    56

    The answer takes us back to the influence of the pecking order on

    testosterone.  In studies of combative monkeys and of competing

    college wrestling teams, a simple fact has emerged.170  Testosterone

    levels go up in the winners and down in the losers.

    Testosterone makes winners restless, confident, and aggres-

    sive.171  The steroids taken by athletes, for example, are a synthetic

    variation of natural testosterone.  These drugs can induce a boldness

    that borders on the insane.  Psychiatrists Harrison G. Pope Jr. and

    David L. Katz (of McLean Hospital and the Harvard Medical School)

    interviewed 41 steroid-using body builders and found, among other

    things, that one of these athletes was convinced he could jump from a

    third-floor window without harm.  And another had bought two

    expensive sports cars, then cockily driven them at 40 miles per hour

    into a tree while a friend had videotaped the feat.172

    Testosterone is the very elixir of feistiness.  Inject a young rooster

    with this remarkable hormone and the bird struts away to look for a

    fight.  What's more, he usually wins the battle, and moves up in social

    stature.173    One  reason  may  be  indicated  by  the  work  of  Turkish

    researcher Una Tan, who showed that testosterone can actually

    increase physical prowess.174

    According to Edward O. Wilson, even "hens given small doses of

    testosterone become more aggressive and move up in rank within the

    dominance hierarchies of the flock."175  In fact, injecting a few hens with

    testosterone propionate is a good way to trigger a literal barnyard

    revolt.176

    A social group that has just had a stroke of good fortune is filled

    with men and women who've won in a big way.  The leaders are on a

    testosterone high!  No wonder the Mongols, flush with fresh

    prosperity, thundered across the Asian plains in search of battle.  They

    were bursting with the hormones of aggression.

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