Astrology research is endlessly fascinating mainly because the results are often so extraordinary.

The work itself of inputting thousands of birth details and analysing the results is fairly mundane but the thing that sustains the researcher is the findings at the end of it.

Having said that there are some subject groups that are more compelling and entertaining than others.

Capricorn Research has just completed a study of the members of Congress. The fascinating aspect of this research is that there is a marked difference between the astrological make up of the typical Democrat and Republican.

But the actual research was pretty boring, attempting to find out why these people feel compelled to stand for high office so that they can spend their lives telling everybody else what to do.

In order to offset the tedium of this congressional project Capricorn Research decided to have another one running alongside it.

The question behind this piece of research is what motivates certain young ladies to get their kit off in glossy magazines for the entertainment of all and sundry ?

The answer would most likely be fame and money. But what would be the astrological factors ?

There are obviously a lot of top shelf magazines whose main selling point is the naked female form, but there is one that perhaps started it all and has the biggest reputation. Playboy has been using the centrefold idea for over 60 years and hence a sample of  706 models gives us a large enough range to identify some astrological traits that they might have in common.

It’s a fair guess that most men reading this article will already have speculated on the most common Sun sign for our sample. And they are almost certainly wrong.

The assumption is that Libra and Scorpio would be the two signs most likely to feature, with possibly an appearance of their polar opposites Aries and Taurus.

Libra and Scorpio do appear more than average at 109 and 105 % respectively but these figures are not high enough to have any significance. Aries is at 99 % and Taurus is the lowest scoring sign with 73 %.

By some distance the highest scoring Sun sign is Virgo with 129 %. This seems to go against the conventional view that Virgoans are rather restrained and even prudish. Most people would feel that this sign perhaps together with Capricorn would score lowest in a survey of centerfold models.

Sexual expression is ruled by Mars and the red planet also scores highest in Virgo, in this case at 136 %. Libra is the 2nd highest Mars placing with 122 % and Aquarius the lowest with 61 %.

This Mars distribution does have serious statistical significance with a ” p ” figure of 0.000372.

Virgo is the definitely not the sign of the exhibitionist, but it is that of the perfectionist. The Playboy idea is to display the perfect ( in their terms ) female form, so perhaps it makes sense for there to be so many Virgos

But in a sense, the displaying of all one’s natural wares in a magazine for all to see is not really a Mars activity, it belongs to the arena of Venus.

Venus does score 3rd highest in Virgo with 119 % although this is fairly likely given the Sun’s frequency in the sign.

The finding that will have most followers of astrology nodding their heads in agreement is the strongest planetary placing by sign in this sample. Venus top scores in Scorpio with 148 %.

The Venus distribution has a ” p ” figure of 0.00729, again clearly beating the 0.01 required for statistical significance, but perhaps even more interesting is that Scorpio is way out on its own, over 24 percentage points above Aquarius which finishes 2nd.

Venus is all about attraction and its placing in the intensely sexual sign Scorpio is what we would expect. The combination with the Sun and Mars in the perfectionist Virgo says a lot about the Playboy narrative.

As this is a study based on birthdays without times, house positions and Ascending signs are not applicable.

It is interesting to look at the most common aspects however.

All of the Sun, Moon and Mercury aspects fall within a range where there is nothing of significance to see.

The aspects that do stand out however belong to Venus and Mars.

Very appropriately, Venus is conjunct Jupiter 150 % of the expected number of times.

Mars also scores highly with Jupiter, the conjunction is 127 % but the biggest single score for any aspect is the sextile with a whopping 166 %.

The very sexually oriented Mars / Pluto conjunction scores 137 %, but perhaps another surprise is the fact that the Mars / Saturn conjunction scores 156 %.

The Mars / Saturn score is intriguing not least because it also scores highly in the survey of 166 Prostitutes, where both the conjunction and the opposition have 176 %. This proliferation of Mars / Saturn here is not surprising as its pretty certain that these individual’s choice of career will inevitably bring a whole series of problems and difficulties along with it.

Perhaps we can infer from this finding that displaying your assets in Playboy can have a similar impact.

There is a common notion that there is a Playboy Centerfold Curse, owing to an apparently large number of models who have suffered a tragic death of some sort or other.

This idea of a curse really comes from the very first Playboy Centerfold in December 1953, Marilyn Monroe who died in mysterious circumstances as the result of a drug overdose in 1962. It is still unknown whether Marilyn’s death was an accident, a suicide or even a murder, with many conspiracy theories attached to the Kennedy family.

At first it was assumed that this tragedy was Marilyn’s alone, but the deaths of two centrefolds from the first 18 months of Playboy doing them started the idea of a curse. Jayne Mansfield was killed in a horrific car crash and Eve Meyer died in a plane crash.

The fact that 3 out of the first 16 centrefolds died in tragic circumstances is strange and gave the idea of the curse.

Since then there have been 5 probable suicides and 5 others who have died as a result of overdoses although its not known whether they were intentional or not. There have also been two murders and three car accidents.

Overall out of a sample of 706 people, 4 deaths in car accidents and one plane crash is probably not that strong an indication of a curse, but 11 potential suicides and 2 murders certainly is significantly more than average expectation.

Of the 11 suicide / overdose cases, Capricorn Research has full charts for 2 and noon charts for 8 of them. Saturn plays a major role in every single one and in many cases the Mars / Saturn conjunction is present.

The most famous of all and the one that started it all off is Marilyn Monroe