This time of year can get pretty mushy. The shops are filled with hearts, cupids, and cards with fancy lettering and love poems…but if you’re just not feeling the whole flowers and chocolates thing this year, maybe you’d be interested in hearing some cold, hard facts that science has helpfully dug up for us about the way people really function when it comes to sex and dating. So if you’re a hopeless romantic, brace yourself for what’s about to come. But if you’re a cynic, get ready for some “I told you so’s,” because we’re about to put aside the mush and drop some harsh truths on the science of mating and dating.
So You Say You Hate It When They Play Hard to Get…
Studies show that people are more attracted to people who play hard to get.
You know how some people seem to have perfected the art of blowing hot and cold, and making you wonder how they really feel about you? And you know how you say that you hate that feeling of being on edge as your crush plays hard to get? Well, it turns out that you might not hate it as much as you say you do. According to a study published in the journal Psychological Science:
“Participants in [an] uncertain condition were most attracted to the men [who they were told liked them either a lot or an average amount] – even more attracted than were participants who were told that the men liked them a lot. Uncertain participants reported thinking about the men the most, and this increased their attraction toward the men.”
At least you know you’re not the only one who can’t stop thinking about the date who just won’t text you first.
Nice Guys Finish…Last?
We’re a little bit skeptical about this one, and we certainly don’t want anyone to kick their kindness to the curb, but brace yourself: there are actual studies that show that women, well, kind of like jerks. For example, according to the Journal of Sex and Marital Therapy, nice guys just aren’t getting the same action as said jerks:
“In one survey of men, Trapnell and Meston (1996) found that nice guys who were modest, agreeable, and unselfish were disadvantaged in sexual relationships. Men who were manipulative, arrogant, calculating, and sly were more sexually active and had a greater variety of sexual experiences and a greater number of sex partners.”
And how about this from the journal Sex Roles? Sounds like nice guys aren’t getting any and they’re just going to have to wait:
“In the end, young women may continue to claim that they find certain qualities in a ‘good guy’ nice guy as highly desirable and that they want to be in a committed relationship with one man as their ultimate goal, but, at the same time, they seem content to spend ‘the meantime and in-between-time’ going out with fun/sexy guys who may or may not turn into ‘jerks.”’
Think that being a happy jerk will make a difference? Think again. According to the journal Emotion, “…happiness was the most attractive female emotion expression, and one of the least attractive in males.” Whaaaa? Guess it’s time to adopt that strong, silent, brooding persona…
Is Cuddling Ever Just Cuddling?
Ah, snuggling and smooching – they’re their own rewards, right? Maybe for some people, but maybe not for everyone. Science is going to drop another bomb on us, and tell us that men like sex, and a lot of what they do is kind of trying to steer things in that direction. Studies show that often the main reason men kiss is to progress toward sex, while women are using their lips to size those guys up and see if they actually want to do the deed with them. According to evolutionary psychologist Gordon Gallup of the University of Albany, “Males tend to kiss as a means of gaining sexual favors, or as a means of affecting reconciliation. Females kiss more as a mate-assessment device.”
And the main reason men cuddle after sex is… to get more sex. According to the Journal of Sex Research, “…females were more likely to engage in post-coital behaviors related to bonding with both short- and long-term partners, whereas males were more likely to engage in ones that were extrinsically rewarding or increased the likelihood of further coital acts.” Hey, whatever – a cuddle is a cuddle, right?
Oh, and even if you’re not into the idea of canoodling up with someone in a lovey-dovey way, and are sure you’ve mastered what’s known as “casual sex,” be careful. According to Helen Fisher, a biological anthropologist, the chief scientific adviser to the dating site Match.com, and the author of several books:
“It’s not casual because when you have sex with somebody, and it’s pleasurable, it drives up the dopamine system in the brain. That can push you over the threshold into falling in love. And when you orgasm, there’s a flood of oxytocin and vasopressin. Those neurochemicals are linked with the attachment system in the brain. So there are all these potential chemical triggers that can get activated when you have sex with someone, whether it’s ‘casual’ or not. Something like one-third of people who’ve had a ‘friends with benefits’ relationship have fallen madly in love with that person.”
Watch out!
It’s All Chemistry
When it comes to what love actually is (yes, science has an answer to all the songs pondering this age-old question – sort of), it really is a series of complex processes in the brain that involve a lot of different chemicals and areas of the brain. There are different chemicals/hormones released that, according to scientists, stimulate “lust” (testosterone), “attraction” (dopamine), and “attachment” (oxytocin and vasopressin) – in fact, we could write a whole article just on that subject.
So, funnily enough, if you ask that oh-so-romantic group of people – scientists – whether love exists, they would give you an emphatic “yes” – except they would say it originates in the head, not the heart. They’d also give you some interesting facts about what happens to your brain on love. Some of it is pretty darn nice, but some of it? Well, it’s a little iffy. Again according to Helen Fisher:
“You can think of love as an intense obsession, but it’s really an addiction. You think about them all the time; you become sexually possessive; you get butterflies in the stomach; you can read their emails and texts over and over again.
But I say it’s an addiction because we found that, in addition to the dopamine system being activated in the brains of people in love, we also found activity in another part of the brain called the nucleus accumbens.
This part of the brain is activated in all forms of behavioral addiction — whether it’s drugs or gambling or food or kleptomania. So this part of the brain fires up in people who have recently fallen in love, and it really does function like an addiction.”
