Carole Hooven, Ph.D.

They become aggressive when the females are fertile.

If the females aren't fertile, all that stuff goes away.

Testosterone drops.

Okay.

So humans are also designed to keep testosterone low, which is why if there's a situation, a competitive situation, say testosterone might go up, but generally it's going to be kept low when it can be.

But we are overnourished in Western populations.

We don't have to worry.

We have enough calories to run our immune system and to do everything else we need to do.

We have the luxury of being able to elevate testosterone over what it would be naturally.

I'm so glad you brought this up.

This is why you guys are the hormonal ones.

Let's say that.

So everyone says women are hormonal.

You're the hormonal one.

You have this high testosterone all the time.

We just don't notice that you're hormonal because it starts in utero and you're permanently hormonal, basically.

Let's just get that out there.

But you are hormonal because there's always going to be fertile females around.

So that's just an interesting point.

But given you have to maintain high testosterone levels throughout your entire life, we only maintain our high estrogen through a fixed time, our reproductive career, which is when we're most attractive.