to
point to the fact that testosterone helpsmen see and move more fluidly within the
world. The researchers also found thattestosterone affected intelligence, and when healthy men
were given testosterone cream as a treatment, their verbal abilities increased, but get
(11:01):
this, their spatial abilities declined.What does this mean, Well, it
means that the relationship between testosterone andintelligence isn't straightforward, whether it's spatial reasoning
or verbal ability. An optimal levelof hormone is vital. But what's an
optimal level? We'll talk about thatlater in the podcast. Every Sunday,
(11:26):
millions of fans experience the power testosteronemakes men both aggressive and protective. Ever
heard of the home team advantage.It used to be only connected to referee
(11:46):
bias, home crowd support, greaterfamiliarity with the venue, and maybe less
travel fatigue, But new research linksit to the fact that men are just
more territorial. In animals, territorialbehaviors are common, and the acquisition of
and defense of territories is often accompaniedby big surges and testosterone. Two separate
(12:09):
studies on humans found that soccer playersdo indeed show a testosterone surge right before
a home game, much more whencompared with just a training session or a
game away. But this home surgeis particularly apparent when the opposing team is
considered a bitter rifle. So testosteroneis all well and good. It may
(12:35):
make men smarter more masculine, moreprotective, healthier, and more sexual.
But there are some downsides to havinghigh testosterone. In case you are wondering,
it's a myth that high testosterone menlose their hair. Men with male
pattern balding may actually have lower circulatinglevels of testosterone, but higher levels of
(12:58):
an enzyme that converts testoterone to DHTthat can cause baldness. Men with higher
levels of testosterone are more inclined tohave bad health behaviors. That means they're
more likely to spoke, to drinkalcohol excessively, and to indulge in risky
behavior that leads to injury or death. Because of behaviors that are driven by
(13:22):
high testosterone, homicide, warfare,driving motorcycles too fast. The sex ratio
tends to reduce as humans age,and by the time we land in a
retirement community, they are a fargreater proportion of females. It's the lucky
older man with a bottle of viagraain an old folks home. So those
(13:43):
delicious high testosterone men, the oneswith the big muscles, the deep voice,
the beards, are they nice guystoo? A group of researchers set
out to answer this question. Howdo human beings decide when to be selfish
and when to be self lests.In this study, they gave testosterone to
twenty five men looking to see ifit had an impact on their pro social
(14:07):
behaviors. They also had a controlgroup as well, and they confirmed the
participants testosterone levels before and after treatment. They used a behavioral economics game commonly
used by psychologists, and what theyfound was pretty startling. Men with artificially
raised testosterone compared with those on aplacebo were twenty seven percent less generous towards
(14:31):
strangers. But get this, menin the lowest group of testosterone were five
hundred and sixty percent more generous thanmen in the highest group. Basically,
what they found is that men withelevated testosterone tend to behave antisocially, and
to underscore that, they also foundthat this group of men were more likely
(14:54):
to use their money in the gameto punish those who were ungenerous towards them.
But testosterone isn't exactly the bee alland end all in the hormonal universe.
It lives in a world with lotsof other hormones that compete for dominance.
My favorite hormone even has its ownnickname the cuddle hormone oxytocin. It
facilitates bonding feelings of closeness, empathy, and compassion. In one study,
(15:18):
they gave a group of men anasal spray containing oxytocin. Another control group
just had salt water. Then theywere asked to play a game that involved
generosity, and you guessed it.The ones who had the oxytocin nasal spray
were eighty percent more generous compared tothe placebo group. Oxytocin plays a very
(15:43):
high role in how people fall inlove. Not surprisingly, when women have
sex, their oxytocin levels rise.In fact, during female orgasm they have
huge surges of oxytocin. The Onlyother time in a woman's life where she
has that much oxytocin is when she'sbreastfeeding to help her bond with her baby.
When men have sex, they havea surge of oxytocin two except they
(16:07):
have a much higher surge of testosterone. The testosterone blunts the effect of oxytocin.
