REAL LIFE NEWS: FONDNESS FOR SPICY FOOD LINKED TO TESTOSTERONE LEVELS
by Hazed
There’s always been a macho element to eating extremely spicy foods; you can see the bravado in the way men egg each other on to munch on a hotter chilli or eat an even more incendiary vindaloo curry. Now scientists at the University of Grenoble have discovered a correlation between enjoying spicy food and levels of testosterone.
Higher levels of the hormone are linked to characteristics seen as typically male: aggression, recklessness and a high sex drive. New research shows that this risk-taking behaviour also extends to taking risks in taste.
The study asked 114 men aged between 18 and 44 to indicate their preference for spicy food. They were then fed a sample of mashed potatoes with hot pepper sauce, and asked to grade the spiciness of the meal.
Afterwards, saliva samples were taken and tested for testosterone. It was found that those who said they liked spicy foods and had voluntarily consumed more of the meal had higher levels of the hormone.
But which is cause, and which is effect? Does it mean that if you have high levels of testosterone then you’re going to enjoy spicier food? Or does eating spicy food raise your testosterone levels? Well, studies on rats show that it may be the latter, but those haven’t yet been proved to apply to humans, so more work is needed.
