by Chris Shugart
What does testosterone have to do with personal integrity? More than you might think. Here's what you need to know.
Many people have a distorted view of high-testosterone men. Cultural stereotypes include:
- High T men are aggressive, even violent.
- They're over-sexed and more likely to stray.
- They're domineering and will do anything to win.
- They're dumb jocks.
- They're dangerous risk takers.
Multiple studies looked into these judgmental assumptions, and the findings are much more nuanced:
High-testosterone men are usually more competitive and do seek status, but this typically doesn't take the form of violent aggression. It usually manifests in positive aggression.
High-T men do have a higher sex drive, but that doesn't mean they chase every skirt they see and cheat in relationships. And testosterone can increase sensitivity to status and respect. That could be expressed through dominance, but it could also come through leadership or striving for honor.
Elevated testosterone is linked to more confidence in risk-reward decisions, but not recklessness. As for intelligence, there's zero evidence that high-T men are dumber. In fact, studies suggest that testosterone improves spatial ability, motivation, and focus.
Here's an overlooked study that offers some further insights.
The cheating study
Who's more likely to cheat to win, or cheat for financial gains? The man with normal levels of testosterone or the man with elevated T levels?
To find out, researchers recruited 91 healthy men, most around age 25, representing a normal-T baseline sample. Half the men received 50 mg of testosterone via transdermal gel; the rest got a placebo. All the men took salivary testosterone tests before and after administration. Roughly translated into the more familiar serum testing numbers, the T-takers went from mid-normal levels (500 ng/dL) to high-normal (900 ng/dL).
The next day, all the participants played a solo dice-rolling game: they privately rolled a six-sided die and self-reported the result via computer. Numbers 1-5 earned the equivalent amount of money (euros in this study), while reporting a 6 earned no money. Participants could lie to increase their earnings.
What happened?
Well, a lot of people lied and reported higher payoffs than expected by chance. However, the testosterone group reported significantly lower payoffs than the placebo group. The researchers concluded that testosterone administration substantially decreased lying.
Why? It seems that testosterone makes the mind more sensitive to pride, honor, and self-respect. That internal drive discourages dishonesty, even when lying is undetectable and profitable.
In this context, lying isn't just about external consequences (being caught). It's also about internal consequences: how you feel about yourself afterward. Yes, high-T men enjoy winning and high status, but cheating is a low-status choice that's beneath them.
It would've been interesting if they'd included a group of low-T (hypogonadal) men, but sadly, they did not. If mid-range men lied more than high-normal men, you could hypothesize that low-T men may be even more prone to dishonesty. But that's speculative. Let me know what you speculate in the comments.
How to use this info
How a man behaves ethically and morally isn't solely determined by his T levels, of course, but this study (and a follow-up study) highlights a trend: high-normal testosterone can make a man more likely to act based on the higher standards he has for himself.
Men with normal T levels probably shouldn't get on TRT yet, but there are advantages to having a high-normal level: easier muscle gain and fat loss, higher sex drive, and (apparently) a stronger sense of personal integrity.
If your T levels are lowish to mid-range, you can bump them into the higher ranges naturally with Longjack (aka Eurycoma or Tongkat Ali). Longjack boosts testosterone in three main ways: synthesizing testosterone by blocking its aromatization into estrogen, and stimulating testosterone production in testicle Leydig cells. It also lowers SHBG production, freeing up natural testosterone.
Just be sure to use the patented LJ100 variety and use a high dosage formulated with Labrasol to increase bioavailability. Omega-Man High Absorption Longjack (Buy at Amazon) contains the effective dosage (300 mg) of LJ100 and uses Labrasol. Take one softgel daily.
Longjack doesn't shrink the testicles or enlarge the prostate. And as a bonus, it appears to be a legit aphrodisiac, if you don't mind being "over-sexed."
Reference
- Wibral, Matthias, et al. "Testosterone Administration Reduces Lying in Men." PLOS ONE, vol. 7, no. 10, 2012, e46774. Public Library of Science.