Secret behind passionate kiss revealed

Ummmms’ and ‘aaahhhs’ are not the only co-partners of kissing, for a passionate lip-lock unleashes a chain of chemical changes that really turn your head, claims a new study.
As Valentine's Day approaches, Wendy Hill, professor of psychology at Lafayette College, Pennsylvania has taken the opportunity to shed light on that most basic of all human expressions of love – the smooch.
In her study, Wendy has found that a meeting of lips can spark a complex chemical surge into the brain that makes a lover feel excited, happy or relaxed. Also, it is being speculated that the hormone release may be triggered directly by an exchange of sexually stimulating pheromones in the saliva.
“This study shows kissing is much more complex and causes hormonal changes and things we never thought occurred,” The Times quoted her, as saying. “We tend to think more about who we are kissing and how it feels, yet there are a lot of other things happening,” she added.
To reach the conclusion, the research team looked at the impact of kissing on levels of two hormones, oxytocin and cortisol, in 15 male-female couples before and after holding hands and before and after kissing.
Oxytocin is known to be involved in social bonding so the researchers predicted that its levels would rise, while cortisol, a stress hormone, would fall. The results showed cortisol levels fell in both sexes, although oxytocin levels rose in men but fell in women.

Women like to target men who are in relationships

A scientific study has found evidence that women like to target men who are already in relationships.

Researchers at Oklahoma State University in the US use the term 'mate poaching' to describe this phenomenon.

During the study, they showed a picture of a moderately attractive man or woman to participants.

Half of the participants were told that the prospective mate was single, while the rest were told that they were not.

Researchers Dr Melissa Burkley and Jessica Parker observed that 90 per cent of the women participants were interested in a man when told that he was in a relationship, compared to 59 per cent when told the same man was single.

"This finding indicates that single women are considerably more interested in pursuing a man who is less available to them," the Telegraph quoted them as concluding.

"This may be because a man who is attached has already shown his ability to commit and, in a sense, has been pre-screened by another woman," they added.

The researchers also noted that men, on the other hand, expressed no preference about whether a woman was in a relationship or not.

"The results showed that only single women were more interested in pursuing an attached target rather than a single target," they said. 

A research article describing the study has been published in the Journal of Experimental Social Psychology.