Aug 17, 2015 10:54 AM EDT By Rashmi Kalia, UniversityHerald Reporter

According to a new study published in Appetite, young women get more romantic on a full stomach than when they have not eaten properly, NYC Times reports.

The study was conducted by a group of researchers from the University of California, San Diego.

For the study, a group of 20 women were put into an fMRI machine after they had not consumed food for eight hours. The women were then shown pictures of heterosexual couples in a variety of romantic postures such as holding hands, sharing an embrace etc.

The women were also shown non-romantic pictures such as images of a car, stapler and so on.

After the participants were shown the pictures, they were treated to a shake rich in calories and proteins. After the meal, the women were scanned again and the machine registered a more active brain activity among women when they saw the romantic images after being satiated with food.

The study also found that women who had dieted before responded more to the romantic images than others.

According to NYC Today, lead author Alice Ely tells Quartz said, "The dieters were more responsive than non-dieters when full in a brain region that's been linked to perceived attractiveness, and given that they are a more weight-gain- prone population, it suggests that their sensitivity to reward generalizes beyond just food".

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