And not only might you become literally addicted to love, you’re probably going to be just a little bit more embarrassing and, uh, dumb than you used to be. According to Katherine Wu, writing for Harvard University, “Sexual arousal (but not necessarily attachment) appears to turn off regions in our brain that regulate critical thinking, self-awareness, and rational behavior, including parts of the prefrontal cortex. In short, love makes us dumb.”
Little White Lies
Ever try to stretch the truth juuuuust a little to impress a potential partner? Science sees you. According to a study published in the Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, participants who had been primed “to think about things in a sexual way” were:
More likely to give in and agree with someone’s argument about a fictitious dilemma than the participants who they had not “sexually primed” beforehand.
More likely to alter their dating preferences to make them fall more closely in line with those of someone they were chatting with online.
More likely to report lower numbers of previous sexual partners, which the researchers interpreted as a subconscious attempt to be more appealing to their attractive conversation partners.
The researchers’ conclusion? According to Professor Gurit Birnbaum, “When your sexual system is activated, you are motivated to present yourself in the best light possible. That means you’ll tell a stranger things that make you look better than you really are.” But we wouldn’t know anything about that.
Ok, ok, so this time of year is for lovers, and maybe we should just let all that testosterone, dopamine, and oxytocin work their magic and not question it. But what kind of friends would we be if we didn’t tell you the truth? Looks like we’d be the kind that had fallen in love. What are your thoughts on the science of love and sex? Does it explain all or are there some mysteries that science just can’t solve?
What’s one thing you have to do over and over, day after day? No, we’re not talking about explaining to your child why they have to wear pants, or reminding your coworkers to unmute themselves. We’re talking about what seems to be the defining feature of adulthood: making an endless stream of decisions. This includes everything from minor things like what to make for dinner to more complicated decisions about your finances, emotional life, and physical health. And now, experts are telling us what we’ve all suspected all along: all of these decisions that need to be made, no matter how small, can really start to weigh on us, and lead to what’s called “decision fatigue.” So is decision fatigue stressing you out, and what can you do about it?
What Is Decision Fatigue?
Roy F. Baumeister, a social psychologist who coined the term “decision fatigue,” used it to refer to the mental exhaustion that comes from having to make a lot of decisions throughout your day, as well as the decline in the quality of decisions that you make after being faced with this multitude of choices. Decision fatigue is different from physical fatigue – you probably don’t even recognize that you’re “tired,” it’s more that you’re low on mental energy. According to Joe Martino, a licensed counselor, “Recognizing it can be tricky because it will often feel like a deep sense of weariness.” But it could be that all the decisions you have to make during the day are dragging you down, whether you’re:
Overwhelmed with too many choices at once
Faced with too many decisions in a row during the day
And, as you might have guessed, and as Baumeister recognized, your reaction to these scenarios is probably going to end up being less than ideal. The first scenario might not seem like such a bad thing – after all, why would restaurants have menus if humans didn’t like to have options? But according to Carla Marie Manly, PhD, a clinical psychologist in California, “Although humans tend to enjoy having a variety of choices, too many choices can lead to mental and emotional exhaustion. For example, having too many options—whether in the grocery store, catalog, or online retailer—can lead to feelings of confusion and dissatisfaction.”
Hey, we get that, and so should anyone who’s ever even seen the cereal aisle at the grocery store, or the books that pass as menus in some restaurants. Being faced with all of those choices at once can easily lead to what’s known as “choice paralysis,” which can be incredibly frustrating.
And the second scenario can be even worse: being faced with too many decisions all throughout your day can lead to two outcomes:
You give up and stop making decisions at all
You start making impulsive, irrational decisions
Both of these outcomes are problematic. You’ll again either be struck with choice paralysis and will be unable to move forward, the frustration of which could lead you to lash out at the people in your life. Or you could end up acting recklessly and impulsively instead of using the energy needed to think things through and consider the consequences. This can result in you doing things like splurging on things you don’t need, tweeting things you should keep to yourself, or sending out an angry email response to someone.
Sound familiar? It’s likely that you’re being bombarded with decisions at work and at home, and are suffering from decision fatigue by the end of the day. So before you throw up your hands and eat ice cream for dinner, let’s talk about how to recognize the signs of it!
Is Decision Fatigue Burning You Out?
Again, as many psychologists have pointed out, decision fatigue can actually be fairly difficult to recognize, especially if it’s not something that’s on your radar as a cause for why you’re feeling and acting the way you are. But being aware of the following signs that you might be headed toward burnout is the first step towards avoiding the worst consequences of decision fatigue. According to Rashmi Parmar, MD, a psychiatrist with Community Psychiatry + MindPath Care Centers and Carla Manly, you should look out for things like:
Having trouble focusing
Procrastinating
Avoiding being in situations where you have to make decisions
Frustration, irritability, and a short temper
Being impulsive
Feeling overwhelmed and possibly even hopeless
Spending a lot of time making decisions
Physical symptoms like fatigue, poor sleep, headaches, upset stomach, etc.
A sense of dissatisfaction with the choices you make
If you see yourself in the signs above, it’s time to find some strategies for coping with decision fatigue.
How Can You Cope with Decision Fatigue?
Unfortunately, all of those decisions you have to make every day aren’t just going to go away. But you can be proactive and work on ways to limit the decision fatigue that often weighs on all of us. Try the following:
Stick to a routine
Don’t get us wrong, being spontaneous is great, but you can actually help to reduce decision fatigue by sticking to a set routine each day. This will help eliminate the need to make decisions for at least some of your routine tasks, like what time you go to bed and get up, what food to eat, days you’ll exercise, and when you go grocery shopping.
