Strategic Sexual Signals: Women's Display versus Avoidance of the Color Red Depends on the Attractiveness of an Anticipated Interaction Partner

Do women strategically display the color red when anticipating an interaction with an attractive man? And do they actually avoid wearing red when anticipating an interaction with a relatively unattractive man? Results from the current study suggest that the answer to both questions is: yes. Consistent with prior research on the link between red and sexuality, our findings indicate that women’s use of red clothing, accessories, and/or make-up can indeed serve as a subtle and strategic indicator of sexual interest. A higher percentage of female participants displayed red when they expected to interact with an attractive (vs. an unattractive) male experimenter. Moreover, the percentage of participants wearing red in the attractive condition was higher than in a naturalistic baseline condition, and–notably–the percentage of women wearing red in the unattractiveness condition was lower than in the naturalistic baseline...

From an evolutionary perspective, the quality of a romantic partner is especially important for women, because women’s potential to produce offspring is more limited than men’s, and because women’s level of initial obligatory parental investment is higher than it is for men (see [35]). Accordingly, women should be particularly thoughtful about finding a partner with high mate value and also careful to avoid a partner with low mate value. Thus, catching the attention of unattractive men might be maladaptive, consistent with theories emphasizing the importance of avoiding unattractive mates for women [33,34]. Indeed, several evolutionary theories suggest that above and beyond seeking attractive mates, people (and women in particular) are motivated to avoid interacting with or mating with unattractive individuals (e.g., [36,37]. Taken together, women who display mating signals to physically unattractive men might risk lowering their reproductive success. Thus, our results are consistent with the idea that the use of red in clothing, accessories, and/or make-up reflects an adaptive strategy to enhance one’s chances to attract (vs. avoid) a partner with high (vs. low) mate value.

Given that clothing choices are an essential part of people’s daily life, it is interesting to consider the implications of apparel decisions more broadly (see [38]). In general, women might avoid red in situations in which their aim is to blend in rather than to stand out or in situations in which they wish to avoid unwanted mating attention. These results might not only have relevance for designers and clients of online dating services who are interested in an “optimal” appearance, but also for people working in marketing and in the field of communication (i.e. for using the color red to persuade people to buy certain products or for conveying specific messages, such as in political or societal contexts). In addition, it is possible that the use and avoidance of the color red might have implications in clinical contexts: In particular, women who are socially anxious or high in introversion might be cautious in their use of red. The use of red could also have implications for workplace interactions, as the color red could signal (potentially inappropriate) levels of attraction toward opposite-sex coworkers. The degree to which the present results and these broader implications also apply to men (i.e., whether they also strategically use the color red in mating contexts; for instance, to signal attractiveness, status or dominance) is an open question worthy of subsequent research (see [39,8].

Full article at:   http://goo.gl/Z2ghRo

By:  Daniela Niesta Kayser,#1,* Maria Agthe,#2 and Jon K. Maner3

¹Department of Psychology, University ofPotsdam, Potsdam, Germany

²Department of Psychology, Ludwig-Maximilians-University of Munich, Munich, Germany

³Department of Management and Organizations, Kellogg School of Management, Northwestern University, Evanston, IL, United States of America

More at:  https://twitter.com/hiv insight

And: http://twitter.com/Prison Health

'Everyone Wants a Vagina That Looks Less Like a Vagina': Australian Women's Views on Dissatisfaction with Genital Appearance

We present a thematic discourse analysis of 94 Australian women's written comments about women's presumed dissatisfaction with their genital appearance. 

Two themes emerged: 'from natural to normal' and 'the difficulty of resistance'. In the first theme, participants discuss genital dissatisfaction with reference to hegemonic constructions of femininity and to postfeminist, neoliberal discourses that position the natural female body as inadequate, with beauty practices necessary to achieve acceptability. 

The second theme addresses the difficulty of challenging this positioning, referencing discourses that position the vagina as unpleasant and discussion of it as taboo. 

