Love key to brain development in children

Love key to brain development in children - Ever noticed how scientific opinions swing from one extreme to the other?

Take the importance of mothers in the development of children. In the early days of psychiatry almost every mental illness, from depression to schizophrenia to autism was blamed on bad mothering. Then in the 1960’s and 70’s the discovery of medications that helped these illnesses allowed psychiatry to reframe them as biological conditions, no different from cancer or heart disease. Parents were fully absolved for the mental illnesses of their children, except to the degree that they passed along bad genes that caused chemical imbalances in the brain.

Myths inevitably survive long after they’ve been scientifically disproven. Such is the case with the fantasy that mental illnesses can be written off solely to genes and chemicals. Over the last decade a string of scientific discoveries has shown that the biology driving mental illness has at least as much to do with the environment as with chemicals or genetic inheritance. And it increasingly appears that the single most powerful environmental factor is the love - or its lack - that children receive from their parents. So in a very real way we parents are back on the hook for the lifelong emotional well-being of our kids.

I say this based on a thousand studies. But to make the point here, let me describe a recent study in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences that more definitively than any before it shows how parental care literally changes not just kids’ hearts and minds, but their brains as well.

Here’s how the study was done. Researchers at Washington University in St. Louis recruited 92 children between the ages of 3 and 6. Rather than asking parents about how they treated their children, the researchers brought the kids and parents into a lab and videotaped them as the parents, almost always mothers, tried to help their children cope with a mildly stressful task that was designed to approximate the stress of daily parenting.

Ratings of parental ability to nurture their children were done by study personnel who watched the videos while knowing nothing about either children or parents. Several years later, on average, the children had the size of a brain area called the hippocampus measured using magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). After taking into account a whole range of factors that can affect hippocampal size, the researchers found that children with especially nurturing, caring mothers, based on their behavior during the laboratory stressor, had significantly larger hippocampi (plural of hippocampus - you’ve got one on each side of the brain) than kids with mothers who were average or poor nurturers.

Why is this finding important? Because more than any place else in the brain, when it comes to the hippocampus, size matters. Other things being equal, having small hippocampi increases your risk for all sorts of troubles, from depression and post traumatic stress disorder to Alzheimer’s disease. If you’ve got depression, having small hippocampi predicts that you won’t respond as well to antidepressants as well as depressed people with larger hippocampi.

Just as having small hippocampi increases the risk for all sorts of mental disorders, all the things in our lives that put us under undue stress and strain also shrink the hippocampus. This is as true for cigarette smoking as it is for being exposed as a child to abuse or parental neglect.

In addition to protecting us against brain illnesses, we all need big hippocampi because this brain area, while not much bigger than your little finger, plays a disproportionately large role in how you will be able to handle the stresses and strains of your life, and how you will remember your life when it’s all said and done. This is so because the hippocampus is crucial for our ability to form and store personal memories. It is also of central importance for restraining the body’s stress and inflammatory responses, both of which can induce significant damage to bodily organs and the brain if not properly reined in.

The finding that especially nurturing mothers can literally grow their children’s hippocampi doesn’t exist in isolation. It is consistent with hundreds of animal studies showing that maternal nurturing has a range of biological effects relevant to physical and emotional health. An especially striking example of this is a study done several years ago in rodents showing that maternal nurturance (measured as amount of licking that rat pups received from their mothers) literally changed how the rat pups’ DNA was expressed in the hippocampus. As a result of these changes, pups who received extra licking had changes in their stress systems that have been repeatedly associated with well-being in humans.

So we underestimate our power as parents at our children’s peril. But I would be remiss if I left you with the impression that mother love is all-powerful or that genes and chemicals don’t matter at all. The association of parental nurturing with subsequent hippocampal size in children was only observed in non-depressed children. In children with signs of significant early depression, maternal nurturing in the laboratory had no association with subsequent hippocampal volume. Why this was the case is anybody’s guess, but it might suggest that at least some cases of major depression are indeed mostly genetic or “hardwired” from an early age, and so are fairly resistant to positive things from the environment.

Given the complexity of the human brain, should we be surprised that every possible outcome of genes, chemicals and environment is actualized in someone somewhere? Meantime, one generation full of deeply loving parents would change the brain of the next generation, and with that, the world. ( cnn.com )

Blog : The Love is Beautiful
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Are You a Dear Loving Spouse?