Plan ahead
For impactful decisions, try your best to schedule them for the morning, before decision fatigue sets in.
To minimize the amount of little decisions you have to make each day, try planning ahead for the next day. In fact, you can make this planning a part of your routine before going to bed: for example, lay out your clothes, make some overnight oats, and pack a healthy lunch. According to Martino, “What people don’t realize is that things that have very little impact on our lives can actually take a lot of decision energy. Try to limit those by choosing them the night before.” And you know what else? When it comes to small decisions, it’s ok to simply choose the thing that makes you feel less overwhelmed, or that is the easiest choice right now.
Make specific times for big decisions
But what about those big, necessary decisions in your life? For those, it’s all about timing. For everyday impactful decisions, try your best to schedule them for the morning, before decision fatigue has a chance to set in. You might even want to make a list of your priorities for the day to make sure you tackle your top ones first.
For other big decisions, Martino suggests that you stop and question yourself before making them: “I think the best question to ask is: How much impact on my life will this decision have?” If it’ll have a big impact, only make it if you’re feeling refreshed. Or even better, have time each week or month when you deal with these big life decisions.
Simplify your choices
Overwhelmed with choices? Try this: narrow your options down to three – and, most importantly, don’t question yourself! Evaluate your final three options and choose one, remembering again NOT to question your final choice. Embrace your selection and move forward, and always try to avoid impulsive decisions.
Have a little help from your friends
If a decision is feeling like too much for you, try sharing the burden! If it feels like it will be helpful, try talking to a supportive friend, partner, or coworker and getting their input. It might even be good for you to do some delegating to take some of the mental load off of you. For example, if meal planning is stressing you out, ask your partner or roommate to take over for a bit, and offer to do the shopping for ingredients in return.
Practice self-care
Finally, as with all problems that can start to overwhelm us in life, it’s important to take care of yourself. Remember to:
Eat healthy snacks (and never make decisions while hungry!): Baumeister’s research found that low glucose levels made a big difference in decision making.
Take regular breaks in your day to replenish your brain and energy levels.
So now you know: if you’re feeling irritable, unfocused, stuck, or overwhelmed it could be that all the decisions of the modern world are just piling up on you and causing decision fatigue. Those negative feelings are signs that it’s time to work at conserving your energy, and you can start by making a few simple changes to lift the load of some of those decisions. Let us know: is decision fatigue burning you out?
They say love is blind. But not everyone is all that jazzed about groping in the darkness for the perfect partner, and so a lot of people are looking for some sort of sign that the person they’re eyeing up is right for them. This is especially true now that we’re often relying on meeting people on dating apps, rather than more old-fashioned and personal ways. In fact, according to one study, by the end of 2019, around 77% of adult online users reported having gone on a date with someone they had met online.
So what is the criteria for some as they swipe their way through those sites (other than a sexy selfie), or as they go on date after date? Well, it can feel tough to find the right person, so a lot of people rely on some sort of guidance that will tell them if they’re compatible – and we’re not talking about their mother’s advice. No, we’re talking about relying on star signs, personality types, and love languages to help them find THE one. Now that Valentine’s Day is upon us again, we wanted to look at these methods for sorting out mates, and ask if any of them actually mean anything.
Star-Crossed Lovers
Surveys show that some people rely on star signs and their horoscope when looking for love.
What’s your sign? For a while, that was a seriously cheesy and outdated pickup line, but now astrology – and checking out your potential lover’s star sign – is making a comeback. One study, for example, found that among the women they spoke to, 72% didn’t think astrology was just superstition and almost 90% said that they find out the sun signs of people they have relationships with. 78% had read a book concerning their sun sign in love. Another small survey of young men found that 70% read a horoscope column once a month and 51% valued its advice. 98% knew their sun sign, 45% thought it described their personalities, and 25% said it can make accurate forecasts.
And in addition to all that, traffic to astrology websites has exploded, with one site reporting a 150% increase recently, and dating apps like Bumble now have an option to include your star sign in your profile. Why this turn back toward the mystical and mysterious? J. Walter Thompson’s Intelligence Group’s 2016 trend report called “Unreality” put it this way: “We are increasingly turning to unreality as a form of escape and a way to search for other kinds of freedom, truth and meaning. What emerges is an appreciation for magic and spirituality, the knowingly unreal, and the intangible aspects of our lives that defy big data and the ultra-transparency of the web.”
Sounds about right: maybe we do have a desire to tap into that unknowable part of ourselves (and others) in this web-weary world. But does it matter if you’re a supposedly organized Virgo, and your date is a creative and crabby Cancer? Well, it might be fun to read up on, but now science has actually checked out whether astrological signs actually have an impact on relationships, and it’s given an emphatic shake of its skeptical head.
A team from the University of Manchester did a study in 2007 called “Ten million marriages: A test of astrological ‘love signs’”, analyzing 10 million marriages, and inferring astrological signs from couples’ birth dates. Their analysis? True believers, brace yourselves:
“This research shows that astrological sign has no impact on the probability of marrying – and staying married to – someone of any other sign. For decades, popular astrologers have promoted the idea of ‘love signs’: compatibility between partners with certain combinations of birthdays. If the more than twenty million married people in England and Wales offer any indication, however, lonely hearts who worry about the zodiac are wasting their time.”
