Month: June 2022

Both men and women are more attracted to a person with this quality.

Being funny is a sign of a higher IQ, research finds.

Funny people have higher levels of general and verbal intelligence.

Not only that, but being funny is also linked to having more dating success.

Both men and women are more attracted to a person who is funnier.

However, women are more discerning about humour and react to it more strongly.

Men, meanwhile, tend to be focused on producing jokes (often to impress women).

The study’s authors write:

“Humor is not just a reliable intelligence-indicator; it may be one of the most important traits for humans seeking mates.

Of course, mate attraction is not the only function of humor.

Humor can also be used in competing for status with same-sex rivals, reducing social tensions, and other adaptive functions.”

The study involved 400 young people who were given intelligence tests and asked about their dating history.

They were then handed New Yorker cartoons with the caption deleted and asked to come up with their own.

The results showed that, unsurprisingly, verbal intelligence was strongly related to being funny.

However, people found it hard to come up with anything really good, with most captions rated as not funny at all.

This shows how difficult jokes are — especially in the medium of New Yorker captions.

Other studies, though, have also found links between intelligence and humour.

In this study, men were especially focused on trying to write funny captions and theirs were rated more highly, the authors write:

“Men were funnier than women on average and produced a larger number of captions, consistent with the sexual signaling hypothesis in which men try (unconsciously) to signal their mate quality through their humor ability, and women are more responsive to and discriminating about humor.”

The study was published in the journal Intelligence (Greengross & Miller, 2011).

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Those whose brains are better at resisting temptation and do not automatically seek out food are better at weight loss.

Two brain networks are highly influential in successful weight loss, neuroscientists have shown.

Activity in one network of brain regions — called ‘FN1’ — is linked to sensory and motors skills.

It is these areas of the brain that control people’s unconscious motivation to seek out food.

In other words, some people are automatically looking for food, even without being consciously aware of it.

The second network called ‘FN2’, influences attention and executive function.

These regions of the brain are involved in how people resist temptations to eat.

People who find it harder to resist temptations naturally have more difficulty losing weight.

In contrast, those whose brains are better at resisting temptation and do not automatically seek out food are better at weight loss, the researchers found.

Professor Jonathan Burdette, the study’s first author, said:

“These findings show that the brain network properties of people who were less successful at weight loss were different from folks who were more successful.

Some people have a stronger unconscious sensory motor bias to pursue food, while others appear to have less.

In a society of food abundance with food cues everywhere, this information can help explain why some people have such difficulty in taking off excess weight and maintaining it.”

The research involved 71 people enrolled in a weight loss trial.

Their brains were scanned at the start to see what types of activity would predict success.

The two functional networks, FN1 and FN2, were found to be critical to people’s progress.

Professor Burdette said:

“Our findings provide further insight into complex functional circuits in the brain so we now have a mechanistic understanding of why people aren’t losing weight.

In theory, if you know more about urges and control, we will be able to tailor therapies to an individual as opposed to treating everyone the same.”

Implications for weight loss therapy

The findings suggest that to lose weight people need to understand the importance of unconscious drives.

Unfortunately, people consistently underestimate the impact of unconscious process like habits on their behaviour.

Mindfulness is one way to become more aware of behaviours that are triggered unconsciously.

Certainly, mindfulness has been consistently found to reduce cravings for food, cigarettes and alcohol.

Over time, people practising mindfulness find it easier to resist acting on their desires.

Mindfulness helps the mind acknowledge cravings and allows them to flow out of consciousness.

In addition, self-weighing encourages people to be aware of their weight and makes them think about what they are eating.

Awareness is more likely to motivate change.

The study was published in the journal Obesity (Burdette et al., 2022).

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Over half the people in the study had a vitamin B12 deficiency.

Depression and lethargy can be signs of a vitamin B12 deficiency, research finds.

Vitamin B12 deficiency is easy to rectify with supplements or by dietary changes.

The body uses vitamin B12 to make red blood cells and to keep the nervous system healthy.

Other common signs of vitamin B12 deficiency include experiencing muscle weakness and being constipated.

Over half the people in the study had a vitamin B12 deficiency.

Professor Heather Keller, the study co-author, said:

“The negative effects of a B12 deficiency are considerable.

This is of particular importance in the context of our aging population with more Canadians requiring long-term care.”

The study included 412 older people entering care homes.

Just over half had low vitamin B12 levels, with 14 percent being deficient.

Kaylen Pfisterer, the study’s first author, said:

“In spending time in long-term care homes, you often see depression and loneliness.

This is why we need to do everything in our power to enhance quality of life and quality of care in this setting.

Screening for B12 deficiency is a first step to targeting B12 treatment to those who may benefit most.”

Vitamin B12 levels can be boosted through supplementation or by eating foods such as dairy, liver, salmon and eggs.

The study was published in the journal Applied Physiology, Nutrition, and Metabolism (Pfisterer et al., 2019).

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