Are You a Dear Loving Spouse? - The S word… Yes, it matters. It’s very much a taboo in our culture, except of course when it’s not working. Then, and only then it seems, do people talk about it – after it’s too late. However, the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) encouraged his companions to discuss sex – and virtually any matter, no matter how personal – with him. The Prophet himself, while not divulging all aspects of his own sexual life, was known for his nature as a loving husband who was sensitive and physically demonstrative.

In several hadith, he speaks about the importance of foreplay and speaking in loving terms during sexual relations. Again, the concept of mutual satisfaction is elucidated in a hadith, which advises husbands to engage in acts that enable a woman to achieve orgasm first. (Check Ihya ulum-id-din (Revival of Religious Learning) by Imam Ghazali, chapter on Marriage).

It is important for both husbands and wives to be aware and conscious of how we speak, let alone what we say, to one another.

Sexual dissatisfaction is considered legitimate grounds for divorce on the part of either wife or husband”.

Qualified scholars and experts in this area should be helping our community to discuss and work through issues regarding healthy sexual relations between spouses. It IS important in a marriage; it is part of being that garment for one another that shields us from the temptations and licentiousness that pervades our societies.

In fact, I would argue that given the overly sexualized nature of society today, healthy sexual relations between spouses is as important as ever toward maintaining healthy and strong marriages, and ostensibly families. In addition to the works of Imam al-Ghazali as mentioned above, there are many other resources and references from our tradition that discuss the adab (ethics) of sexuality.

Another reason why this issue is of great importance today is the fact that pornography has become a major problem among Muslims. Too many Muslims, especially our men, are resorting to pornography and using it to self-gratify, which, not only is haram in our deen, but often leads to a nagging addiction that is difficult to rid oneself of, and extremely harmful in numerous ways. This, unfortunately, is not only a problem among our unmarried young men, but married people as well.

Thus, healthy sexuality between spouses is important for the prevention of sins and dysfunctions.

Being careful with speech.

It is important for both husbands and wives to be aware and conscious of how we speak, let alone what we say, to one another. Romance often starts with gentle, kind, and affectionate speech. It has been said by many experts of marriage that a soothing tone of voice can actually become a type of foreplay between two people. In this regard, the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) said, "Let none of you come upon his wife like an animal, let there be an emissary between them." When asked what the emissary is, he replied, "The kiss and sweet words."

In another hadith, the Prophet points out that one of the deficiencies of a man is that "he should approach his wife and have sexual contact with her before exchanging words and caresses…”

The Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) said that the most heinous sound was the braying of the donkey. Despite this, many spouses scream and yell at each other in decibels and tones that come close to the sounds of farm animals.

There is nothing romantic about talking to someone in such a manner, nor does it help create an atmosphere in the home where people want to actually be together.

We must be conscious of how we speak to one another, and try our best – again, struggle – not to give into anger and frustration that might lead us to be harsh in speech.

Guarding the tongue is one of the great jihads mentioned by Allah and His Messenger (peace be upon him), and it is one that we must put into practice every day in our homes so that we can nurture an environment of peace, love and, in the case of husbands and wives – romance.

Understanding true love.

The love we have for our spouses at this level is different because it’s unconditional, and when it’s unconditional we don’t let ‘little things’ fluster us.

Understanding true love is very important in the context of marriage.

The images that our media feeds us every day, aim to present a notion of love that is more desperation and lust than love.

True love requires peace – it requires a peaceful heart because real love is love of Allah, which, when achieved, allows one to love truly and completely. The projection and need for ‘romantic love’, however, is based more on the desires of our incomplete selves telling us that to ‘fill the hole’ within ourselves we have to find another -- someone that has what it takes to complete us.

A relationship that exists on this level of co-dependency primarily revolves around placing expectations on a partner to meet one's own needs and desires. Our ego/nafs tricks us into thinking that this other person will complete us and make us whole, which is what our true

Self is always seeking to begin with. For to be whole means to be with Allah, and that is where the true self desires to be because it’s where we came from (“To Allah we belong and to Him is our return”).

From my own experience, many years of pre-Islamic searching for that perfect someone to ‘right my ship’ made me realize that the search is not ‘out there’ but rather in my own heart.