What this study didn’t look at, though, was the impact that believing in astrology could have on people’s partner picks. Meaning, you might truly believe that you’re meant to be with a water sign because you’re an earth sign, so that’s who you’re searching for. And who’s to say? Astrologist Juliana McCarthy makes a tempting point when she says that we can use astrology as a guide for love. In her words: “the remedy for any sign’s neurosis is the enlightened qualities of the opposite sign. Earth signs can provide balance, pragmatism, and grounded-ness to water signs, while water signs can provide fluidity, spirituality, and emotional depth to earth signs. Air signs can fuel fire signs with brilliant ideas and intellectual stimulation, while fire signs help bring air signs’ mental energy into action.”
The catch? You have to have your whole “natal chart” done, which includes things like knowing your moon sign and the “positions” of your planets, not just know your sun sign. Sounds like a lot of work and a lot of information to ask for from a Tinder date, so our conclusion on this one? Astrology is fun, but it’s better to keep it light and find out other information about your date before you worry if their birthday will drive you apart.
What Are Your Initials?
Finding out what your personality is and how it works with other personality types might help you with love.
Did you read the above and totally pooh-pooh the unscientific nature of astrology? Is finding compatibility more “scientific” for you? For example, does it mean knowing the results of your Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) personality test? This test claims to measure how introverted or extroverted, sensing or intuitive, thinking or feeling, judging or perceptive you are, and if you take the test, you’ll end up with a set of mysterious initials (like ESTP or INFJ) that you’ll often see attached to online dating profiles.
A lot of people swear by MBTI compatibility charts in making love matches, but the truth is that psychologists are actually split when it comes to any evidence backing up the usefulness of this test. For a lot of them, using the MBTI to assess your potential partner is not all that different from using their astrological sign. According to Skeptoid:
“One obvious trait that the MBTI has in common with horoscopes is its tendency to describe each personality type using only positive words. Horoscopes are so popular, in part, because they virtually always tell people just what they want to hear, using phrases that most people generally like to believe are true, like ‘You have a lot of unused potential.’ They’re also popular because they are presented as being personalized based on the person’s sign. This has been called the Forer Effect, after psychologist Bertram Forer who, in 1948, gave a personality test to his students and then gave each one a supposedly personalized analysis. The impressed students gave the analyses an average accuracy rating of 85%, and only then did Forer reveal that each had received an identical, generic report. Belief that a report is customized for us tends to improve our perception of the report’s accuracy.”
And as the Guardian points out, the test can be problematic because it kind of boils you down to one or the other of something: “the MBTI seems to rely exclusively on binary choices….For example, in the category of extrovert v introvert, you’re either one or the other; there is no middle ground. People don’t work this way, no normal person is either 100% extrovert or 100% introvert…”
That’s true, so our conclusion? Go on, take the test, and read up on what that person who you like’s initials mean, but don’t put too much stock in the results.
Speaking the Language of Love
Finally, some of you looking for something beyond the fun of astrological and personality quiz assessments are all in on the idea that finding someone with the right “love language” is the true way to find a partner who understands your needs. And, unlike astrology, love languages are rooted in our own feelings and experiences, not based on arbitrary positions of stars and planets, so maybe there’s more to them?
So what are these so-called love languages? Well, they are five ways that people express themselves to their partners: words of affirmation, quality time, physical touch, acts of service, and receiving gifts. According to Salon.com, “For some reason, in the 2010s, the love language concept became explosively popular — to the extent that identifying one’s love language was considered a categorical, dating-profile-ready personality trait as important as astrological sign or Myers-Briggs personality type.”
And with that being said, the idea of love languages is actually slightly more supported by a lot of professionals than the other two types of compatibility measurements – but not because it predicts compatibility. Rather, it’s because understanding your partner’s language shows investment in them, and can help foster appreciation and resolve certain little conflicts.
The idea of love languages is actually slightly more supported by a lot of professionals than the other two types of compatibility measurements.
For example, if one partner’s love language is words of affirmation, they’ll probably expect that kind of thing in return, and will want to hear things like “I love you,” and be complimented. But, if the other partner is all about acts of service, their efforts to do chores and cook dinner for their beloved might go a little unnoticed, and they won’t get those things in return. So understanding that these things are what your partner needs AND how they’re telling you they love you, can go a long way toward building a happy relationship.
According to psychotherapist Erin Miller, “If nothing else, the [love languages] give the person and the couple something to point out and reflect on. Obviously, it’s not like a one-size-fits-all, instant repair — but it is something to be mindful of, because at the end of the day by investing in that you’re investing in the relationship.”
She says it’s only problematic when it is relied upon too heavily, forced on your partner, or even weaponized: “I think when people are too heavy-handed with it and are trying to really force it on their partner, that’s when it becomes counterproductive. Then resentment builds and those partners end up just feeling either incompetent or resentful…It’s the same kind of thing with people who get into astrology, it can be really amazing for self-reflection. But it becomes a problem when you start using it as a way of putting blame and shame on your partner for not understanding or investing enough in your love language.”
Our conclusion on this one: it’s not a way to determine who you’ll be compatible with before you meet them, but understanding the love languages of yourself and someone your dating can actually be a way to bring you a little closer together, if you are both on board with doing some reflection on how you show your love.
In the end, unfortunately, there’s no predicting who you’re going to click with, or fall head over heels for, or stay with forever and ever. The above ways of looking for love can be fun, or can even help you to have a more understanding relationship with a potential partner, but really all you can do is get out there, meet people, and get to know them IRL (gasp!). Who knows? You might be looking for a Virgo ESTP whose love language is words of affirmation, and you might end up with an Aquarius INFJ who’s totally into quality time. After all, Cupid’s arrow works in mysterious ways.