That's why men don't fall in lovethrough sex. A man can have
casual sex with a woman for weeksor months and not fall in love,
whereas if a woman does the samething with the same partner. All that
(16:29):
oxytocin means that she has a veryhigh chance of falling in love. But
what's an optimal level of testosterone fora man? You know, if he
has too much, she's more likelyto be a cheater, and if he
has too little, he might losehis libido and his energy. If you
believe the marketing of some pharmaceutical companies, low tea is a common condition that
(16:52):
must be treated immediately. I havelow testosterone. There I said it did
well and really see. I figuredlow testosterone would increase my sex drive.
But when I started losing energy andbecame booty, that's when I had an
honest conversation with my doctor. There'sa lot of controversy about a diagnosis of
low t I personally think it wasinvented by pharmaceutical companies. There's plenty of
(17:18):
evidence to suggest that testosterone cream canrestore sexual functioning in young and middle aged
men who already have lower testosterone levels, but it has no influence on sexual
behavior when hormone levels are about normal. You know, Mother nature is a
perfect programmer. She knows when todip down those levels of testosterone to protect
(17:41):
women and children. One research studyshowed that husbands of pregnant women had a
big dip in testosterone during her thirdtrimester. This phenomenon, according to evolutionary
psychologists, likely was designed to divertsexual energy and convert it in to protecting
and providing for and monogamy can makemen's testosterone levels drop. One study found
(18:07):
that men in long term relationships formore than a year tested lower in testosterone
than single men or men in newrelationships. This could be evolutionary because men
with lower testosterone are more likely tobe better caregivers and less likely to pursue
additional sex partners. Well, Ithink it depends on what stages in your
(18:27):
life you are too. I thinkin certain time, when my girlfriend and
I broke up, I was definitelyon the higher under that scale. But
you know, after a while youkind of missed that camaderie. I think
a little bit and start to understandthe benefits of monogamy, feeling of having
a partner to take on this thingthat we call life. Finally, low
(18:48):
testosterone guys are great fathers. Astudy in twenty thirteen found that slightly smaller
testicles were associated with a more nurturingquality among fathers. Reduced testosterone levels and
testies volume were associated with higher levelsof paternal caregiving. I love kids.
I just wanted to be married witha family. So what's a woman to
(19:15):
do. If she chooses a hightestosterone mate, she may have a gorgeous
protective cheater on her hands. Andif she chooses a low testosterone guy,
she'll have plenty of help in thedaddy department. But what about the bedroom.
Well, there are two factors thattemper cheating behavior in high testosterone men,
religion and intelligence. Men who faithfullyfollow religious doctrine tend to override their
(19:38):
high testosterone urges with good impulse control. And my family history, faith was
really important. I just didn't Ididn't have an interest in spending a lot
a lot of time or sleeping witha bunch of women because it wasn't the
way that I was brought up.One slightly longer than the other. Which
(20:00):
one is that the ring finger?Ah, that's high testosterone. Were you
raised with a religion? I wasraised as a Christian. My wife comes
from a religious background as well.We met when we were in high school
and dated and got married and hadour first kids. When we were in
the early twenties. And some researchshows that high intelligence men can be better
at committing to family over fun thewhole everyone dreams of, like high school
(20:26):
and college and like dating around andall these girls and stuff. And I
was just ready to be like amarried dad and like have my life in
middle school. And for those whochoose the good guy, stable daddy,
there are ways to increase a man'stestosterone. Again, enter my favorite hormone,
oxytocin. It's called the bonding hormonebecause it helps make people feel connected.
(20:48):
Couples who have been given oxytocin nospray reported more lovemaking, trust,
and caregiving. But short of anoxytocin lace no spray, the other way
women raise their own oxytocin is throughsex. The problem is when a woman's
oxytocin is low, her sex drivegoes down. She just doesn't want to
have sex. And as for herhusband, his naturally lowered testosterone to divert
(21:14):
sexual energy toward providing and caregiving maymake him a low energy couch potato.
