Hormones in Semen Shown to Make Women Feel Good
LONDON (Reuters) - Hormones in semen may help to ease female depression because women whose partners don't use condoms are less likely to feel down.
Scientists at the State University of New York suspect the mood-altering hormones are absorbed through the vagina and make women feel good but they stressed that their results are not an excuse for unprotected sex.
"I want to make it clear that we are not advocating that people abstain from using condoms," Gordon Gallup, who led the study, told New Scientist magazine on Wednesday.
"Clearly an unwanted pregnancy or a sexually transmitted disease would more than offset any advantageous psychological effects of semen," he added.
The researchers assessed the moods of 300 female students using a standard questionnaire. A score of more than 17 was considered moderately depressed.
Women whose partners never used condoms scored about eight on the test while those who never had sex without condoms scored 11.3. Women who weren't having sex at all scored about 13.5.
Depression in the students who sometimes or never used condoms was more severe the longer they went without sex.