After loving -- several times over -- then finally finding Allah through Islam did I come to realize that no other person was going to make me whole.

In popular art -- movies, songs, etc., the people ‘in love’ always talk about how badly they need one another and they can’t live without them and they’ll die if they don’t get them. I once felt that way too. However, after years of searching, finding and searching again, I realized that this illusory need actually reflects a deeper yearning for true love that cannot be fulfilled by another human being.

Love at the deepest level is love of Allah and surrender to Him, because only when our hearts filled with love of Allah will we be whole and not in need of anyone else to complete us.

When this occurs (insha-Allah!), real love is achieved, which means we become servants of the Most Merciful and no longer in need of what others can “do for us”, but rather we can give and receive love for Allah’s sake.

The love we have for our spouses at this level is different because it’s unconditional, and when it’s unconditional we don’t let ‘little things’ fluster us.

We don’t divorce at the drop of a hat because we realize that Allah is the one navigating the ship. A relationship at this level is thus a union of two complete human beings, not two individual halves each seeking to make themselves whole through the other.

That is why the ideal marriage is a union of two people whose hearts are fully surrendered to Allah. In such a relationship both people are already whole and not in need of the other for their fulfillment. In this way, they act as partners on the path to Allah, helping and assisting (and often challenging) each other toward greater heights.

Such lovers are thus able to spend their precious time serving one another, selflessly loving one another, and teaching their children to do the same. They also dwell in a reality that acknowledges and accepts struggle, imperfection, and the bumps in the road that always occur in marriage.

And lastly,

Love for the sake of Allah, not for yourself.

The cornerstone of our deen is centering our entire existence around the worship, service, love and fear of Allah. Too often, we carry out our daily transactions completely forgetful of our reason for being here.

We might pray, fast, and avoid what we are asked to avoid. But outside of our rituals and rules we do not connect the other aspects of our lives to Allah. It’s a problem with worldview and it often plays itself out in the context of marriage.

If we work to put Allah first, then marriage does not become a focus, it becomes an effect of Allah’s mercy and kindness to us. Then our spouses become more than spouses, they become a product of God’s favor to us.

When we see them in such a manner, then naturally we will ask ourselves how does God want us to act towards them and treat them?

As Allah has commanded, of course, and as He has shown us through the teachings of His Messenger (peace and blessings be upon him), which means kindness, love and affection.

When we are right with Allah – truly – then we can only be right with our spouses. When we are not right with Allah, then the results will speak for themselves. Starting with marriage is not the key, however, starting with Allah is. ( onislam.net )

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The secret to a happy retirement can be found between the sheets

The secret to a happy retirement can be found between the sheets - Ask an elderly couple what the key to a happy marriage is, and they’ll probably tell you it’s down to mutual respect and not going to bed without resolving an argument.

But, according to researchers, the secret is regular sex.

Scientists say older people are much more likely to enjoy their twilight years if they make love frequently.

Secret to happiness: The study found that frequency of sexual activity was significantly linked to general and marital happiness

A study of over 65s found almost 80 per cent who had sex more than once a month were ‘very happy’ with their life in general.

This compared with just 59 per cent who reported no sexual activity in the past 12 months and 40 per cent who had been celibate for over a year, according to the findings presented at an ageing conference in Boston, in the U.S.

Professor Adrienne Jackson, of Florida Agricultural and Mechanical University, said: ‘This study will help open the lines of communication and spark interest in developing “outside the box” approaches to dealing with resolvable issues that limit or prevent older adults from participating in sexual activity.

‘Highlighting the relationship between sex and happiness will help us in developing and organising specific sexual health interventions for this growing segment of our population.’

Based on a social survey of 238 married people aged 65 or older in the US., she discovered frequency of sexual activity was significantly linked to both general and marital happiness.

The association remained after accounting for factors such as age, gender, health status and satisfaction with financial situation.

The respondents were asked about the frequency of their sexual activity during the past 12 months and also invited to assess their general and marital happiness by describing themselves as ‘very happy’, ‘pretty happy’, or ‘not too happy’ in answer to each question.

On Saturday, the Mail revealed that Britain is seeing a boom in ‘silver separations’ as the latest figures, for 2009, reveal that more than 11,500 over-60s were granted a divorce. This is up by 4 per cent in two years and pensioners are the only age group where the divorce rate is rising.

