Men Love Sports Cars: True. Duh.

A big-name university has quantitatively proven what we've long suspected. Parents, behold your tuition dollars at work.

An academic study that determines men indeed salivate at the sight of high-end sports cars would seem to come straight out of the Department of the Obvious. Yet a professor at Northwestern University's prestigious Kellogg School of Management has issued just such a report.

In his paper "A Mouthwatering Prospect: Salivation to Material Reward" published by the Journal of Consumer Research, David Gal set out to determine whether a longing to obtain material goods would be on the same physiological plane with our craving for food when hungry. "In multiple languages, the terms hunger and salivation are used metaphorically to describe desire for non-food items," Gal writes. "But will people actually salivate when they desire material things?"

In a word, yes.

Further pounding the palpable, Gal's study established that members of the male species drool even further when eyeballing an exotic sports car if a member of the opposite sex is somehow part of the equation.

As part of his research, Gal induced men to have a "mating goal," based on prior data that suggested - and here's another surprise - that men have a tendency to try and impress women by acquiring conspicuous luxury items. Gal accomplished this by showing one group of men photos of attractive women and asked them to consider which one they would most like to date. Meanwhile, he asked another group of men to imagine a visit to the barbershop. After subsequently showing both groups images of high-end sports cars Gal found that the men with the active mating goal had salivated more than those who had been prompted to envision getting a haircut.

This, of course, reinforces an axiom marketers have adhered to since the dawn of advertising: sex sells.

For those wondering how the drool factor was actually measured, Gal had participants put cotton dental rolls in their mouths and later weighed the rolls to measure the amount of saliva present. We assume teaching assistants did the dirty work.

For his part Gal concluded that, "All objects of desire, whether biological or non- biological, activate the same general reward system in the brain. Salivation might merely be the consequence of the activation of this general reward system."

And which cars do men seem to be drooling over the most proficiently these days? The most exotic of the bunch is something called the Pagani Huayra. It's not yet available in the U.S. but that isn't keeping enthusiasts from pining for this sultry Italian import. A Mercedes-Benz AMG-sourced bi-turbo V12 is said to deliver 700 horsepower, enabling this arrabbiata auto to hit 60 mph in a little over three seconds with a scenery-blurring top speed of 235 mph.

Or consider the McLaren MP4-12C, which rides on a carbon fiber chassis and simply looks fast. Soon to debut, the first mass-produced road car from the renowned British racing-car engineering firm is as close to a street-legal Formula One ride as they come, with a twin-turbo 3.8-liter V8 that promises around 600 horsepower.

Then there's the angularly shaped Lamborghini Aventador LP 700-4, which sits so close to the ground it barely clears the pavement and packs a 700-horsepower 6.5-liter V12 engine. And consider the Ferrari 458 Italia, which is as much a rolling masterpiece of automotive art as it is a high-performance car, with a rear mounted 4.5-liter V8 that gives its occupants a kick in the pants with a forceful 570 horsepower.

Sightings of any of these astronomically priced cars are sure to be few and far between, but especially if you're a guy taking even a fleeting gander at any of them in passing, the experience is sure to test your salivary gland's mettle.

(c) CTW Features