Or if he's looking for a wayto spike his testosterone, he may be
prone to cheating. So how doesa woman raise her husband's testosterone just enough?
And how does a man raise hiswife's oxytocin so she'll have sex with
him? Couples can keep her oxytocinhigh by doing lots of bonding behaviors that
(21:40):
don't involve sex. Communicating more,cuddling, kissing, having date nights,
touch without the pressure of sex canraise her oxytocin enough to make her eventually
want to have sex, and thatthe sex will really raise her oxytocin.
And how how to raise his testosteronewell? To do that, he needs
(22:03):
a win and he needs to feelterritorial. Even watching his team win can
give him a boost of testosterone.So can playing sports, hanging out with
his guy friends, or achieving atwork. And there's another way that your
husband can psychologically have a win whenhe feels good about himself when you compliment
him. Yes, when women saynice things to their husbands, their testosterone
(22:26):
goes up. As for feeling territorial, when his partner practices good grooming and
looks appealing to other men, he'llnaturally want to keep her closer to him.
Is there trouble with testosterone? Hardlylike all other hormones, they work
in concert with a party of hormones, many who temper their effect, and
(22:48):
when we look at the nature versusnurture debate, it's important to remember that
thinking and beliefs have as much todo with human behavior as biology. I'm
doctor Wendy Walsh. Thanks for listeningto Mating Matters on our next episode,
(23:10):
The God That Clubs, How religionsmake rules around sexuality to increase reproductive advantage.
Mating Matters with Doctor Wendy Walsh isproduced by iHeartMedia. It is researched,
written and hosted by me, doctorWendy Walsh, and produced and edited
by the Brooke Peterson. Follow uson Twitter, Facebook, YouTube and Instagram
(23:33):
at doctor Wendy Walsh. Listen toMating Matters on the iHeartRadio app or wherever
you listen to your podcasts.
Why is it that some men areso monogamous and others are complete players.
I'm doctor Wendy Walsh. I thinkit has to do a testosterone. This
hormone can affect a man's ability tofall in love. It might even increase
his death rate. This is MatingMatters. A sound of a deep baritone.
(00:33):
That was Ken Turner of the CrystalRiver Boys. I'm doctor Wendy Walsh.
Welcome to the Mating Matters Podcast.On this episode, the Trouble with
testosterone. How does the amount ofthis male hormone make men more attractive,
less likely to fall in love,and sometimes better fathers? Oh sweet?
(00:55):
The sound. That's the voice ofa man who, according to YouTube,
has the deepest singing voice ever.His baritone makes women shiver. And here's
the speaking voice of Red Pepper,a voiceover artist with over one hundred movie
trailers under his belt. This isgreat, big story. Okay, great,
(01:17):
thank you got it? Yeah,that's great. Cool. You can
still speak about that now, though, what do you mean? This is
how I always speak. All ofthese men carry a male vocal trait that
can be a big indicator of hightestosterone. Testosterone, a hormone found in
both men and women. Is responsiblefor creating long vocal chords that produce deep
(01:38):
sounds. Hello, I'm a humanmale. One way to tell if a
man has high or low or mediumtestosterone is to listen to the pitch of
his voice. Hello, I'm ahuman male. Hello, I'm a human
male. Hello, I'm a humanmale. Hello, I'm a human male.
Hello, I'm a human male.Did you spot the dude with high
testosterone? If you're a woman,you probably had no problem. Women always
(02:01):
find lower voices attractive because it indicatesa higher sex drive and greater sperm production.
My name is Muhammad Ali. Buttestosterone does much more than that.
