
Birth Control Pills Affect Women's Taste in Men (2008) - timr
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=birth-control-pills-affect-womens-taste
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rauljara
My general complaint about journalism regarding these sorts of studies:
Normally the study did in fact find the effect the journalist reports on, and
the effect was indeed statistically significant, however, 9 times out of 10,
the effect is tiny. Frequently the effect doesn't affect all people the same
(e.g., in clinical trials, even when a treatment is statistically significant,
some people under the treatment effect will get worse rather than better). And
yet, even though these effects are tiny and not universal, the journalist
almost always reports it as though it is some ironclad rule of human behavior.

I have no idea how strong the birth control pill effect is; maybe it is indeed
a strong one. But this sort of reporting leaves you absolutely no way of
knowing. And I have a problem with that.

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nandemo
Here you go (the original paper):

[http://rspb.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/275/1652/2715...](http://rspb.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/275/1652/2715.short)

The newspaper misinterprets the study's conclusion. The study only says that
pill affects odour preference and that "if odour plays a role in human mate
choice, our results suggest that contraceptive pill use could disrupt
disassortative mate preferences." Clearly, that's a big "if" and it doesn't
seem to be discussed in the article.

PS: I live in Japan, and reading the newspaper my first thought was that at
least there's some upside to the fact that Japanese women don't use the
pill...

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FlorinAndrei
Short term? (the "hookup phase") Maybe not, what with daily showers and
deodorants and what not.

Long term? It likely plays an important role.

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nazgulnarsil
I've heard it cited that marriage counselors _very_ commonly hear "Can't stand
the way they smell" as a complaint.

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jkincaid
Just as an anecdote, I took a class on human sexual evolution about four years
ago. Our professor said he was so convinced that this phenomenon was real that
when his daughter got engaged, he convinced her to go off the pill for a month
to ensure that she still loved her fiance (she did).

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endtime
Anecdotally, my ex-girlfriend started taking the pill around the start of the
two years we dated (to regulate her cycle, not because we started dating,
though it was...convenient). She's off it now, and looking back on it, she
thinks that the effect it had on her mood/personality contributed to our
breakup (we're still friends, in case that's not obvious, and have discussed
this).

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ff0066mote
I guess if your marriage is built more upon sexual attraction to your
significant other than upon other kinds of compatibility, then this news would
be rather shocking to you.

~~~
araneae
Or if you want to have immunocompetant children.

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yread
[2008]

~~~
jobu
not exactly news

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maukdaddy
I thought this was going to be much dirtier than it was.

