Men's Brain Reacts to Certain Body Shapes Like a Drug, Study Finds.
A study conducted in 2010 found that men are attracted to hourglass female body shapes, with a more pronounced waist-to-hip ratio activating the brain's natural reward system. Looking at pictures of rounded backsides mimics the effects of being high or drunk. The study also found that changes in a woman's body-mass index only really affected brain areas linked to simple visual evaluations of size and shape, suggesting that body fat influences judgments of female beauty due more to societal norms than brain wiring.