A study has found that gay men's brains react differently to a sexual stimulus than those of heterosexual males. They react more like those of women upon inhalation of a male pheromone.
Sandra Witelson, a researcher on brain anatomy and sexual orientation, says this shows that sexual orientation is biologically based and not just learned.
Researchers at the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm, Sweden made participants inhale chemicals made from male and female sex hormones, chemicals which are believed to be pheromones. The human response to pheromones has been contested, but in 2000 American researchers found a gene thought to direct a human pheromone receptor in the nose.
The study was part of a series investigating if brain regions involved in reproduction vary in reaction to odors and pheromones, said the lead researcher Ivanka Savic. Indeed, it was found that the brains of different groups varied in their response to the pheromones.
Using PET brain scans, the researchers studied the response to sniffing the chemicals of three groups (heterosexual men, heterosexual women and homosexual men). When sniffing smells, only the olfactory region of the brain was active.
Yet the chemical from testosterone ignited a response in both straight women and in gay men. This was concentrated in the hypothalamus, mostly in the preoptic area which dominates sexual behavior. Conversely, heterosexual men responded strongly to the estrogen pheromone in their brain’s reproductive region. The study results involving homosexual women are not yet complete.
In another study on people's response to body odors, pheromone reviews in Philadelphia also found acute distinctions between gay and straight men and women. Neuroscientist Charles Wysocki led the study, which concluded that gender preference is biologically rooted. Thus, differences in body odors between gay and straight individuals do indicate physical differences.
This study looked at responses from 82 heterosexual and homosexual men and women to underarm sweat odors from 24 donors of different sexual orientations. Gay men preferred different odors, those from gay men, and their own body odors were the least preferred by the other groups.
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Helena Berger works as an author for Seductive Pheromones, well established pheromone research company that specialises in learning about the top attractants on the market today.
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