You hit a certain age, then the years and the decades just seem to roll by. And all of those years rolling by tends to come with another kind of roll: those stubborn ones right around your waistline. But what can you do? You’re not 25 anymore, and at this point, it’s all about your metabolism, right? Actually, you might be wrong about that! In fact, what many of us tend to think about metabolism and aging might be wrong, and blaming that “middle-age spread” on your metabolism might mean you’re doing yourself a disservice: you’re not getting to the real root of the issue and making the healthy changes you should be. So what does the latest science say about metabolism and aging, and why does it matter?
The Study
Remember the days when you felt like you could eat all the late night pizza you wanted and it didn’t matter? Then middle-age and/or menopause hit and you felt like you were packing on the pounds and you couldn’t help it? Or how about that old “eating for two” when you’re pregnant thing, or having a hard time losing the baby weight, and envying guys for being fat-burning machines? Turns out, all of those assumptions (like our metabolism changes as we hit milestones in our life like puberty or menopause, or that men have “better” metabolic rates than women do) are all pretty much wrong.
A study shows that metabolism starts its decline later in life than you might think.
And how do we know this? A major, groundbreaking study published in the journal Science this year that suggests your metabolism, the rate at which you burn calories, actually peaks much earlier and starts its inevitable decline later in life than you might think.
It turns out that, before this study, we actually knew relatively little about how metabolism really works. According to the study’s principal investigator, Herman Pontzer, an evolutionary anthropologist at Duke University, “It was really clear that we didn’t have a good handle on how body size affects metabolism or how aging affects metabolism. These are basic fundamental things you’d think would have been answered 100 years ago.” So you’re not alone!
But now, after 80 study co-authors combined efforts from a half dozen labs collected over 40 years, there now seems to be sufficient information to ask general questions about changes in metabolism over a lifetime. The researchers analyzed the average calories burned by more than 6,600 people, ranging in age from 8 days old to 95, as they went about their daily lives. And, while most previous large-scale studies measured how much energy the body uses for basic vital functions like breathing, digesting, and pumping blood (which only account for 50-70% of the calories we burn each day), this massive, combined study had the money and resources to actually look at the energy we expend doing all those little everyday tasks, like washing the dishes, walking the dog, breaking a sweat at the gym, and even just thinking or fidgeting.
To get the most accurate info on how our bodies use energy, they used the gold standard “doubly labeled water” method. This involved measuring calories burned by tracking the amount of carbon dioxide a person exhales during daily activities. They also had participants’ heights and weights and body fat percentage, which allowed them to look at fundamental metabolic rates. They knew that a smaller person would burn fewer calories than a bigger person, but they wanted to find out, correcting for size and percent fat, were their metabolisms different?
And what they found blew them away, because it challenged assumptions about how our metabolisms work, especially when it comes to how they change as we age.
The Findings
According to one study co-author, Jennifer Rood, PhD, Associate Executive Director for Cores and Resources at Pennington Biomedical Research Center, “As we age, there are a lot of physiological changes that occur in the phases of our life such as during puberty and in menopause. What’s odd is that the timing of our ‘metabolic life stages’ doesn’t appear to match the markers we associate with growing up and getting older.”
In other words, the study found that the things that we would expect to change our metabolism, such as growth spurts during puberty, turning 30, 40, or even 50, pregnancy, and menopause, didn’t really do all that much. What they did find was that metabolism was different for everybody, but that there are four distinct stages of life when it comes to how much we’re individually burning:
Infancy – While newborns actually have metabolisms similar to their mothers for the first month of their life, their metabolism shoots up after that, and by age 1, babies are burning 50% more energy than adults.
Age 1 – Age 20 – Metabolic rate gradually starts to decline after age 1, decreasing by about 3% a year until age 20.
Age 20 – Age 60 – Now here’s where things really get wild. This is when you’d guess that metabolic rate really drops off, right? Wrong. Between these ages, metabolism is actually at its most steady.
Age 60 and over – The data suggest that our metabolisms don’t really start to decline again until after age 60, and that the slowdown is gradual, only 0.7% a year – and a person in their 90s needs 26% fewer calories each day than someone in midlife.
In addition, the study found that, controlling for body fat and muscle percentage, women’s metabolisms were essentially the same as men’s. They also found, maybe most unsurprisingly of anything in the study, that individual metabolic rates varied significantly: some subjects had rates 25% above average for their age, while others had rates 25% below average.
So what does this all mean? Well, it might leave you scratching your head, or maybe shaking it in disbelief, because your experience of slowdown and/or weight gain from your 40s on seems very real. Even Pontzer admits, “I’m in my 40s, so I expected to see some evidence to back up my subjective experience that my metabolism is slowing down. It feels that way to me! But it’s not really what’s happening.” So now what?
What This Means for You
Maybe calling middle-age spread a myth is going too far. After all, weight gain as we age is very real for a lot of people: in fact, research shows the average U.S. adult gains one to two pounds a year from early to middle adulthood. But this research shows us that there are contributing factors other than metabolism. According to Pontzer, “Your stress level, your schedule, your hormone levels, your energy levels are different in your 40s or 50s compared to your 20s. If you’re gaining weight it’s easy to say, ‘Oh, that’s my metabolism.’ It’s almost like a scapegoat. Now that we know it’s not metabolism, we can focus on some of those other factors.”