On reaching retirement, and without the routine of work to fill their day, many realise they can no longer stand their husband or wife.

More men than women over 60 were divorced, reflecting the fact that husbands are usually older than their wives.

Among the male over 60s age group, the divorce rate rose by 3 per cent between 2007 and 2009 but among the female over 60s, it soared by 6 per cent.

Despite older women showing a bigger increase, overall there were still more men than women getting divorced. ( dailymail.co.uk )

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Is A Cuddle Better than Sex?

Is A Cuddle Better than Sex? - Recently, I met a few close female friends for dinner. As is the way on these occasions, the talk swiftly turned to relationships.

Tellingly, the topic of marital sex — or more accurately, the lack of it — was a big issue among this group of fortysomething women, many of whom have either young children, husbands with demanding jobs or high levels of financial stress.

‘We hardly ever have sex these days,’ admitted my friend and lecturer Jo, 37.

According to conventional wisdom, she and her husband of many years, David, 44, could be on the verge of divorce. After all, it’s a long-held tenet that lack of sex in a marriage is a sure sign that the emotional end is nigh. However, Jo insists that the lack of action underneath the covers isn’t affecting their relationship.

‘We cuddle all the time,’ she explains. ‘We go to sleep holding each other, we always have a big hug before we go off to work and we lie entwined on the sofa together watching TV at night. If we didn’t have that daily contact, I’d feel as if I was just living with a flatmate. But not having sex simply isn’t a problem for us.’

Perhaps it’s not surprising that we set so much store by sex. After all, there’s so much focus on it in films and on TV that it’s all too easy to believe that diminished passion signals a marriage in terminal decline.

Romance: Hugging can keep the love alive just as well as sex (posed by models)

But according to new research, the frequency of cuddling is a far better indicator of the strength of a relationship than how often you’re swinging from the chandeliers.

‘Cuddling provides not just sensual pleasure, but also a feeling of comfort, security and companionship, all of which are just as important to a relationship as sex,’ explains Paula Hall, relationship expert for online dating service Parship.

In fact, maintaining an intimate connection without the wild abandon of the hormonal early days can be vital for a happy relationship.

‘The advantage of non-sexual intimacy is that couples often use this time together to talk about their emotional lives,’ says Paula. ‘Whereas when sex is their only way of getting close, couples who find emotional openness difficult often rely on making love to help them connect. They can find themselves missing out on other levels of intimacy.’

Many other women I spoke to would agree. ‘My husband Ben and I split up last year,’ says Lydia Kay, 39, an office manager. ‘Sex was never a problem because we always found each other physically attractive. But we communicated less and less emotionally and, in the end, it wasn’t enough to keep us together.’

If sex is the focus, it can mean that emotional problems are never discussed — whereas non-sexual touching, such as cuddling and stroking, encourages more relaxed bonding and intimate conversation, due in large part to the crucial ‘cuddle hormone’ oxytocin.

‘Oxytocin is produced by touch and, as well as making us feel good, it also inspires us to touch more,’ says Paula. ‘That means that the more you touch, the closer you feel and the more you want to touch.’

Once assumed to be related only to childbirth, because of the role it plays in both encouraging contractions and then chemically bonding mother and newborn, recent research suggests that oxytocin’s ability to promote feelings of calm, love and connection also extends to couples in monogamous relationships.

The feeling of ‘melding’ that happens when you gaze into a loved one’s eyes, and the after-effects of calm and well-being that follow even non-sexual physical intimacy, could all be down to this miraculous hormone.

‘We used to think that oxytocin was found only in the pregnant uterus, but in fact it’s found in many sites in the body,’ says clinical psychiatrist and author Dr Brenda Davies.

‘It’s been called “the love hormone” and its levels in our blood certainly increase when we hug, when we feel loving and even when we stroke a beloved pet. So it has a huge role to play in intimacy — and not just of the sexual kind.’

This wonder-hormone may even help you to broach difficult subjects. New research suggests that oxytocin can prevent the body’s ‘freeze’ response to threat, and reduce ‘fight-or-flight’ panic.

