Text reblogged from What I Learned Today
you down with MHC?
Just read this interesting article in Time Magazine about how romance is linked to smell. We respond to olfactory cues and in fact, smell helps us narrow our choices of potential partners.
MHC (the major histocompatibility complex), a set of genes that controls the immune system and influences tissue rejection is especially critical. You jive best with a partner whose MHC is sufficiently different from your own. Studies show that couples with similar MHC’s have trouble conceiving or an increased risk of miscarriage.
A study had females smell various t-shirts worn by different anonymous men, then pick the one that appealed to them most. Most women chose ones worn by men with a MHC dissimilar to her own (=good). Those who chose the t-shirts worn by men with similar MHC (=bad) were on birth control. The daily dose of hormones confounds the MHC-smell detection system.
A chemist associated with the studies “wonders if the Pill may contribute to divorce… Women pick a husband when they’re on birth control, then quit to have a baby and realize they’ve made a mistake.” Here’s an in depth description of the study & a scientific explanation here.
Watch out Match.com, ScientificMatch.com is taking over. My friend Pavla read about this online dating service where you send in saliva samples and the program matches you with a mate with dissimilar immune system genes. Only $1,995.95 for a year for anyone except convicted criminals or women on birth control.
— dihard
Nice blog! Yeah, I am definitely down with MHC. There is still much to be discovered about hormones and olfaction. Some people in the field think PMS is fake, which is pretty ridiculous. None of them are female, by the way. And whoa, ScientificMatch.com sounds unbelievably shady! As if it is that simple. I’ll stick with sniffin’ somebody out.
There was one study, arguably the first solid study on human MHC odor preferences, which found that women prefer the smell of their fathers. The women in the study could identify their paternally-inherited gene for MHC. So, basically, we have an absolutely amazing and refined sense of smell, and we naturally select moderately similar/dissimilar genes. It’s like weighing inbreeding and outbreeding costs but not consciously. My friend Art, 60-something year old artist, just said to me yesterday that when a woman senses a great deal of chemistry with a guy, it always means that she wants to have his children. I didn’t argue with him, but I did ask him why he doesn’t have any kids.
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