Women often complain of freezing, and doctors believe that their hormones are to blame. Back in 1998, they found out that women’s body temperature is by 0.4 degrees higher than that of men, but their hands and legs are 2.8 degrees colder. According to a theory, it is a natural mechanism: the female body is set up to protect the child from the cold during pregnancy.
Professor Michael Tipton of the University of Portsmouth claims that heat receptors are in a millimeter from the skin surface. Due to blood capillaries, skin usually has a comfortable temperature. But women’s body temperature often varies depending on the level of estrogen, which controls the peripheral vessels. The more hormone women have in the blood, the higher the sensitivity of their blood vessels to temperature is.
When freezing, the receptors give the command for the capillaries to get narrower and redirect blood to the vital organs. Thus, vasoconstriction may occur in women even at a slight decrease in temperature.
Ladies also have 10% more fat. Adipose tissue protects the internal organs from damage, but it also prevents the heat from reaching the surface of the skin, that is why obese people always have lowered skin temperature.
