Hormonal fluctuations associated with fertility are associated with a greater tendency for women to use conspicuous luxury symbols, potentially to be noticed by men, according to a study published September 2, 2026, in the open access journal PLOS One by Aekyoung Kim of Jeonbuk National University of the Republic of Korea, and colleagues.
Color me skeptical after having just read about a completely unrelated study that used fabricated data and has been highly influential for a quarter century. Might just be me, but something feels off to me about this.
If you take a bunch of people and measure their baseline behaviour, and then subject them all to a hormonal change, is it really that surprising that you’re then able to find measurable group-level differences in how they behave?
Color me skeptical after having just read about a completely unrelated study that used fabricated data and has been highly influential for a quarter century. Might just be me, but something feels off to me about this.
If you take a bunch of people and measure their baseline behaviour, and then subject them all to a hormonal change, is it really that surprising that you’re then able to find measurable group-level differences in how they behave?