STUDY: GOSSIPING IS GOOD FOR YOU

According to research – if you stretch the definition of “research” – gossiping is good for you. Scientists from the University of Pavia in Italy say that the brain releases significantly greater proportions of the hormone oxytocin (ock-see-TOE-sin) when we gossip than when we engage in other forms of conversation. Oxytocin is often described as the pleasure hormone: it’s released when we’re aroused, during and after sex, during mother-child bonding, or when we touch each other. The study’s lead author, Dr. Natascia Brondino, recruited 22 female students from a local university and randomly assigned them to one of two groups. The first group gossiped about a recent unplanned pregnancy on campus. The second, non-gossip group heard someone tell an emotional personal story about how a sporting injury meant she might never be able to play sports again. Afterwards, the subjects were tested for their oxytocin and cortisol levels. While cortisol levels — the body’s primary stress hormone — decreased equally among the gossip and non-gossip group, oxytocin levels were significantly higher in the group that gossiped. Brondino believes her findings attest to the vital importance of gossip in human social interaction because it brings people closer together than they would be if they were talking about some impersonal topic.
* That’s not what I heard.
* And I heard Brondino only got a degree by sleeping with her professor.
* Which professor? Try all of them.
* Plus, she likes to get freaky with her grad students.
* Hey, don’t look at me – it’s all over school.
* That “unplanned pregnancy on campus”? It was her.