(02:25):
Testosterone develops masculine traits such as sexdrive, sperm production. It creates a
higher energy level, It can affectbehavior. It grows larger muscle mass and
bone size, and it grows hair. For the most part, testosterone is
well great man evolved to carry lotsof it for reproductive survival. High testosterone
(02:50):
men are like chick magnets. Theytend to be taller, more muscular,
brave, and they grow really greatbeards. Oh and they have lots of
energy. Think professional athlete and hunkyaction hero. Besides vocal tone. There's
(03:10):
another pretty accurate way to tell howmuch testosterone a man has, the size
of his testes. Think about it. We even use the term in common
language. He's got big balls,right. Well, obviously it doesn't make
sense that we could ask the guestsin our studio to show us their scrotum.
Instead, I ask them to doan interesting experiment with their hand.
(03:32):
Can you hold your hand like this, fingers together and looking at the back
of your hand. If you lookat your first finger, your pointer finger,
and your ring finger, describe whichone is longer, shorter? Or
are they the same? They lookalmost the same? What do you say?
Almost? Yeah, they look almostexactly the same. Men who've been
(03:53):
exposed to a lot of testosterone inutero tend to have a ring finger that's
just longer than their pointer finger.Just hand to hand, both my ring
fingers are much longer than my pointerfinger, like almost a niche Yes,
is one longer than the other?Even slightly? Yeah, my pointer finger
(04:15):
or my ring finger. Yeah,my ring finger is a little longer.
It's a lot longer. There's alsobeen some interesting research that associates that longer
ring finger with better music ability.Apparently, music was designed to attract women,
and one study that asked a manto stand on the street in Paris
(04:36):
and simply ask women for their telephonenumber had a terrible time, really bad
odds. Then the researchers asked himto hold a guitar, and holding a
guitar he was able to collect farmore female phone numbers. Thus, musicality
and the testosterone that creates it,we're designed to attract women. They're pretty
(05:00):
close. I would say my ringfinger is a little bit larger. Singer,
I not really anymore. I playedguitar, Yeah, I played alto
sacks for six years, and thenI played bass guitar for about eight Are
you musical at all? Absolutely?You played. Yes. But testosterone also
(05:23):
has a few downsides. It canaffect personality, can actually make men selfish,
and even affect a man's ability tofall in love and in long term
monogamy. A natural lowering of testosteronecan turn a perfectly good husband into a
couch potato. Stick with me untilthe end of this podcast, because I'll
(05:44):
tell you how women can actually helpmen maintain just the right levels of testosterone
to create happier relationships, all withoutpharmaceuticals. But let's start at the beginning.
Around the world, slightly more babiesare born than female that's because boy
babies don't always get to grow upto be men. Young males are biologically
(06:06):
weaker sorry guys, and more susceptibleto diseases and premature death. And then
there's that pesky testosterone that makes youngmen more likely to die from violent causes
than women. Won a lot offights, maybe because I knew if I
didn't then they would come back.Bullies tend to want to pick on only
(06:27):
kids, but my dad had taughtme a long time ago as an only
child that I would have to standup for myself, and he never ever
wanted to see me start a fight. But he never ever wanted to see
me high tailing away from a fight, because if that happened, then I'd
have to fight him, and Icertainly didn't want. This is how men
(06:47):
teach masculinity. Yeah, but itwasn't about exerting dominance. It was just
a function of responding to bullying selfprotection. Sometimes buble finds you even though
you're not looking for it. Duringpuberty, when testosterone levels rise, suddenly
well boys become men, and formany this is a shocking transformation. It
(07:11):
was a little strange. It wasa little strange. I remember seeing my
female classmates a little bit differently.Well. I remember it as a time
of a lot of confusion. Idon't think I was prepared for it.
I don't think I was warned aboutjust how weird puberty would feel. It
hit when I was in middle school, seventh to eighth grade, probably if
(07:35):
I can remember correctly, And thebiggest thing I remember was the desire to
be closer to girls more than ever. Kind of notice, you know,
little girls a little bit more didn'twant to punch him as much. Probably
I wanted to spend more time huggingon them. I noticed a girl in
(07:57):
my sixth grade class. She hadbreasts, and she was far more mature,
if you will. I noticed thatI was having erections every five minutes,
and I didn't understand what was goingon with my body. A lot
of it is mental. You startedthinking about sex a lot, which feels
weird or even feels like a littlebit dirty. I don't remember exactly how
(08:18):
old I was. I felt likeI was older than a lot of those
around me. I remember them likeI remember getting like feeling like I got
armpit hair later on than everyone elsedid, and being like kind of self
conscious about that. Probably around twelveor so, my voice started to change.
