Physiological effects of improper urinal etiquette and touching wood

Urinal etiquette is sacred. Why do men always leave an empty urinal as buffer space when peeing in a public restroom? Could it have an effect on how well they pee?

Why do people enjoy hiking in the woods so much? Can you get the same enjoyment from touching a piece of wood?

In this episode, Lu and Tirth discuss the physiologic reason behind men’s well-established urinal etiquette and how touching wood affects your brain and heart activity.

Timestamps:

• 0:00 Intro
• 0:26 Tirth’s upcoming wedding plans
• 3:17 Urinal study
• 18:14 Touching wood study
• 28:44 Let’s read some mail
• 31:05 What did you learn today, outro

Article links:

• Middlemist et al., 1976. Personal space invasions in the lavatory: suggestive evidence for arousal. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. https://psycnet.apa.org/doiLanding?doi=10.1037%2F0022-3514.33.5.541
• Ikei et al., 2017. Physiological Effects of Touching Wood. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC5551239/
• Zongker, 2006. Chicken chicken chicken chicken chicken. Annals of Improbable Research. https://improbable.com/airchives/paperair/volume12/v12i5/chicken-12-5.pdf

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