What about the academic argument that men are primed much more than women to highly value beauty in romantic partners in an evolutionary quest for health, fertility and preservation of the gene pool? The new Northwestern research poses at least as many questions as it answers about the differences between the sexes. Is it possible after all that, when it comes to romantic attraction, men aren't from Mars and women aren't from Venus? The new study suggests that both sexes have similar romantic responses to each other right here on planet Earth.
"Sex Differences in Mate Preferences Revisited: Do People Know What They Initially Desire in a Romantic Partner?" was published in the February issue of the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. Northwestern University (2008, February 14).
"What Men And Women Say And Do In Choosing Romantic Partners Are Two Different Matters". ScienceDaily. Retrieved from http://www.sciencedaily.com; /releases/2008/02/080213133337.htm
Like Attracts Like?
Physical attractiveness is important in choosing whom to date. Good looking people are not only popular targets for romantic pursuits, they themselves also tend to flock together with more attractive others.
All of this causes one question to come to mind. Do more attractive versus less attractive people wear a different pair of lens when evaluating others’ attractiveness?
Columbia University marketing professor, Leonard Lee, and colleagues, George Loewenstein (Carnegie Mellon University), Dan Ariely (MIT) and James Hong and Jim Young (HOTorNOT.com), decided to test this theory in the realm of an online dating site. The site HOTorNOT.com allows members to rate others on their level of physical attractiveness.
Lee and colleagues analyzed two data sets from HOTorNOT.com -- one containing members’ dating requests, and the other containing the attractiveness ratings of other members. Both data sets also included ratings of members’ own attractiveness as rated by other members.
The results, which will be published in an upcoming issue of Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science, are revealing. Consistent with previous research, people with similar levels of physical attractiveness indeed tend to date each other, with more attractive people being more particular about the physical attractiveness of their potential dates.
Furthermore, people prefer to date others who are moderately more attractive than them.
Compared to females, males are more influenced by how physically attractive their potential dates are, but less affected by how attractive they themselves are, when deciding whom to date.
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