Scientists Find Gene That Predicts Happiness In Women 323
An anonymous reader writes "For reasons that scientists have not conclusively determined, women are happier than men. And now, researchers think that they may have pinpointed one of the reasons for that. They have found a gene in women that predicts the level of happiness in women. 'After controlling for various factors, ranging from age and education to income, the researchers found that women with the low-expression type of MAOA were significantly happier than others. Compared to women with no copies of the low-expression version of the MAOA gene, women with one copy scored higher on the happiness scale and those with two copies increased their score even more. While a substantial number of men carried a copy of the "happy" version of the MAOA gene, they reported no more happiness than those without it.'"
Re:you fail at biology forever (Score:5, Informative)
The VAST majority of sexually active females are *not* trying to have a baby.
That is true in a conscious way, but they generally want to have sex when they feel like having sex. They will feel like having sex when their body tells them they are interested. That interest tends to be generated when certain requirements are met, unless they're somehow impaired (i.e. drunk). Those requirements will tend to reflect who will provide good genes for a child. That's why a woman can like a man just fine and think he is awesome, but has no interest in having sex with him.
You may well not have sex for reproduction, but we've evolved various aspects of it for that purpose, and nature doesn't care if we intend to get pregnant or not, it will do its best to find the right reproductive partner to have sex with if there is even a chance reproduction may occur.
Obviously, women can override the immediate desire to have sex and certainly can try and avoid pregnancy, but she's probably not going to try to override her instincts about who she finds attractive.
Re:you fail at biology forever (Score:5, Informative)
First of all sex is more than reproduction, you know this, right?
cca 1,000,000,000 years ago: Sexual reproduction appears and sexual behavior develops.
cca 200 years ago: Effective contraceptives get into widespread use.
You think that our basal ethology and psychology has had the time to adjust to the existence of artificial reproductive barriers?
Re:Wait. What? (Score:4, Informative)
A friend told me about his racing school teacher who was divorced many times and had discovered the secret to happy marriage: Add a piece of jewellery to the budget for every new set of tires.
For the average slashdotter just replace "new set of tires" with "new computer/PC overhaul"