Research has also shown that metabolism and weight aren’t always as closely linked as you imagine. “It’s not about how many calories you burn, it’s about whether you’re burning more than you’re eating,” says Pontzer. “Just because you have a high metabolism doesn’t mean you’re better at matching your intake to your output.”
So that means sticking to the basics of maintaining a healthy weight:
Eating a healthy, balanced diet consisting primarily of whole foods in the form of fruits, vegetables, lean protein, and whole grains.
Maintaining an active lifestyle with a goal of at least 150 minutes of physical activity a week. This includes focusing on strength training to increase or maintain lean muscle mass. Lost muscle mass as we get older may be partly to blame for weight gain, the researchers say, since muscle burns more calories than fat.
Getting enough sleep, which for most people means 7-8 hours a night.
Managing stress through mindfulness, meditation, or other relaxing activities.
But beyond looking at the question of why we gain weight as we age (which maybe this study didn’t really help to answer!), the study’s findings could also be important for your health in other ways as you age. For example, knowing how the body’s metabolism works could help doctors treat cancer more effectively. The study also sheds new light on the aging process, specifically how cell activity changes as you grow older. “There’s an age-related decline that happens across the body’s systems,” says Pontzer. “One of the exciting things from the study is now we have a map of how this change is happening at the metabolic level — because metabolism is a reflection of how busy your body is.”
Knowing what’s happening in our cells as they age could help us figure out how to deal with all of the diseases that seem to come with aging. According to Rozalyn Anderson, professor at the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health Anderson, who studies the biology of aging, “Around age 60 is when we start to see the emergence and increased risk for age-related conditions like cancer, cardiovascular disease or neurodegenerative diseases. When I saw this data, I was immediately struck by the fact that there’s also an intrinsic change in innate metabolism that begins at the same time.”
The bottom line is, researchers have brought us another step closer to the “how’s” of metabolism, but not really the “why’s.” It might be fascinating, or even hopeful, to know that, if you are gaining weight as you age, it’s not just an inevitable change in your metabolism – or it might be incredibly frustrating! If that’s not the reason, then what is?! Well, keep watching this space, as they say: researchers are hard at work. And, while you’re waiting, make any little changes to your lifestyle that could benefit your health (and your waistline), and know that they might just crack the code one of these days.
It’s cold out there. And running on the treadmill sucks. And, wait: you also just remembered that you actually hate running. But if you’re trying to lose fat, and you’re not willing to spend endless time running and jumping, you’re out of luck, right? Maybe not…there’s a new study out there that seems to suggest that you don’t actually need to do a ton of cardio to burn fat. Sounds good, right? Now, we’re not saying you don’t have to exercise at all to burn fat, but the old conventional wisdom that to gain muscles, you strength train, and to lose fat, you do cardio might not be all that wise, after all. Cardio haters rejoice: a recent study is busting myths, offering compelling scientific proof that cardio isn’t the only way to get leaner.
The Debate That We Just Can’t Seem to Settle
There has been an ongoing debate whether cardio is better for you or strength training, but science has now settled it.
Cardio or weight training? Which is better? Might as well ask whether the chicken or the egg came first, because we actually just don’t know. But a common thing you hear in the exercise world is that cardio (like running, cycling, or swimming) is the best thing for losing weight or improving heart health, and resistance training (like weightlifting) is the best thing for building muscle (though without any cardiovascular benefits). But is that really the case?
Up until now, there really haven’t been any conclusive studies on the best type of exercise for getting rid of some of that pesky body fat. Why? Well, to be honest, there’s not much money in researching exercise – actually, it’s pretty expensive to conduct sports science studies. Getting people to follow an exercise plan requires quite a bit of money, especially when you’re also doing some complex analyses, so many studies in the field have too few participants to make a solid conclusion.
It’s also just really difficult to run the studies and get trustworthy results. If you recruit people who are already fit, your findings will be less impressive and the conclusions less generalizable. But if you recruit untrained people, you might end up with no result because the subjects didn’t understand how to do the exercises well enough.
So have we learned anything before this year about the benefits of cardio versus resistance training? Well, there have been a few notable studies. For example:
One study from 2017, which followed over 100 obese people who were randomly assigned to do cardio, weight training, both, or nothing, found that people who did some cardio saw a bit more improvement in heart health than people who did only resistance, and the people who did any resistance training improved more in terms of lean muscle mass and bone density. But nothing much could be determined by this small study: the change in lean muscle mass between the cardio and resistance groups differed by less than 1%. So really all that was learned was that if you start from nothing, making any change will result in some sort of improvement – not exactly groundbreaking.
Even when researchers do try to gather data comparing resistance training and cardio, there’s not all that much to look at: for example, researchers conducted one review in 2018 of more than a dozen studies showing that cardio improved health, but only a handful compared cardio and resistance, and those lacked enough evidence to draw any conclusions at all.
But one meta-review looking at multiple studies in 2011 did find some mentions of how exercise can affect visceral fat, or the fat that builds up in your torso and is thought to be the primary driver of obesity-related disease. The review found that cardio provided benefits in this area, but when compared to resistance training, the data, unfortunately, was inconclusive.
Hm. Not exactly helpful, right? If you’re trying to lose fat, it’s kind of like you’re either stuck doing the same old cardio routine, or you’re hoping for the best – or you’re so anti-cardio that you’re just not doing anything at all. But enter a new study that could give you some hope.
Lift Weights, Lose Fat?
