Cats may improve your social life

The cat parasite toxoplasmosis gondii may affect human personality:

THEY may look like lovable pets but Britain’s estimated 9m domestic cats are being blamed by scientists for infecting up to half the population with a parasite that can alter people’s personalities.The startling figures emerge from studies into toxoplasma gondii, a parasite carried by almost all the country’s feline population.

They show that half of Britain’s human population carry the parasite in their brains, and that infected people may undergo slow but crucial changes in their behaviour.

The study into more subtle changes in human personality is being carried out by Professor Jaroslav Flegr of Charles University in Prague. In one study he subjected more than 300 volunteers to personality profiling while also testing them for toxoplasma.

He found the women infected with toxoplasma spent more money on clothes and were consistently rated as more attractive. “We found they were more easy-going, more warm-hearted, had more friends and cared more about how they looked,” he said. “However, they were also less trustworthy and had more relationships with men.” [Sunday Times]

Update: Chris has a great post on toxoplasmosis and human personality at Mixing Memory.

Comments

[R. Mildred]

Pussy lovers rock, well known fact.

though I'm intrigued by how they judged that the women "were also less trustworthy", were they prone to bouts of kleptomania, habitual liers, did they keep talking about the researchers behind their backs or were they just prone to lateness?

[John Emerson]

Next to be studied: chocolate.

[Steve D]

Err... OK, fine for women, but I'm not sure I needed "to become more aggressive, scruffy, antisocial and are less attractive." I think I'll keep my cats anyhow, tho.

[Boyd F]

Gee, that's a pretty vague personality change.
Do you start licking yourself more too?

[Dior]

I knew it..cats are really alien visitors here to make us all slaves to pamper them and cater to their whims. H.P.Lovecraft tried to warn us and now it' too late.
Dior

[Njorl]

Whenever I hear of toxoplasmosis, I can't help but think of "Trainspotting". (shudder)

[Yosef]

Those catty women.

sorry.

[Amanda]

Good thing I make my boyfriend change the cat box.

[Dior]

Cat evolution, if you are intersted, can be found on
http://afarensis.blogsome.com/ a new blog to explain science to the average American, or below average European.

[Chris]

I did a little research when I read this yesterday, and it turns out that the researcher mentioned in the article, Professor Flegr, published a finding just this year that indicates that at least some of the behavioral differences associated with toxoplasmosis infection may be associated with physical differences, specifically those related to prenatal testosterone levels (which may also be associated with schizophrenia), that are not caused by infection (in fact, they may be related to resistance to the parasite). In other words, at least some of the behavioral differences may have existed prior to infection.

No one has done a pre and post-infection study, so the jury is still out on what role the parasite is playing, but it's strange that the article, published this week, didn't report the professor's latest research, which was published a few months ago, but instead reported primarily on his research that is at least 2, and in some cases 9 years old.

[Lindsay Beyerstein]

Cool. Thanks Chris. Have you blogged about this story yet?

[Chris]

Yup, but I ultimately just said what I mentioned in the last comment.

[Jason E.]

Interesting! I've long wondered about behaviour changing pathogens ever since that mouse virus that causes obesity was discovered. It seems to me that if we can have such a specific pathogen that infects the brain and physically alters it such that the normal sense of full is disrupted, resulting in obese mice, why not virii or other pathogens that can alter other aspects? Why not ones that lower resistance to impulisve behaviour? Why not ones that cause hypomania or full tilt mania? Why not depression, or other mood disorders? A little viral monkeywrenching in the hypothalamus and you could alter all kinds of baseline mood and behaviour issues. Given the size and structural differences in the bed nucleus of the stria terminalis seen between gay men, women, gay women, transsexuals and so on, with women, gay men, and transsexuals having a smaller region and straight men and gay women having a larger region, why not a virus that damages this area making lesbians straight and men gay?

Is anyone looking for these things? I think it would be fascinating if there's a viral or pathogen component to who we are. Of course, I can only imagine the hysteria that would erupt if it was found there was a "gay virus" that made people gay, and some men were carriers of it. It would lead to sheer panic in society. Personally I think it would be astounding and interesting, but I imagine most people wouldn't like to consider that elements of their personality, components of their core sense of who they are, may be nothing more than pathogen caused subtle brain damage.

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