http://phys.org/ en-us Phys.org internet news portal provides the latest news on science including: Physics, Nanotechnology, Life Sciences, Space Science, Earth Science, Environment, Health and Medicine. Sexually naïve male mice respond differently to the chemical signals emitted by newborn pups than males that have mated and lived with pregnant females, according to a study published March 20 in The Journal of Neuroscience. The findings may help scientists to better understand the changes that take place in the brains of some mammals during the transition into parenthood. http://phys.org/news282927106.html Biology Tue, 19 Mar 2013 17:00:01 EST news282927106 Malala Yousafzai, the teenaged advocate for Pakistani girls' education, was released from the hospital earlier this month. Most of the world's girls don't have to fight as hard as Yousafzai for their education. However, even in countries with high gender equality, sex differences in math and reading scores persisted in the 75 nations examined by a University of Missouri and University of Leeds study. Girls consistently scored higher in reading, while boys got higher scores in math, but these gaps are linked and vary with overall social and economic conditions of the nation. A better understanding of these gaps and how they are related could help educators design curricula to help students of both genders apply their talents and deal with their weaknesses. http://phys.org/news282472874.html Other Sciences Thu, 14 Mar 2013 09:41:20 EST news282472874 Researchers studying aging in an endangered lemur known as the Milne-Edwards' sifaka report that in old age, females are the safer sex. http://phys.org/news281281277.html Biology Thu, 28 Feb 2013 14:00:13 EST news281281277 From research showing that adults in an Amazon village had about equal competence to Harvard students at basic geometry, Elizabeth Spelke drew a striking lesson. http://phys.org/news267777352.html Other Sciences Tue, 25 Sep 2012 07:36:08 EST news267777352 The rise of the first complex life depended on vital metals brought up to the Earth's surface from far below in vast granite deposits, a new study argues. http://phys.org/news263537708.html Space & Earth Tue, 07 Aug 2012 05:55:26 EST news263537708 (Phys.org) -- Five-month-old female alligators exposed during development to toxins found in a polluted Florida lake show changes in ovarian gene function and decreased body weight at hatching, but paradoxically showed accelerated growth rates in the months after hatching, according to a study at the University of Florida. http://phys.org/news261987779.html Biology Fri, 20 Jul 2012 07:24:05 EST news261987779 Sex differences account for some of the most of the spectacular traits in nature: the wild colours of male guppies, the plumage of peacocks, tusks on walruses and antlers on moose. Sexual conflict – the battle between males and females over mating – is thought to be a particularly potent force in driving the evolution traits that differ in males and females. http://phys.org/news255278958.html Biology Thu, 03 May 2012 15:49:28 EST news255278958 Hormones shape our bodies, make us fertile, excite our most basic urges, and as scientists have known for years, they govern the behaviors that separate men from women. But how? http://phys.org/news247404526.html Biology Thu, 02 Feb 2012 12:00:02 EST news247404526 (PhysOrg.com) -- The brains of all vertebrates display gender-related differences. In songbirds, for example, the size of the brain areas that control their singing behaviour could be linked to the size of their song repertoires. In many songbird species, only the males sing and indeed, they do have larger song control areas in the brain than females. However, even species where both sexes sing identically, display the same sex differences in their brain structure. Researchers at the Max Planck Institute for Ornithology in Seewiesen have now demonstrated for the first time in the white-browed sparrow weaver, an African songbird, that the extent of these sex differences in the brain varies according to social status, and cannot be explained by singing behaviour as previously thought (PLoS One, 8 June 2011). http://phys.org/news227175717.html Biology Mon, 13 Jun 2011 09:22:20 EST news227175717 (PhysOrg.com) -- An experiment by researchers at the University of Warwick has found the first real evidence that men tend to make black-or-white judgements when women are more prone to see shades of grey in choices and decisions. http://phys.org/news222333229.html Medicine & Health Mon, 18 Apr 2011 08:14:03 EST news222333229 It seems that women become addicted to cocaine more easily than men and find it harder to give up. New research published in BioMed Central's open access journal Biology of Sex Differences reinforces this position by showing that the motivation of female rats to work for cocaine is much higher than males. http://phys.org/news219038325.html Biology Fri, 11 Mar 2011 03:59:05 EST news219038325 A new study from Utrecht and Cambridge Universities has for the first time found that an administration of testosterone under the tongue in volunteers negatively affects a person's ability to 'mind read', an indication of empathy. The findings are published this week in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. http://phys.org/news216472723.html Medicine & Health Wed, 09 Feb 2011 11:19:12 EST news216472723 People love to speculate about differences between the sexes, and neuroscience has brought a new technology to this pastime. Brain imaging studies are published at a great rate, and some report sex differences in brain structure or patterns of neural activity. But we should be skeptical about reports of brain differences between the sexes, writes psychological scientist Cordelia Fine in Current Directions in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science. http://phys.org/news207416025.html Medicine & Health Wed, 27 Oct 2010 16:35:20 EST news207416025 Women have to work harder than men in order to