A study published in Sports Medicine in September this year might finally be providing some answers – and busting some myths – about exercise and fat-burning. According to senior author of the study Dr. Mandy Hagstrom, exercise physiologist and senior lecturer at University of New South Wales (UNSW) Medicine & Health in Australia, “A lot of people think that if you want to lose weight, you need to go out and run. But our findings show that even when strength training is done on its own, it still causes a favorable loss of body fat without having to consciously diet or go running.”
Wow, really? Yup – and it looks like this study blows other ones out of the water for accuracy and reliability. Dr Hagstrom and her team pulled together the findings from 58 research papers that used highly accurate forms of body fat measurement (like body scans, which can differentiate fat mass from lean mass) to measure the outcomes from strength training programs. Altogether, the studies included 3000 participants, none of whom had any previous weight training experience, and most of whom worked out for roughly 45-60 minutes each session for an average of 2.7 times per week for about five months.
And what did they find? The research team found that the participants lost, on average, around 1.4% of their body fat, or a little more than a pound of fat, through these strength training only programs, which is similar to how much you might lose through cardio or aerobics. As Dr. Hagstrom points out, “Resistance training does so many fantastic things to the body that other forms of exercise don’t, like improving bone mineral density, lean mass, and muscle quality. Now, we know it also gives you a benefit we previously thought only came from aerobics.”
That’s very good news for the cardio haters out there. And while Dr. Hagstrom still encourages people who are looking to lose fat to eat right, and do a combination of cardio and resistance training, she also acknowledges that these findings might be just what some running-resistant people might need. “If you want to exercise to change your body composition, you’ve got options,” she says.”Do what exercise you want to do and what you’re most likely to stick to.”
Change Your Relationship with Your Scale
But there’s something else that Dr. Hagstrom encourages: changing how you see the numbers on your scale, and how you look at weight loss. Why is it that many of us don’t see strength training as a way to get rid of fat? Probably because we’re too focused on “losing weight,” or seeing the numbers on the scale go down.
But that’s not really the right way to approach things: it should be more about getting lean, and changing your body. Stepping on the scale only tells part of the story: you might change the numbers more by doing tons of running or cycling, because you’re burning fat, but when you lift weights you’re burning fat and gaining muscle. That means that the numbers on the scale might not be changing all that much, but your body is!
Instead of focusing on the scale, focus on how lean you’re becoming based on how your clothes fit and the muscles gained.
According to Dr. Hagstrom, “More often than not, we don’t gain any muscle mass when we do aerobic training. We improve our cardiorespiratory fitness, gain other health and functional benefits, and can lose body fat. But when we strength train, we gain muscle mass and lose body fat, so the number on the scales won’t look as low as it would after aerobics training, especially as muscle weighs more than fat.”
“If you’re strength training and want to change how your body looks, then you don’t want to focus on the number on the scale too much, because it won’t show you all your results. Instead, think about your whole body composition, like how your clothes fit and how your body will start to feel, and move, differently.”
This study might not show us everything we need or want to know. For example, it didn’t look at whether variables like exercise duration, frequency, or intensity impacted fat loss percentage, but the research team does hope to next investigate whether how we strength train can change the amount of fat loss. But even just the information it has provided us with is pretty groundbreaking, and a great first step toward learning so much more about how strength training can change our bodies.
And it might be very welcome news to you that cardio isn’t the end-all-be-all of health and fat loss – just remember, as with everything, it’s all about balance. Get moving, get lifting, get cooking healthy, whole foods, and you’ll be heading in the right direction!
Now that the holidays are over, do you feel like you’ve been buried under an avalanche of debt? If so, that avalanche has probably been building up for a while, and it just took the last few months of spending (or even the last few years of tough times) to really shake it loose and make you feel crushed under the weight. So if you are feeling helpless, and like you’re never going to be able to start saving, what can you do? You might want to try two proven strategies to pay down that debt and then turn around and start saving: turning that avalanche of debt into a debt snowball, so you can then build a wealth snowball.
What Is a Debt Snowball?
If you are struggling with debt, you can learn to pay it off and begin saving money by making snowballs.
It’s no secret that you can’t start saving, and therefore start building wealth, if you’re saddled with debt. But, if you’ve got multiple debts that you’re struggling to pay off every month, it can be overwhelming trying to figure out how to start paying them off. Well, there are different routes you can take: for example, some choose the “debt avalanche” strategy, meaning they prioritize putting money towards high-interest debts in order to save money. This strategy might end up saving you money in the long run, but for many people this strategy of focusing on the long game offers little in the way of more short-term motivational milestones.
So if you find yourself stumbling when it comes to a more long-term debt pay-down strategy, maybe what you need is a more rewarding approach. That’s where the debt snowball comes in: with this method of repayment, you throw all of your money at your smallest debt first, then when that debt is paid off, you use the money you’ve freed up to start paying off bigger debts – kind of like rolling a snowball down a hill. The advantage to this method? What you lose out on in terms of savings on interest payments, you will gain in motivation and satisfaction, as you see your debts (even if they’re the smallest ones initially) eliminated one by one.
How to Start Building Your Debt Snowball
Building your debt snowball is pretty straightforward, and can be broken down in a few steps:
Make a list of the debts that you’re paying off each month (leaving out your mortgage, if you have one) and then sort them from smallest to largest.
Start with the smallest balance you have and throw as much money as you can at it, while only paying the minimum amount on your other, larger debts. This is probably the trickiest step in the process, as you’ll have to crunch some numbers to figure out how much you can afford to pay towards your smallest debt, while still having enough to pay the minimum on your other debts, and still have enough to comfortably get by every month. Some experts recommend having a $1000 cushion of savings before beginning this method, but at this point, you’re not worrying as much about saving; this part of the plan is all about getting rid of the debt you have so you can get to the saving stage!
