A new research has scored sunny and smiling men low when it comes to segxwal attraction, writes ABIMBOLA ADELAKUN.
Are you the kind of man that is very sunny, upbeat and ever smiling? This might be a good time to reconsider such an overly positive disposition as a new study has suggested it can reduce your segxwal allure.
According to the study titled, Happy Guys Finish Last: The Impact of Emotion Expressions on segxwal Attraction, carried out by the University of British Columbia, women find happy guys significantly less segxwally attractive than swaggering or brooding men. The study helps to reinforce and explain the enduring allure of “bad boys” and other iconic gender types. In essence, when it comes to getting dates, good and happy men would be finishing last while broody men would be ahead of the pack.
The UBC study – believed to have potential to make men to smile less on dates, and inspire online daters to update their profile photos – finds dramatic gender differences in how men and women rank the segxwal attractiveness of non-verbal expressions of commonly displayed emotions, including happiness, pride, and shame.
According to the study, very few studies have previously explored the relationship between emotions and attraction, and this is the first to report a significant gender difference in the attractiveness of smiles. Published online in the American Psychological Association journal, Emotion, it is also the first to investigate the attractiveness of displays of pride and shame.
“While showing a happy face is considered essential to friendly social interactions, including those involving segxwal attraction, few studies have actually examined whether a smile is, in fact, attractive,” says Prof. Jessica Tracy of UBC’s Dept. of Psychology. “This study finds that men and women respond very differently to displays of emotion, including smiles.”
In a series of studies carried out, more than 1,000 adult participants rated the segxwal attractiveness of hundreds of images of the opposite sex engaged in universal displays of happiness (broad smiles), pride (raised heads, puffed-up chests) and shame (lowered heads, averted eyes).
The study found that women were least attracted to smiling, happy men, preferring those who looked proud and powerful or moody and ashamed. In contrast, male participants were most segxwally attracted to women who looked happy, and least attracted to women who appeared proud and confident.
“It is important to remember that this study explored first-impressions of segxwal attraction to images of the opposite sex,” says Alec Beall, a UBC psychology graduate student and study co-author. “We were not asking participants if they thought these targets would make a good boyfriend or wife – we wanted their gut reactions on carnal, segxwal attraction.” He says previous studies have found positive emotional traits and a nice personality to be highly desirable in a relationship partners.
Tracy and Beall say other studies suggest that what people find attractive has been shaped by centuries of evolutionary and cultural forces. For example, evolutionary theories suggest females are attracted to male displays of pride because they imply status, competence and an ability to provide for a partner and offspring.
According to Beall, the pride expression accentuates typically masculine physical features, such as upper body size and muscularity. “Previous research has shown that these features are among the most attractive male physical characteristics, as judged by women,” he says.
The researchers say more work is needed to understand the differing responses to happiness, but suggest the phenomenon can also be understood according to principles of evolutionary psychology, as well as socio-cultural gender norms.
For example, past research has associated smiling with a lack of dominance, which is consistent with traditional gender norms of the “submissive and vulnerable” woman, but inconsistent with “strong, silent” man. “Previous research has also suggested that happiness is a particularly feminine-appearing expression,” Beall adds.
“Generally, the results appear to reflect some very traditional gender norms and cultural values that have emerged, developed and been reinforced through history, at least in Western cultures.” “These include norms and values that many would consider old-fashioned and perhaps hoped that we’ve moved beyond.”
Displays of shame, Tracy adds, have been associated with an awareness of social norms and appeasement behaviors, which elicits trust in others. This may explain shame’s surprising attractiveness to both genders, she says, given that both men and women prefer a partner they can trust.
While this study focused on segxwal attraction between heterosegxwal men and women in North America, the researchers say future studies will be required to explore the relationship between emotions and segxwal attractiveness among homosegxwals and non-Western cultures. Overall, they found that men ranked women more attractive than women ranked men.
In a similar research carried out at Rice University, the University of Texas-San Antonio and the University of Minnesota, the results indicate that men’s conspicuous spending is driven by the desire to have uncommitted romantic flings. The good thing is that women can see right through the man’s schemes.
Just as peacocks flaunt their tails before potential mates, men may flaunt flashy products to charm potential dates. Notably, not all men favoured this strategy - just those men who were interested in short-term segxwal relationships with women do.
The series of studies, Peacocks, Porsches and Thorstein Veblen: Conspicuous Consumption as a segxwal Signaling System, was conducted with nearly 1,000 test subjects and published recently in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology.
“This research suggests that conspicuous products, such as Porsches, can serve the same function for some men that large and brilliant feathers serve for peacocks,” says Jill Sundie, assistant professor of marketing at UTSA and lead author of the paper.
“The studies show that some men are like peacocks. They’re the ones driving the bright coloured sports car,” says co-author Vladas Griskevicius, assistant professor of marketing at the University of Minnesota.
According to the researchers, women found a man who chose to purchase a flashy luxury product (such as a Porsche) more desirable than the same man who purchased a non-luxury item (such as a Honda Civic). However, there was a catch: Although women found the flashy guys more desirable for a date, the man with the Porsche was not preferred as a marriage partner. Women inferred from a man’s flashy spending that he was interested in uncommitted sex.
“When women considered him for a long-term relationship, owning the sports car held no advantage relative to owning an economy car,” notes co-author Daniel Beal, assistant professor of psychology at Rice. “People may feel that owning flashy things makes them more attractive as a relationship partner, but in truth, many men might be sending women the wrong message.”
Though often associated with Western culture, extreme forms of conspicuous displays have been found in cultures across the globe and throughout history. While finding that men may use conspicuous consumption as a short-term mating signal, the researchers discovered that women don’t behave in the same manner and don’t conspicuously spend to attract men.
“Obviously, women also spend plenty of money on expensive things,” Sundie says. “But the anticipation of romance doesn’t trigger flashy spending as it does with some men.”
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