So if you have a tricky discussion about money or the kids coming up, a big cuddle before you begin talking is the perfect way to approach a difficult subject. Oxytocin has also been shown to decrease blood pressure and the stress hormone cortisol, which has been linked to weight gain and a depressed immune system.

‘It even plays a part in raising our self-esteem and, therefore, improves our capacity to have healthy, close relationships,’ says Dr Davies. ‘It’s also a powerful natural anti-inflammatory, and has anti-ageing properties — one reason why people living isolated lives, with little human touch, can age prematurely.’

Experiments with animals have shown that it can play a major role in ‘pair-bonding’ among certain species — like the adoring prairie vole, which mates for life and ‘cuddles’ its chosen partner during lengthy grooming sessions. The same urge to be physically close without necessarily having sex is evident in humans.

One study suggests that after the intense sexual passion of the first few months, partners become ‘imprinted’ on each other. Once bonded, just the sight of your partner triggers a surge of oxytocin and a need for physical closeness that can be satisfied simply by cuddling.

This is good news for couples who still love each other but can’t summon the energy for seduction on a nightly basis.

‘Steve can live without sex, but he gets much more bad-tempered if we haven’t cuddled for a while,’ confirms Susie Gould, 34, a teacher. ‘He’s harder to talk to and it’s as though our connection’s snapped.

‘But if we have a glass of wine and cuddle up on the sofa for a chat, he visibly relaxes — I can almost feel the tension leaving his body and we can talk about anything.’

While men and women produce equal amounts of oxytocin, its effects are intensified by oestrogen, meaning women tend to have functionally higher concentrations of the hormone.

A Cambridge University study found that men who were given higher doses of oxytocin displayed greater levels of empathy with other’s emotions.

‘When this hormone’s flowing freely, it puts us in a peaceful, happy state of mind,’ says Dr Keith Kendrick, who led the study. ‘It helps us feel emotionally connected to whoever’s the source of that touch and gets men’s oxytocin levels on a par with women’s.

‘For many women, you could say oxytocin is a godsend, as it makes men more empathetic.’

Of course, it’s often assumed that women are happy with a platonic cuddle, while men are always eager to get down to business. But another recent study from the Kinsey Institute for Research in Sex, Gender and Reproduction suggests a different story.

According to its research, among middle?aged couples in committed relationships, tenderness is often more important to the man than the woman; regular kisses and cuddling lead to greater relationship satisfaction in men than in their partners.

‘I put weight on due to illness and I’d started to dread sex,’ says Kathy Logan, 50, who runs an online business. ‘But once Alan reassured me that he was happy just to cuddle and he wasn’t expecting anything more, it was lovely.

‘We developed a whole new side to our relationship because it got us out of that push-pull situation that a lot of my friends also seem to be stuck in, where one of you wants sex and the other’s making excuses and feeling resentful. With us, that had gone on for years, and I’d gone right off sex.’

Knowing it wasn’t on the agenda meant Kathy and Alan, 49, could appreciate each other again, without any expectations.

‘I’ve lost a lot of the weight now, and we do have sex again,’ says Kathy. ‘But it’s so different because now we can both say “I’m not really in the mood tonight, shall we just cuddle?” without feeling like it’s second-best.’

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Paula Hall says: ‘Inevitably, there are times when sex isn’t an option due to illness or stress. By keeping in touch with hugging, a couple can continue to express their love and affection for each other.’

That rings true for my friend Jo, who says: ‘Work is very stressful at the moment, and we’ve got a one-year-old who doesn’t sleep. Just lying with my head on Dave’s chest and his arm round me makes me feel so much more relaxed and calm. If he’s away for work, I become tense, and I know it’s because we haven’t had that vital physical contact.’

‘The great advantage of cuddling is that, unlike sex, you can do it anywhere, any time,’ explains Paula, ‘and enjoy all the benefits of feeling loved, cared for, protected and comforted.’

Suddenly, ‘Not tonight, darling, let’s just cuddle’ doesn’t seem like such a bad thing after all. ( dailymail.co.uk )

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Men Are From Cuddle, Women Are From Penis

Men Are From Cuddle, Women Are From Penis - A new study supposedly says women want sex but men want cuddling. Don't believe it.

