This is a great little snippet from New Scientist that claims that the smell of breast milk to women without children increases sex dive by 24% and fantasies by 17%!!! Amazing!
The logic is that there's a chemical cue in the milk that encourages women to conceive when times are favorable (because other women could do it). BUT, I disagree with the chemical cue part. The article says that they can't locate the chemical responsible and I think this might be one of those things that are partly social and partly biological.
Acording to studies I've read in the past, the biggest turn on smell for women is baby powder. At first it's sort of perverse, but it's serving the exact same function as breast milk. It's reminding women of babies and the smell means that other women are able to have them so conditions must be favorable. And there's obviously no chemical cue in baby poweder that triggers brain activity in women, but through social mechanisims, we've come to associate baby poweder with babies, so it can serve the same function. Which is interesting: that a smell with a socially derived meaning could have biological responses.
After that, I've heard that women also get turned on by lavender and men get turned on by licorace so go figure.
Posted by bluprnt at December 17, 2004 07:50 PM