Bad news for men who have feminine-looking features, like a soft jawline, big eyes and thin eyebrows (this means you Justin Bieber, Leonardo DiCaprio and Jude Law). Turns out, women with partners who have softer facial characteristics are more likely to fantasize about masculine-looking men during Week 2 of their cycle (which starts 8 days after the first day of your period) than women attached to burly-looking dudes, reveals a just-released study in the journal Evolution and Human Behavior. Why? High estrogen is pushing you to find a mate with a high testosterone level—which is a key indicator of health and virility—to fertilize your egg during ovulation, which occurs at the end of Week 2. And a strong jawline, small eyes and thick eyebrows are all indicators of a high amount of this hormone!

You can leave your makeup at home during Week 2 of your cycle—high estrogen is triggering changes in your face that make you appear naturally more beautiful to both men and women, according to a study in  the journal Biology Letters.

To test this, researchers showed male and female study participants pairs of photos of women in neutral, non-smiling poses without makeup—one photo was taken between Days 8 and 14 of the women’s cycles (when estrogen is high), the other photo was taken between Days 17 and 25 (when estrogen is lower and progesterone is high). None of the study participants were aware that the photos were taken at different phases of the women’ s cycles. Yet, when asked to rate the attractiveness of the women’s faces, most participants chose the photos taken during Days 8 and 14. 

You can thank evolution for the hormonal make-over, the researchers say.  As you approach ovulation at the end of Week 2, estrogen prompts subtle changes in your body that help you attract a mate.

[photo: Mercedes.. Life as I Pictured]

Listen to their voice! In a new study published in the Journal of Nonverbal Behavior, male and female study volunteers who were given photographs of strangers and asked to leave scripted Skype messages for them made their voice deeper when leaving a message for those they found attractive.

Sure, it makes sense that men deepen their voice when trying to woo someone since it makes them sound more masculine. But, what’s most surprising about this study’s findings is that women also lower their voice when they find someone attractive. It was expected that women would raise their voice to sound more feminine. In fact, during Week 2 of your cycle around ovulation, peaking estrogen has you using more higher notes than during other times in your cycle.

So, why the anomaly? The researchers chalk it up to nature vs. nurture, and nurture wins! Turns out, we’re taught by pop culture that a woman with a husky, breathy, lower-pitched voice is sexy, for instance, Demi Moore, Angelina Jolie and, the huskiest of all, Kathleen Turner. As a result, we copy that behavior.

[photo: pedrosimoes7]

Have a high-pitched voice? Chances are, you prefer masculine men with deeper voices over guys who use mid-range or higher notes when they speak, say researchers from the University of Aberdeen in Scotland. In their recent study, women with the highest-pitched voices who listened to recordings of men saying “I really like you” or “I really don’t like you” were 20% more likely to believe the men with the deeper voices were probably attractive regardless of what they were saying than women with lower-pitched voices.

The link? Researchers point a finger squarely at your hormones. A high-pitched voice in women is an indicator of a high estrogen level and a deep-pitched voice in men is an indicator of a high testosterone level, which is a common romantic pairing since these high hormones are key indicators of fertility and health, raising the chances of having lots of offspring.

Voices are also a key indicator of personality, with high voices in women suggesting traditionally feminine traits—such as agreeableness, empathy and cooperation—and low voices in men suggesting traditionally masculine traits—such as a dominant personality and competetiveness (picture the stereotype of the cheerleader and the football player). Women and men with mid-range voices and, therefore, hormones (like me and my husband) meet somewhere in the middle personality-wise.

But, this doesn’t mean women like me aren’t affected by a throaty male voice. Fact is, at mid-cycle during ovulation when estrogen is highest, most women find deeper tones hard to resist, past research shows.

[photo: CarbonNYC]

Wonder why guys become such show-offs when women are around? They can’t help it! As soon as a man spies an attractive female, his body churns out more testosterone than usual, which makes him more confident and willing to take dangerous risks. That’s the news from researchers at Australia’s University of Queensland who studied male skateboarders and discovered that they performed more daring maneuvers when observed by a female researcher than when observed by a male one. To find out why, the researchers tested the skaters’s saliva and found higher levels of testosterone in the saliva of men being observed by the women. Biologically, this makes perfect sense, says study co-author Bill von Hippel, Ph.D., since men need to compete with other males for access to fertile women, plus it shows women how healthy and stong they are, advertising themselves as better potential mates.

[photo: albany_tim]