system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
How does the body decide where to store fat?

In general, females seem to store fat around the hips and thighs, males around the gut.  Why?  How does the body decide where to store fat?
gpt
Beyond the generalized sex differences, there are a number of hormones that affect where and how we store fat - for ex. estrogen encourages the more 'classically feminine' fat storage patterns (hips and thighs) whereas stuff like cortisol and insulin production lead more to belly fat. As the latter two, cortisol in particular, are highly stress-dependent, people may even notice different fat storage patterns at different stages of life, depending on things like diet and levels of stress or of sex hormones.