1. Men need cuddling.

This is the most popular takeaway. "Men Need to Cuddle More Than Women," says L.A. Weekly. "Guys like to cuddle more," says MSNBC. "Cuddling key to happy relationships—for men," says CBS News.

Don't bet on it. The study didn't measure what people need or like. And the cuddle gap was small. Men whose relationships included frequent kissing and cuddling were about 12 percent more likely than other men to say they were happy in the relationship. Slate's Dave Johns is a fine example. Among women, the increase in happiness associated with kissing and cuddling was more like 9 percent.

The cuddle gap looks bigger in the published paper because the authors, in their analysis, combine cuddling with caressing. They note that the two activities—lumped together in the institute's press release as "tenderness"—increased the probability of reporting relationship happiness about twice as much among men as they did among women. But the questionnaire used in the study defined "caress" erotically. It asked how often you've been "sexually touched and caressed by your partner." That's more than tenderness. A kiss is just a kiss, but a thigh is a thigh.

Also, while the questionnaire phrased caressing as something done to you, it phrased cuddling as a mutual activity: "My partner and I kiss and cuddle each other." So when men who are happy in their relationships cuddle their partners, the cuddling may sometimes be an effect of happiness, not a cause.

2. Staying together longer makes you happier.

According to the press release, "Both men and women reported more happiness the longer they had been together." Nearly every news report interprets this as evidence that "men and women became happier with their relationships the longer they stayed together." Neither claim is strictly true. Among women, average reported happiness declined in the first 15 years of a relationship and didn't begin to recover until year 20.

One possible reason is kids. Ninety percent of couples in the study had children. The more difficult question is why the relationship-happiness curve, unlike the sexual-satisfaction curve, takes 15 years to bottom out. Here's a guess: attrition. Remember, this is a study of couples. If your relationship deteriorates and you break up or divorce, you disappear from the population being sampled. And as couples like yours disappear, the sampled population becomes, on average, happier and happier.

Check out the U.S. Census divorce tables. About 40 percent of marriages end before year 40. Of these, half end before year 15, and the other half end afterward. So 15 years is roughly where the average divorce occurs. And that's when the relationship happiness curve for women starts to recover.

Sexual satisfaction follows a different curve. It increases for women throughout the relationship. But is that because the sex gets better, as the Los Angeles Times infers, or because women become more easily satisfied? According to the study, the average woman goes from a 40 percent probability of reporting sexual satisfaction in the first year of her relationship to an 86 percent probability in the 40th year. By the 40th year, every woman is menopausal. In short, women become more satisfied as their sex drives wane and their partners age. The study's lead author, Kinsey Institute director Julia Heiman, concedes, "Possibly, women become more satisfied over time because their expectations change."

3. Promiscuity makes you unhappy.

The authors report that "for men, having had more sex partners in their lifetime was a predictor of less sexual satisfaction." Serves those lechers right. "Sorry, Charlie Sheen," clucks one journalist.

But this isn't a study of single men or serial newlyweds. It's a study of long-term couples. The men's ages ranged from 39 to 70, with a median of 55. So the study didn't measure a man's prowling phase. It measured his subsequent satisfaction in a committed relationship against the background of his prowling phase. The happier he was in the old days—the better the sex he had—the less likely he is to be satisfied with the monogamous sex to which he's now confined. Is that an indictment of promiscuity, or of monogamy?

Another possibility is that the causal arrow runs the other way: Men who move on from partner to partner do so because they're hard to satisfy, and they remain less satisfied after they're committed. "Searching for a better partner or sexual experience may emerge from or be connected to a lack of sexual satisfaction," the authors note. "Alternatively, more partners might indicate different standards based on greater experience." Or, to put it less nicely, higher standards.

4. Men who care about pleasing their partners are happier.

According to the authors, "Men who valued their partner's orgasm were more likely to report relationship happiness." But men in the study weren't asked whether they valued their partner's orgasm. They were asked a slightly different question: "How important is it that your partner reaches orgasm when you have sex together?"

For men who interpreted that question as valuation, the answer was obvious. Everyone knows you're supposed to say your partner is important. And most did. On a scale of 1 to 10, with 10 signifying the highest importance, women gave their partners' orgasms an average importance rating of 7.96. Men gave an average rating of 8.53.

