We finally know why men don't live as long as women, say scientists

Males that spend less energy on sex and more on raising their children tend to live longer

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A group of researchers at Germany’s Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology has been trying to find out why men tend to live shorter lives than women.

Their study, published in Science Advances, examined over 1,000 animals to track down common evolutionary traits in species where one sex tends to outlast another.

They discovered that although genetics does seem to play a part, monogamy and child-rearing also affect lifespans.

In humans, women live an average of 5.4 years longer than men, but we're not the only species where that happens. In fact, in 72 per cent of mammals, females outlast their male counterparts by an average of 12 per cent.