This just in from the department of the fairly bleedin' obvious: US boffins have discovered that women find men who like kids more attractive as potential long-term mates.

They are, however, more likely to go weak at the knees for guys with higher testoterone levels - at least if they're looking for a "wham, bam, thank you ma'am" short-term fling.

The study, Reuters notes, probed 68 men and women. Thirty-nine male undergraduates were tested for testoterone levels, while their "affinity" for kids was gauged by showing them pictures of children and adults and asking them to "rate their interest".

They were then photographed, and 29 female students asked to score the rogues' gallery according to "whether they thought they liked children, their masculinity, physical attractiveness, and potential as short and long-term partners".

The upshot of it all was that "the women were able to choose the men who had expressed an interest in children during the photo test" while they "also described men who had high testosterone levels as being masculine".

James Roney of the University of California explained: "Our data suggests that men's interest in children predicts their long-term mate attractiveness even after we account for how physically attractive the women rated the men."

Study co-author Dario Maestripieri of the University of Chicago chipped in: "The study provides the first direct evidence that women's attractiveness judgments specifically track both men's affinity for children and men's hormone concentrations."

The research - which will certainly delight weightlifting male kindergarten teachers - is published in Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences. ®

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