Why did some people give a rating lower than 10? Maybe they were devaluing their partners' satisfaction. But the more plausible guess is that they were downplaying the importance of orgasm in general. The gender breakdown fits this hypothesis: While women were less likely than men to say their partner's orgasm was important, they were also less likely to say their own orgasm was important.

Why downplay orgasm? Maybe because it's difficult for your partner to reach orgasm due to age, health, or some other factor. If so, this underlying difficulty, rather than your failure to "value" your partner's pleasure, may account for your lower level of relationship happiness.

Or, as with the cuddling correlation, the causal link might run in reverse: The happier you are with your wife, the more you care about her pleasure.

5. Men want love; women want sex.

"Survey Shows Men Need to Cuddle, Women Value Sex," says Time's headline. "Men value cuddling, women sexual satisfaction," says the Boston Globe. "Sexual satisfaction is more important to women," says MSNBC.

But the study didn't measure what women value. It measured their level of satisfaction. More men than women reported being happy in their relationships, while more women than men reported being satisfied in their sex lives. But that gap doesn't necessarily signify that women valued sex more. It could well signify the opposite.

Here's how. In previous studies, the authors note, "men usually reported higher levels of sexual satisfaction than did women, regardless of sociocultural context." This study didn't match those findings. And what made this study different? It's "the first international study of individuals in committed relationships, where the focus was on middle and older-aged men and women in relationships with a median of 25 years duration." In other words, the men and women being surveyed were in the same long-term couples.

Suppose that on average, men value sex more than women do, while women value love more than men do. Given their freedom, men would seek sex more often than women do. And men might use their greater leverage to get what they want. They would report more sexual satisfaction.

But lock the same men and women into committed relationships with each other, and you get a different outcome. In each couple, the lowest common denominator prevails. The man can't get more sex than the woman will give. The woman can't get more love than the man will give. The result is a higher rate of sexual satisfaction among women than men, and a higher rate of relationship satisfaction among men than women. Satisfaction turns out to be the inverse of valuation.

For every theory I've proposed here, I can see problems. My cynical interpretations of the data may not stand up under scrutiny. But I doubt the media's rosy interpretations will stand up, either. Love and sex are too complicated for that. So are men and women. ( slate.com )

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Love Lessons from Dogs?

Love Lessons from Dogs? - Believe it or not, your pet knows the secrets to achieving a successful relationship. Here are five love lessons that man's best friend can share with you.

Though dogs have been labeled man's best friend, when it comes down to it, Fido is probably more the type of buddy you'd seek out for a game of catch, not love advice. According to Harrison Forbes, professional dog trainer and author of Heart of a Dog: What Challenging Dogs Have Taught Me About Love, Trust and Second Chances, however, you might want to reconsider the notion that your canine knows nothing about matters of the heart. "Dogs do the types of things we should do more often, and the things they don't get involved in — well, we should really skip them, too, if we're looking for love," he asserts. Puzzled by the notion that you may actually be able to get some romance pointers from your Pointer? Read on for five love lessons you can learn from dogs.

1. The reassurance of forgiveness

In order to have a successful partnership, letting bygones be bygones is crucial. An inability to get over issues and move ahead is a key roadblock to happiness. Dogs, Forbes notes, are always in the moment and therefore don't hold grudges or hang onto resentment. "Dogs wipe the slate clean many times a day," he explains. "If you are grumpy and yell at your dog, but then wait a minute and act like you never did, he will forgive you — many times over. If humans could let the little things go as easily as dogs do, their relationships would be better for it."

2. The security of unconditional love

Forbes says that as a rule, when a dog loves his owner, that bond is lasting and real. "It's interesting to note that celebrities are over-the-top pet lovers," he says. "This is because their dogs really love them for who they are, not their A-list status; a dog will always treat you the same. Dogs offer truly substantive relationships in a way most people don't," he notes. When it comes to romantic relationships, humans should strive to emulate a dog's focus on what a person really offers in terms of love, kindness and warmth, he advises.

3. The comfort of consistency

In a romantic relationship, consistency can be quite comforting. What's not to love about a partner who is never moody or capricious? "We as humans understand there are different types of behavior, yet we crave consistency," Forbes says. "With dogs, regardless of your animal's personality, you pretty much get the same behavior unless he's ill. A lot of people take comfort in that aspect of pet ownership, so you can only imagine how much similar behavior could add to a romantic relationship."

