Is your job ruining your love life? It could be if this new research is to be believed. Apparently scientists have found that women who have stressful jobs are more likely to struggle when it comes to finding a bit of romance outside the office.

Researchers from the University of Turku in Finland found that high-powered jobs cause an increase in levels of the stress hormone cortisol, which actually makes women less attractive to men.

To come to this conclusion, the researchers asked a group of male volunteers to rate the attractiveness of women’s faces. The results showed that women who had stressful jobs (and higher-than-normal levels of cortisol in their bodies) were rated lower in terms of their natural attractiveness than women who possessed average levels of the hormone.

Is your career ruining your romantic prospects?

Researchers believe that the impact on women’s love lives is a negative side effect of the fact that men are biologically more likely to be attracted to women who are healthy and fertile. When we have higher levels of cortisol in our bodies, we’re likely to look older and less healthy.

“...low levels of cortisol signal health in female faces. This would be consistent with many studies in humans that have found that stress has strong negative effects on health, including immune function, heart disease and susceptibility to cancer,” said Dr. Markus Rantala, who led the study.

“An alternative explanation is that facial attractiveness signals reproductive potential, which is mediated partly by stress hormones,” he added.