Rebecca Kamm: Women's studies: mothers-in-law, queues and fear-sweat

Studies show women tend to hate their mother-in-law.Photo / Thinkstock

Women hate their mothers-in-law

Mothers-in-law: whatever you're doing, there's a 40 per cent chance it's giving your daughter-in-law a hernia. Evidence: online researchers OnePoll questioned 2000 women and found four out of ten ladies felt "uneasy" around their husband's mother. Also, 10 per cent weren't speaking to their mother-in-law after a row, half had argued with their husband about her and 15 per cent had come close to ending their relationship because of her.

The biggest gripe was being told how to raise the children, which I don't understand because I know I'll have zero idea what to do with the tiny people and therefore please, PLEASE take over. But there you go. Another gripe was "Buying a plug-in air freshener when she is staying with you." I don't know, that sounds kind of good to me too.

Anyway, the ten most annoying mothers-in-law are Margaret; Marjorie; Brenda; Linda; Maureen; Peggy; Angela; Barbara; Patricia and Cynthia. (By which I'm assuming they mean names, because otherwise, huh?)

Women are better at waiting

UK mobile operator Three did a study on queues, and it turns out ladies will wait for longer in them than men, by 16 SECONDS. (3 minutes 39 seconds vs. 3 minutes 23 seconds).

People older than 55 are the most patient; they'll wait four minutes. 18 to 24 year olds will stand in line for no more than 2 minutes 59 seconds because they forget why they're even there then wander off in search of new gadgets.

Women can smell wimps

Ladies can smell men's fear-sweat! They know this because researchers got 10 male humans to watch scary movies then paid 36 women not nearly enough to inhale the "chemosignals" of the men's perspiration.

The women were then looked at really up close and it was observed that they opened their eyes very wide in a "fearful expression". They also grimaced as if in disgust. (Which I could have predicted, saving everybody much time.)

"These findings are contrary to the commonly accepted assumption that human communication runs exclusively via language or visual channels," said Gün Semin from Utrecht University in the Netherlands.

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