4. The need to be playful

Forbes notes that most dogs want to have a good time, keeping things light and not so serious all of the time. "The easiest way to burn out a working dog is to work him all the time — that pretty much goes for relationships as well," he says. In police-dog training, Forbes explains, training is balanced with play and fun. "The harder you go at it in a training phase, the more you have to counterbalance it," he says. "It's the same with a relationship — you have to relieve the pressure through play and good times."

5. The importance of effective communication

While communicating with your partner is important in a relationship, it's not merely the act of communicating that will ensure your relationship's success, but finding the way to do so that best matches your partner's needs. This is a skill that you can easily learn from working with dogs, Forbes says. "The different ways in which I communicate with my three dogs are suited to what works best for them … and for me with them," he explains.

You have to be willing to experiment and find the best way to communicate with dogs, and the same goes for your romantic interests, he says: "Just as a hot-tempered dog won't respond to yelling and lots of commands, neither will a hot-tempered person. At the same time, some more sensitive types may need a gentler approach. Essentially, no one person or dog communicates the same way — each individual has a unique style, and taking the time to learn about your partner's needs is the key to a strong bond." ( msn.com )

READ MORE - Love Lessons from Dogs?

How Hot Are You? Promiscuous Men and Warm Women Know Best

How Hot Are You? Promiscuous Men and Warm Women Know Best - People who fit gender stereotypes in their dating habits are better at judging their own hotness than those who march to the beat of a different drummer, a new study of speed-daters has found.

Men who hew closest to stereotypically male patterns of dating — a desire to play the field and have more no-strings-attached sex — are better at judging how attractive they are to potential dates than are men who prefer a quieter dating lifestyle. Similarly, women who conform to the traditional female dating personality of warmth and trust are better at judging their own appeal than the less-stereotypical ladies, researchers report in an upcoming issue of the journal Psychological Science.

The researchers speculate that the reason for their finding is that daters who conform to gender stereotypes get more practice at the mating game. Promiscuous men are more likely to put themselves out there than shy guys, thus interacting with more women and developing a better understanding of what the other sex wants. Meanwhile, warm, trusting women may attract more flirtation than their aloof counterparts, increasing their experience with men's likes and dislikes.

The dating game

Knowing your own hotness is important in dating and mating, wrote study researcher Mitja Back of the University of Mainz in Germany. A schlub living in his mom's basement may be wasting his time pursuing Angelina Jolie, while a smart, accomplished go-getter may sell himself short in the romantic realm by hooking up with a woman not his social equal. From an evolutionary perspective, the best way to pass your genes on is to reproduce with the highest-quality mate you can find without wasting your time chasing after people out of your league.

To find out how good people are at striking that balance, Back and her colleagues asked 192 female and 190 male participants in real-life speed-dating events to fill out questionnaires about their personalities. She also had each person predict how many interested dates they'd have on the hook before the night was out.

After the participants rotated through their three-minute speed dates, they filled out forms indicating whether they'd like to see their dates again. The researchers calculated people's attractiveness, or "mate value," by tallying the number of "yes" forms each participant got. They then compared the actual number of yeses with the number of yeses each dater expected.


Hot stuff

On the whole, none of the participants were stellar at predicting their attractiveness to others. However, personality and gender had an influence on how well people gauged themselves. Men who had what researchers called "unrestricted sociosexuality" (in other words, a tendency toward promiscuity), were better at guessing how many women would like them. For every 10 percent increase in their estimates, 2.2 percent more women actually wanted to see them again. For more-restrained men and for women who were either restrained or promiscuous, the expected number of dates showed no correlation with how many people actually wanted to go out for drinks.

Women who rated low on "agreeableness," a trait comprising warmth, trust and cooperativeness, and both agreeable and disagreeable men were hopeless at guessing how many dates they'd score. Women who were highly agreeable did much better: For every 10 percent increase in their predictions, 4 percent more men wanted to see them again.

Because personality is partially heritable, the researchers wrote, the findings could open the way for future research on how personality traits are passed on and if there is an evolutionary component to the link between gender and personality. The next step, Back wrote, is to find out how well people evaluate each other's choosiness — and to learn whether they know what it is about themselves that's so appealing. ( LiveScience.com )

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