I started picking up a little bitmore weight. I started seeing more
(08:41):
definition in my arms and then myneck, my back. Even my friends
joked with me about it. Researchshows that it's advantageous to be an early
maturing boy. They have better sociallives and even better grades, and that
effect of high testosterone can be lifelong. Here's the really good news about how
high testosterone. Men with it havebetter health. But is their health related
(09:05):
to the amounts of testosterone circulating intheir system or the increased energy caused by
testosterone that makes them work out somuch? Take, for example, clearly
high testosterone to Wane the rock Johnsonnamed by Muscle and Fitness magazine as Man
of the Century. I see everytime I travel internationally. Their weights are
(09:26):
in kilos, and I don't knowhow to convert kilos to pounds. Yeah,
so here's the thing I do.So I just look down here,
and you know what I do.I grab the heaviest shit possible. All
right, It's very kane man like, but it works for me. Men
with higher levels of testosterone are fortyfive percent less likely to have high blood
pressure, seventy two percent less likelyto have experienced a heart attack, eight
(09:48):
percent less likely to have three ormore colds in a year, and forty
five percent less likely to rate theirhealth as fair or poor. Oh and
by the way, men with hightestoster may also be smarter, at least
in terms of nonverbal intelligence, spatialreasoning, hand eye coordination, art and
music. I don't like to askfor directions. I like to reroute,
(10:16):
and I would call it improvising.Do you know why men don't ask for
directions? Well, partly it's maleego, but a big piece has to
do with visiospatial reasoning. We carrya map around in our heads. Men
are natural map makers. In fact, words don't help them as much as
reading a map or spotting a landmark. In one study, lower testosterone men
(10:39):
showed deficits in this mapping ability comparedwith a control group. This seems to
point to the fact that testosterone helpsmen see and move more fluidly within the
world. The researchers also found thattestosterone affected intelligence, and when healthy men
were given testosterone cream as a treatment, their verbal abilities increased, but get
(11:01):
this, their spatial abilities declined.What does this mean, Well, it
means that the relationship between testosterone andintelligence isn't straightforward, whether it's spatial reasoning
or verbal ability. An optimal levelof hormone is vital. But what's an
optimal level? We'll talk about thatlater in the podcast. Every Sunday,
(11:26):
millions of fans experience the power testosteronemakes men both aggressive and protective. Ever
heard of the home team advantage.It used to be only connected to referee
(11:46):
bias, home crowd support, greaterfamiliarity with the venue, and maybe less
travel fatigue, But new research linksit to the fact that men are just
more territorial. In animals, territorialbehaviors are common, and the acquisition of
and defense of territories is often accompaniedby big surges and testosterone. Two separate
(12:09):
studies on humans found that soccer playersdo indeed show a testosterone surge right before
a home game, much more whencompared with just a training session or a
game away. But this home surgeis particularly apparent when the opposing team is
considered a bitter rifle. So testosteroneis all well and good. It may
(12:35):
make men smarter more masculine, moreprotective, healthier, and more sexual.
