Xenoestrogen
Xenoestrogens are a type of xenohormone that imitates estrogen. They can be either synthetic or natural chemical compounds. Synthetic xenoestrogens include some widely used industrial compounds, such as PCBs, BPA, and phthalates, which have estrogenic effects on a living organism even though they differ chemically from the estrogenic substances produced internally by the endocrine system of any organism. Natural xenoestrogens include phytoestrogens which are plant-derived xenoestrogens. Because the primary route of exposure to these compounds is by consumption of phytoestrogenic plants, they are sometimes called "dietary estrogens". Mycoestrogens, estrogenic substances from fungi, are another type of xenoestrogen that are also considered mycotoxins.
Pheromone
Axillary steroids are produced by the testes, ovaries, apocrine glands, and adrenal glands. These chemicals are not biologically active until puberty when sex steroids influence their activity. The change in activity during puberty suggest that humans may communicate through odors. Several axillary steroids have been described as potential human pheromones: androstadienol, androstadienone, androstenol, androstenone, and androsterone.Further evidence of a role for pheromones in sociosexual behavior comes from two double blind, placebo-controlled experiments. The first from 1998, by Cutler, had 38 male volunteers apply either a "male pheromone" or control odor and record six different sociosexual behaviors over two weeks. This study found an increase in sexual behavior in the pheromone users compared to the control group. The study 2002 by McCoy and Pitino was similar, except that participants were women, not men. Females treated with "female pheromone" reported significant increases in many of the behaviors including "sexual intercourse", "sleeping next to a partner", "formal dates", and "petting/affection/kissing". The researchers believed that pheromones had a positive sexual attractant effect. The third study was performed on 44 postmenopausal women and was published in 2004 by Rako and Friebely in the "Journal of Sex Research". The study confirmed the previous results (McCoy & Pitino, 2002) for reproductive-aged women for the two subjective behaviors studied; weekly averages of informal dating and male approaches were not significantly increased for pheromone users. The study found among postmenopausal women, a significantly greater proportion of those using pheromone than those using placebo showed an increase over their own baseline in intimate sociosexual behaviors.