Soul Talk

Women for men with low-pitched voices

A recent study by McMaster University’s Dr. Jullian O’Connor has found that women prefer men with low-pitched voices like that of actor Jon Hamm from Mad Men. But sexual bliss could elude you if your voice is squeaky like David Beckham’s. It has been widely believed that men with deep voices attracted women more but it has been found that women also associate these voices with those of men who are more likely to cheat and are unfit for marriage.

Women choose men with low-pitched voices for short-term relationships as they are linked to higher chances of infidelity. Conducted on 87 test subjects who were undergraduate women in their last academic year, the study was online in the journal Personality and Individual Differences.

Teen mothers’ kids late bloomers

A Canadian study by St. Michael’s Hospital Researchers points out that kids born to teen moms face delayed speaking skills and spatial sense development. It is not a direct consequence of being a mother in teenage but rather related to limited education of teen moms, lack of good jobs, no father figure and the like. Lead author, Dr. Julia Morinis at the St. Mike’s Research Centre for Research on Inner City Health has said that being a teen mother is in itself a risk factor indicative of poor conditions. Based on the data from the MCS, which included about 19,000 kids born in the United Kingdom between 2000 and 2001, the study has found that such children had much lower scores as compared to kids born to moms who were 25 to 34 years old. The delay was up to as much as 11 months in some cases.

Half of high-risk young couples infertile

The Indian Society for Assisted Reproduction (ISAR) has found that 46 per cent high-risk couples (31-40 years) in India are infertile. Among these, almost half have already undergone in-vitro fertilisation. Spanning nine cities, 100 infertility experts and 2,562 respondents, the study took note of the fact that an increasing number of women are reporting poor ovarian reserves. While 41 per cent men are infertile due to sperm problems, 40 per cent women have polycystic ovarian disorder as the underlying cause. Stress is figured to be the biggest cause for infertility and an equal number of men and women are coming in with the problem.

Teenagers are exercising more and eating more vegetables too. This is leading to a levelling off of the obesity rates according to a new study published in the journal Pediatrics. Most children are believed to be engaging in an hour of exercise fewer than five days a week and spending more than two hours a day on television, chatting online and playing video games. Dr. Ronald J. Iannotti, an author of the study and chair of the department of exercise and health sciences at the University of Massachusetts Boston said that that it was a hopeful start towards a downwards trend in obesity. About tens thousand schoolchildren in grades 6 to 10were surveyed from 2001 to 2010 and the study hints at improvement in rate of obesity in younger children, with some showing a decline too. It was also found that boys indulge in more physical activity than girls but ate fewer vegetables compared to girls.

— Compiled by AG

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