'Huh?' Health Headline Of The Week: Stressed Men Prefer Heavier Women

Not every health headline is an announcement of a life-altering new medical procedure, a science-heavy disease explanation or a love letter to kale.

Sometimes, health headlines are worth jumping for joy -- Chocolate Linked To Lower BMI! -- or are laughably obvious -- Healthy Lifestyle Makes Women Less Likely To Die Suddenly. Every once in a while, a headline comes along that makes us go, "Wait... what?!" Every week, we'll be collecting our favorite tweets about the "Huh?" headline of the week.

This week, the winner comes from a study published in the journal PLoS ONE, titled "The Impact of Psychological Stress on Men's Judgements of Female Body Size."

The journal tweeted the headline, sticking closely to the study's findings:

Stressed men rate heavier women as more attractive than non-stressed men do ow.ly/cPWVj

— PLOS ONE (@PLOSONE) August 8, 2012

But other tweets had more fun. Check out the many different opinions on the study in the slideshow below.

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• BBC News (World)

• LHJ Health Editors

• SELF Magazine

• CNN Health

• TheAtlantic/Health

• Jezebel

• SciAm Blogs

• U.S.News&WorldReport

• Dr. Ruth Westheimer

• HuffPostUKLifestyle

• L.A. Times Health

• TIME Healthland

• Comment is free

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Comments

[Diana Bitritto]

08:27 AM on 08/11/2012

And they prefer skinny chicks when they're not stressed?

[Amy56]

07:39 AM on 08/11/2012

If this is true I would think that perhaps it is because men might feel that they have to work much harder to maintain a relationship with what society feels might be a more beautiful woman.
And they are already putting a lot of energy into their jobs - hence feeling stressed. My guess anyway.

[Gnomish]

07:27 AM on 08/11/2012

I just thought of it as random filler, the story fit the space alloted.

[carolfortlauderdale]

04:10 AM on 08/11/2012

To put it another way.....Men who can't get beautiful thin women, "prefer" fat women!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Gnomish]

07:29 AM on 08/11/2012

A feel Good N Plenty story.

[westend1]

11:09 PM on 08/10/2012

Okay here is the real story: stressed men drink more beer--hence when they lock around at women they are looking through their beer goggles. However both men and women still seems happy it works!

[emmaleen]

10:04 PM on 08/10/2012

While stressed out men want heavier women, stressed out women just chocoalate and to be left the heck alone.