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Did you know women's tears could turn men off! [Representational image]Reuters

Tears are said to be a woman's biggest weapon, but scientists have found that they are also a big turn off for men!

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The revelation was made  by a team of researchers of the Weizmann Institute in Israel, led by Professor Noam Sobel.

Researchers analysed the tears of women who cried while watching a sad movie. Male participants were then given either the tears or a salt solution to sniff.

The male participants weren't informed about what they were smelling. According to researchers, men couldn't differentiate between the tears and the salt solution anyway, as both are odourless.

After being given either of the solutions,the men were shown a picture of the woman's faces and questioned whether they found her sexually appealing or not.

It was found that those men who sniffed the tears found the women sexually less attractive, but when they had the saline solution, they found the women more tempting.

The reason behind this is that women's tears possess a chemical signal that has the ability to lower sexual arousal in men.

On average, a drop of 13% was observed in the levels of the sexual hormone testosterone, which was present in the saliva of the men who sniffed the tears.

A measurement of their heart rate, respiration rate, and skin temperature was taken by researchers and a dip was observed in those as well, after they smelled the women's tears. Also, lower brain activity related to sexual arousal was seen on MRI scans taken by researchers of men who had the tears, ratrher than the saline solution.

"This study reinforces the idea that human chemical signals — even ones we're not conscious of — affect the behaviour of others," Prof Sobel stated in the comments published in the online journal Science Express.

"The results raised many questions, such as what the chemical giving out the signal was," he stated further.

So ladies! Make sure, that this Valentine's day if you want to get lucky, you keep your tears at bay!