start sweating, while men are more effective sweaters during exercise, according to new research published in the journal Experimental Physiology. http://phys.org/news205729697.html Medicine & Health Fri, 08 Oct 2010 04:40:01 EST news205729697 It seems the old nature versus nurture debate can't be won. But a new Northwestern University study of men in the Philippines makes a strong case for nurture's role in male to female differences -- suggesting that rapid weight gain in the first six months of life predicts earlier puberty for boys. http://phys.org/news203612585.html Medicine & Health Mon, 13 Sep 2010 16:03:19 EST news203612585 In 1871, Charles Darwin sparked debate that continues today when he proposed that human sex differences evolved based on sexual selection. Sexual selection is Darwin's theory that certain physical, mental or psychological traits evolved because they aid in competition among individuals for access to preferred mates or because they are enhancements of traits that help to attract mates. http://phys.org/news190389250.html Biology Tue, 13 Apr 2010 15:10:01 EST news190389250 Male and female shopping styles are in our genes---and we can look to evolution for the reason. Daniel Kruger, research faculty at the University of Michigan School of Public Health, says it's perfectly natural that men often can't distinguish a sage sock from a beige sock or that sometimes women can't tell if the shoe department is due north or west from the escalator. http://phys.org/news178997182.html Other Sciences Wed, 02 Dec 2009 18:00:01 EST news178997182 What do flocks of birds have in common with trust, monogamy, and even breast milk? According to a new report in the journal Science, they are regulated by virtually identical neurochemicals in the brain, known as oxytocin in mammals and mesotocin in birds. http://phys.org/news169391813.html Biology Thu, 13 Aug 2009 14:17:25 EST news169391813 Men are better at seeing things in the distance due to their hunter-gatherer past chasing animals, while women are better focusing on things at close range, a British study said Thursday. http://phys.org/news168157251.html Medicine & Health Thu, 30 Jul 2009 07:21:48 EST news168157251 A study by neuroscientist Heather Rupp and her team found that a woman's partner status influenced her interest in the opposite sex. http://phys.org/news163245070.html Other Sciences Wed, 03 Jun 2009 10:54:36 EST news163245070 Arthritis can have significant physical and psychological repercussions that impact quality of life and for those of working age, it can affect their ability to remain employed. Compared to individuals with other types of chronic diseases or disabilities, arthritis appears to have a more profound effect on a person's ability to work. Previous studies have found that about half of those with severe forms of arthritis were not working, leading to a loss of skilled workers and increasing the personal and socioeconomic burden of the disease. Few studies have looked at sex differences in the work experiences of people with arthritis, but a new study found that women may be more likely to leave employment, while men may be more likely to remain working and report negative experiences. The study was published in the May issue of Arthritis Care & Research. http://phys.org/news160322501.html Medicine & Health Thu, 30 Apr 2009 15:02:00 EST news160322501 Differing biological response to infection between men and women may explain higher death rates among older men who are hospitalized with community-acquired pneumonia (CAP). The findings, published online in the Critical Care Medicine journal, may have important implications for understanding sex differences in life expectancy. http://phys.org/news160224097.html Medicine & Health Wed, 29 Apr 2009 11:42:07 EST news160224097 Women don't choose careers in math-intensive fields, such as computer science, physics, technology, engineering, chemistry, and higher mathematics, because they want the flexibility to raise children, or because they prefer other fields of science that are less math-intensive--not because they lack mathematical ability, according to a new study. http://phys.org/news155283837.html Medicine & Health Tue, 03 Mar 2009 06:24:35 EST news155283837 Inbreeding can unexpectedly extend male lifespan. Insect experiments described in the open access journal BMC Evolutionary Biology have shown that, in seed beetles, inbreeding causes males to live longer, while shortening female lifespan. http://phys.org/news153147399.html Biology Fri, 06 Feb 2009 12:57:37 EST news153147399 (PhysOrg.com) -- Women are not from Venus any more than men are from Mars. But even though both sexes are perfectly terrestrial beings, they are not lacking in other differences. And not only in their reproductive organs and behavior, either, but in such unsexy characteristics as the propensity for drug abuse, fine motor control, reaction to stress, moods and many brain structures. http://phys.org/news152812170.html Medicine & Health Mon, 02 Feb 2009 15:50:10 EST news152812170 In a new fMRI study conducted in the Epidemiology, Biostatistics and Clinical Research Laboratory (Montpellier I University, France) and published by Elsevier in the February 2009 issue of Cortex, researchers found differences among male and female groups on activation strength linked to verbal fluency (words generation). http://phys.org/news152455678.html Medicine & Health Thu, 29 Jan 2009 12:48:40 EST news152455678 Boys may be more apt than girls to have childhood asthma, but, when compared to girls, they are also more likely to grow out of it in adolescence and have a decreased incidence of asthma in the post-pubertal years. This indicates that there may be a buried mechanism in asthma development, according to a prospective study that analyzed airway responsiveness (AR) in more than 1,000 children with mild to moderate asthma over a period of about nine years. http://phys.org/news138004229.html Medicine & Health Fri, 15 Aug 2008 07:30:29 EST news138004229