Curious times

 
 
By ANDREAS OHRT
Jul 12 2006

A weekly roundup of newsbites from the "truth is stranger than fiction" department.

A PHOTOCOPY OF BIG BROTHER IS WATCHING YOU

If you still work in an office with one of those snack boxes which work on the honour system (yum, free snacks!), you'll love this finding from psychologists at Newcastle University who discovered that simply hanging up a picture of a pair of human eyes in the coffee room almost tripled the amount of money paid by students in the psychology department. The experiment was carried out over the course of several months, with new price lists posted each week. While the prices of the drinks remained the same, a picture at the top of the price list alternated between flowers or human faces with eyes which looked directly at the observer. The remarkable result was that in weeks with eyes on the list, staff paid 2.76 times as much for their drinks as in weeks with flowers. (New Scientist)

LET'S NAME THE CHILD "YES! YES! OH MY GOD YES!"

If you're pregnant and fearing the pain of childbirth you might want to enlist the help of a new breed of midwives who suggest that giving birth can be an orgasmic experience for women who let themselves go for it. This story comes out of London, England, where at least two midwifery agencies promote the idea of erotic birth experiences for women. Katrina Caslake, 44, became a midwife after experienceing orgasms during the birth of both her sons. "I found giving birth very sensual," she claims. "All my erogenous zones were stimulated. And I had a definite climax. I was doing the most feminine thing a woman can do and it felt fantastic." As farfetched as this might sound, a study of 151 women in the U.S. found that 32 of the women reported having at least one orgasmic birth. "If couples are willing, nipple and clitoral massage can be used to bring on labour contractions, open the cervix and vagina and help with pain relief," says Nathalie Mottershead of London's Birth Centre. "If mothers-to-be are open to feeling sexy, labour can be pleasurable, not painful, and it sometimes builds up to a climax at birth." (The Times)

HOWEVER, YOUR CHANCES OF DYING ARE 100%

Another reminder that the things we fear will kill us aren't actually very likely to do us any harm, while the things we enjoy the most will probably end up killing us. An article titled "The Six Most Feared But Least Likely Causes of Death" explains that the most common fears we have are also the most improbable events we will ever encounter. For example, you would have to fly on an airplane every day for 19,000 years before the odds caught up with you and you died in a plane crash. Your odds of being attacked by a shark are only one in 11.5 million, being murdered is also exceedingly rare, and dying in a terrorist attack gives you odds of just one in 9.3 million. Meanwhile, the actual leading causes of death include all our favorite pastimes: smoking, drinking, poor diet and physical inactivities, car crashes, illicit drugs, and, according to this article, sexual behaviours. (SixWise.com)
 
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