Sunday 6 May 2018

zoology - Does increased calorie intake cause increase in libido in humans?


I'm interested in the effect of increased calorie intake on sex hormones and chosen mating strategy in humans.


I'm aware that humans have a dual mating strategy - somewhere between pair bond and casual mating. There are a number of physical measures to indicate this - such as sexual dismorphism between male and female, sperm counts and tested size, as well as age of puberty of females.


I've recently listened to a podcast that suggested that long term increased calorie intake causes differences between two mating strategies in case of apes. An example given was that gibbon ape filled their ecological niche and has no predators. Their population size is controlled by food supply. This makes food scarce and gibbons are more monogamous with more paternal investment (to teach offspring to forage)


At the same time another kind of savanna dwelling ape has natural predators limiting population and thus having more food supply. This ape has more offspring and less paternal investment and more promiscuity. It is as if they are more sexually active.


I'm interested if there is any truth to this and if this is also applicable to humans. Does increased calorie intake long term increases libido, while caloric restrictions reduce it?




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