But there are some downsides to havinghigh testosterone. In case you are wondering,
it's a myth that high testosterone menlose their hair. Men with male
pattern balding may actually have lower circulatinglevels of testosterone, but higher levels of
(12:58):
an enzyme that converts testoterone to DHTthat can cause baldness. Men with higher
levels of testosterone are more inclined tohave bad health behaviors. That means they're
more likely to spoke, to drinkalcohol excessively, and to indulge in risky
behavior that leads to injury or death. Because of behaviors that are driven by
(13:22):
high testosterone, homicide, warfare,driving motorcycles too fast. The sex ratio
tends to reduce as humans age,and by the time we land in a
retirement community, they are a fargreater proportion of females. It's the lucky
older man with a bottle of viagraain an old folks home. So those
(13:43):
delicious high testosterone men, the oneswith the big muscles, the deep voice,
the beards, are they nice guystoo? A group of researchers set
out to answer this question. Howdo human beings decide when to be selfish
and when to be self lests.In this study, they gave testosterone to
twenty five men looking to see ifit had an impact on their pro social
(14:07):
behaviors. They also had a controlgroup as well, and they confirmed the
participants testosterone levels before and after treatment. They used a behavioral economics game commonly
used by psychologists, and what theyfound was pretty startling. Men with artificially
raised testosterone compared with those on aplacebo were twenty seven percent less generous towards
(14:31):
strangers. But get this, menin the lowest group of testosterone were five
hundred and sixty percent more generous thanmen in the highest group. Basically,
what they found is that men withelevated testosterone tend to behave antisocially, and
to underscore that, they also foundthat this group of men were more likely
(14:54):
to use their money in the gameto punish those who were ungenerous towards them.
But testosterone isn't exactly the bee alland end all in the hormonal universe.
It lives in a world with lotsof other hormones that compete for dominance.
My favorite hormone even has its ownnickname the cuddle hormone oxytocin. It
facilitates bonding feelings of closeness, empathy, and compassion. In one study,
(15:18):
they gave a group of men anasal spray containing oxytocin. Another control group
just had salt water. Then theywere asked to play a game that involved
generosity, and you guessed it.The ones who had the oxytocin nasal spray
were eighty percent more generous compared tothe placebo group. Oxytocin plays a very
(15:43):
high role in how people fall inlove. Not surprisingly, when women have
sex, their oxytocin levels rise.In fact, during female orgasm they have
huge surges of oxytocin. The Onlyother time in a woman's life where she
has that much oxytocin is when she'sbreastfeeding to help her bond with her baby.
When men have sex, they havea surge of oxytocin two except they
(16:07):
have a much higher surge of testosterone. The testosterone blunts the effect of oxytocin.
That's why men don't fall in lovethrough sex. A man can have
casual sex with a woman for weeksor months and not fall in love,
whereas if a woman does the samething with the same partner. All that
(16:29):
oxytocin means that she has a veryhigh chance of falling in love. But
what's an optimal level of testosterone fora man? You know, if he
has too much, she's more likelyto be a cheater, and if he
has too little, he might losehis libido and his energy. If you
believe the marketing of some pharmaceutical companies, low tea is a common condition that
(16:52):
must be treated immediately. I havelow testosterone. There I said it did
well and really see. I figuredlow testosterone would increase my sex drive.
But when I started losing energy andbecame booty, that's when I had an
honest conversation with my doctor. There'sa lot of controversy about a diagnosis of
low t I personally think it wasinvented by pharmaceutical companies. There's plenty of
(17:18):
evidence to suggest that testosterone cream canrestore sexual functioning in young and middle aged
men who already have lower testosterone levels, but it has no influence on sexual
behavior when hormone levels are about normal. You know, Mother nature is a
perfect programmer. She knows when todip down those levels of testosterone to protect
(17:41):
women and children. One research studyshowed that husbands of pregnant women had a
big dip in testosterone during her thirdtrimester. This phenomenon, according to evolutionary
psychologists, likely was designed to divertsexual energy and convert it in to protecting
and providing for and monogamy can makemen's testosterone levels drop. One study found
(18:07):
that men in long term relationships formore than a year tested lower in testosterone
than single men or men in newrelationships. This could be evolutionary because men
with lower testosterone are more likely tobe better caregivers and less likely to pursue
additional sex partners. Well, Ithink it depends on what stages in your
(18:27):
life you are too. I thinkin certain time, when my girlfriend and
I broke up, I was definitelyon the higher under that scale. But
you know, after a while youkind of missed that camaderie. I think
a little bit and start to understandthe benefits of monogamy, feeling of having
a partner to take on this thingthat we call life. Finally, low
(18:48):
testosterone guys are great fathers. Astudy in twenty thirteen found that slightly smaller
testicles were associated with a more nurturingquality among fathers. Reduced testosterone levels and
testies volume were associated with higher levelsof paternal caregiving. I love kids.