Once you’ve paid off the smallest balance, and you’re basking in that satisfactory glow of having rid yourself of a debt, take that motivation – and the money you’d been putting toward your smallest debt – and put it into paying off your next smallest debt. Don’t be tempted to use the money you’ve freed up by paying off that debt for something else, or even to save it, keep the momentum of your snowball going!
As it says on your shampoo bottle: lather, rinse, repeat: keep repeating these steps until you reach your largest debt, and then are eventually debt free!
To give an example: let’s say all of your minimum payments on your debts equal $800 a month, and that’s what you’re currently paying – just the minimum. And let’s say, for your smallest balance, the minimum is $50 – try throwing some extra money at that smallest balance until it’s quickly paid off. Then you’ve got an extra $50 plus whatever extra you were paying towards that balance to put towards your next largest balance, which has a minimum payment of $100. Once that debt is paid off, you then have $150 to put towards your next biggest debt, and so on and so on, making sure to never go below that original $800 per month, no matter how much smaller your debts get. And before you know, you’re knocking off debts left and right!
What Is a Wealth Snowball?
Building your debt snowball does take discipline, but once you see it rolling and rolling, and you start paying off debt after debt, you’ll be so motivated by that rewarding sight that you’ll keep going. But once you’ve got those debts paid off, what then? It’s time to use that motivation and discipline to get the most out of the money you’ve freed up.
Get Rich Slowly founder J.D. Roth puts it this way: “I know a lot of people who have gotten out of debt, and once they do they’re kind of lost,” he says. “They don’t know what to do with their money next. So they go out and they start spending again, and it’s kind of like losing weight … they get into the same problems they used to have where they’re spending too much.”
The solution? Focus on building your wealth snowball. Basically, instead of putting that $800 in the example above towards paying off debts every month, take that amount and save it. What you do with it will depend on your personal needs, but many experts suggest doing more with it than simply letting it sit in a low-interest savings account. You should find ways to save that have tax advantages, or that allow you to build up compound interest.
Again according to Roth, “Start building a wealth snowball where you’re socking the money away every month in a retirement account, preferably, because they carry tax advantages. But if not retirement accounts, then in investment accounts where you’re getting returns on your investments, and these returns can compound over time, creating this wealth snowball that’s similar to a debt snowball.”
How to Start Building Your Wealth Snowball
What financial experts want you to know about building your wealth snowball is that, while it might feel difficult, or even unattainable, to consistently save money, the principle behind it is actually super simple: you have to spend less than you earn. Yup, that’s it – and once you’ve paid off debts that becomes much easier. But according to Roth, paying off your debts is great, “But debt reduction is an outcome and not a habit…Better instead to focus on the habit that leads to debt reduction. That habit is saving. That habit is creating a gap between your earning and spending.”
In other words, once you’ve gotten into the habit of finding the extra money to pay off those debts with your debt snowball, keep the ball (or snowball!) rolling, and continue to find ways to put that same amount of money – or more – aside. For example, try cutting your spending in small ways (after all, every little bit helps!), and using your money wisely:
Reevaluate your recurring expenses, like all of those subscriptions
If you eat out or have takeout more than once a week, considering cutting it down to once a week
Look for cheaper cell phone and internet providers
Pay attention to how you use your credit card, making sure you’re only spending what you can fully pay off each month, and avoid buy now, pay later arrangements. Even better, try to stick to cash as much as possible – you’ll be less likely to impulse buy.
Buy used or refurbished when you can
Use energy efficient light bulbs
Cook in bulk, and freeze your leftovers
Brew your own coffee instead of buying overpriced coffee drinks every day
Remember that you don’t need to be rich to save: put aside whatever you can afford, whether it’s $200 a month, or $10 a month!
To sum up: to build your wealth snowball: first, get yourself debt-free. Then, take the money you were putting toward debt payment, and put it into tax-advantaged retirement accounts like a work-sponsored 401(k) or your own IRA like a Traditional or Roth IRA, because of the power of compound interest: the more you save, the more you earn. Finally, when you’ve gotten better at the habit of spending less, try throwing an extra $25 a month into your savings, and slowly increasing that amount over time. In addition, if you get a big bonus, tax rebate, or other windfall, consider putting around 90% aside, leaving the other 10% for a little guilt-free spending.
If you’re looking ahead to retirement – and you probably are if you’re focused on saving! – we wanted to give you a quick look at what Mr. Money Mustache calls “the shockingly simple math behind early retirement,” just to give you an idea of what saving a little extra can mean for you. So, this is what experts say – if you save:
10% of your income, you’ll need to work 50 years to retire
20% of your income, you’ll need to work 37 years to retire
35% of your income, you’ll need to work 25 years to retire
50% of your income, you’ll need to work 17 years to retire
70% of your income, you’ll need to work 8.5 years to retire
Now, no one is saying you need to save 70% of your income! But those numbers are very interesting, and should give you an insight into where your savings can take you. For now, though, if you’re feeling crushed by the weight of debt, just start where you are. Focus on digging yourself out by rearranging your life a little bit so you can start building your debt snowball – then, once that snowball is gaining momentum and is steamrolling over your debt, don’t stop! Keep the momentum going so you can start building your wealth snowball, and can eventually reach your financial goals – and man, that will feel good!
