Short people just can't catch a break. First scientists reported that individuals with short legs were more susceptible to heart disease and diabetes. Now, a new study indicates that both men and women are more attracted to those with long legs.

As New Scientist has reported, researchers at the University of Wroclaw in Poland digitally altered images of male and female legs, making them 5, 10, or 15% longer or shorter than the average leg length; though the leg length varied, however, the height remained consistent. The images were shown to a group of 218 men and women, who were asked to rate the attractiveness of each image. The sexiest gams-according to both sexes-were 5% longer than the Polish average, with legs that were 10% longer following closely behind.

"Long legs are signaling health," explains researcher Boguslaw Pawlowski.

That's enough to send you running to the nearest Louboutin boutique for some skyscraper platforms, but don't book that leg-lengthening surgery just yet: Legs that were 15% longer than normal weren't considered attractive. Pawlowski says this could be attributed to an assumption that an extremely long-legged woman would have trouble conceiving children.

"One can hypothesize that excessively long legs, and therefore excessively small torsos, might indicate insufficient space for development of a fetus," he suggests.