I just wanted to be married witha family. So what's a woman to
(19:15):
do. If she chooses a hightestosterone mate, she may have a gorgeous
protective cheater on her hands. Andif she chooses a low testosterone guy,
she'll have plenty of help in thedaddy department. But what about the bedroom.
Well, there are two factors thattemper cheating behavior in high testosterone men,
religion and intelligence. Men who faithfullyfollow religious doctrine tend to override their
(19:38):
high testosterone urges with good impulse control. And my family history, faith was
really important. I just didn't Ididn't have an interest in spending a lot
a lot of time or sleeping witha bunch of women because it wasn't the
way that I was brought up.One slightly longer than the other. Which
(20:00):
one is that the ring finger?Ah, that's high testosterone. Were you
raised with a religion? I wasraised as a Christian. My wife comes
from a religious background as well.We met when we were in high school
and dated and got married and hadour first kids. When we were in
the early twenties. And some researchshows that high intelligence men can be better
at committing to family over fun thewhole everyone dreams of, like high school
(20:26):
and college and like dating around andall these girls and stuff. And I
was just ready to be like amarried dad and like have my life in
middle school. And for those whochoose the good guy, stable daddy,
there are ways to increase a man'stestosterone. Again, enter my favorite hormone,
oxytocin. It's called the bonding hormonebecause it helps make people feel connected.
(20:48):
Couples who have been given oxytocin nospray reported more lovemaking, trust,
and caregiving. But short of anoxytocin lace no spray, the other way
women raise their own oxytocin is throughsex. The problem is when a woman's
oxytocin is low, her sex drivegoes down. She just doesn't want to
have sex. And as for herhusband, his naturally lowered testosterone to divert
(21:14):
sexual energy toward providing and caregiving maymake him a low energy couch potato.
Or if he's looking for a wayto spike his testosterone, he may be
prone to cheating. So how doesa woman raise her husband's testosterone just enough?
And how does a man raise hiswife's oxytocin so she'll have sex with
him? Couples can keep her oxytocinhigh by doing lots of bonding behaviors that
(21:40):
don't involve sex. Communicating more,cuddling, kissing, having date nights,
touch without the pressure of sex canraise her oxytocin enough to make her eventually
want to have sex, and thatthe sex will really raise her oxytocin.
And how how to raise his testosteronewell? To do that, he needs
(22:03):
a win and he needs to feelterritorial. Even watching his team win can
give him a boost of testosterone.So can playing sports, hanging out with
his guy friends, or achieving atwork. And there's another way that your
husband can psychologically have a win whenhe feels good about himself when you compliment
him. Yes, when women saynice things to their husbands, their testosterone
(22:26):
goes up. As for feeling territorial, when his partner practices good grooming and
looks appealing to other men, he'llnaturally want to keep her closer to him.
Is there trouble with testosterone? Hardlylike all other hormones, they work
in concert with a party of hormones, many who temper their effect, and
(22:48):
when we look at the nature versusnurture debate, it's important to remember that
thinking and beliefs have as much todo with human behavior as biology. I'm
doctor Wendy Walsh. Thanks for listeningto Mating Matters on our next episode,
(23:10):
The God That Clubs, How religionsmake rules around sexuality to increase reproductive advantage.
Mating Matters with Doctor Wendy Walsh isproduced by iHeartMedia. It is researched,
written and hosted by me, doctorWendy Walsh, and produced and edited
by the Brooke Peterson. Follow uson Twitter, Facebook, YouTube and Instagram
(23:33):
at doctor Wendy Walsh. Listen toMating Matters on the iHeartRadio app or wherever
you listen to your podcasts.
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