We consider implications of these constructions for women's well-being.

Purchase full article at:   http://goo.gl/YF68Xg

By:   Moran C1, Lee C2.

• 1The University of Queensland, Australia.
• 2The University of Queensland, Australia c.lee@psy.uq.edu.au.
• J Health Psychol. 2016 Mar 23. pii: 1359105316637588. 

More at:  https://twitter.com/hiv insight

And: http://twitter.com/Prison Health

Mapping Female Bodily Features of Attractiveness

“Beauty is bought by judgment of the eye” (Shakespeare, Love’s Labour’s Lost), but the bodily features governing this critical biological choice are still debated. Eye movement studies have demonstrated that males sample coarse body regions expanding from the face, the breasts and the midriff, while making female attractiveness judgements with natural vision. However, the visual system ubiquitously extracts diagnostic extra-foveal information in natural conditions, thus the visual information actually used by men is still unknown. 

We thus used a parametric gaze-contingent design while males rated attractiveness of female front- and back-view bodies. Males used extra-foveal information when available. Critically, when bodily features were only visible through restricted apertures, fixations strongly shifted to the hips, to potentially extract hip-width and curvature, then the breast and face. 

Our hierarchical mapping suggests that the visual system primary uses hip information to compute the waist-to-hip ratio and the body mass index, the crucial factors in determining sexual attractiveness and mate selection.

Below:  Left panel: difference fixation maps performed on the Linear Mixed-Model (LMM, Eq. 2) between the front view 2° spotlight and natural viewing conditions.

Full article at:   http://goo.gl/rYtD6Q

By:  Jeanne Bovet,a,1,3 Junpeng Lao,2 Océane Bartholomée,3 Roberto Caldara,2,* and Michel Raymond3,*

¹Institute for Advanced Study in Toulouse, Manufacture des Tabacs, 21 allée de Brienne, 31015 Toulouse Cedex 6, France

²Department of Psychology, University of Fribourg, Switzerland

³Institute of Evolutionary Sciences, University of Montpellier, CNRS, IRD, EPHE, France

^aEmail: rf.tsai@tevob.ennaej

Sci Rep. 2016; 6: 18551. Published online 2016 Jan 21. doi:  10.1038/srep18551

More at:  https://twitter.com/hiv insight

And: http://twitter.com/Prison Health

Beauty and the Eye of the Beholder: Gender and Attractiveness Affect Judgments in Teacher Sex Offense Cases

The present study investigated the effects of gender and attractiveness on judgments of bail requirements, incarceration, and sex offender registration lengths, and attitudes toward offenders and victims in a teacher-student sexual perpetration scenario. 

Researchers presented 432 undergraduate students at a large southwestern university with one of four vignettes detailing a sexual relationship between a 35-year-old teacher and a 14-year-old student. Vignettes varied by both attractiveness and gender of the offender (using heterosexual offender-victim dyads). 

Results indicate that both gender and attractiveness affect judgments of sex offenders; specifically, female sexual offenders were viewed more leniently and judged less punitively than male sexual offenders. Although attractive female sexual offenders were given particularly lenient treatment, attractiveness did not affect judgments toward male sex offenders. In addition, although male and female participants tended to rate male offenders similarly, male participants were more lenient toward female offenders than were female participants. 

Finally, post hoc analyses revealed that, for many variables, unattractive female sexual offenders may not be viewed differently from male sexual offenders. These results have serious implications for the legal system, sex offender management, and societal views regarding male and female sexual offenders and their victims.

Purchase full article at:   http://goo.gl/aw6bT4

By:  Mackelprang E1, Becker JV2.

• 1University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ, USA emimack@email.arizona.edu.
• 2University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ, USA. 

More at:  https://twitter.com/hiv insight

And: http://twitter.com/Prison Health

More about word cloud at:  https://goo.gl/Oal4Pp

Women's Hairstyle & Men's Behavior: A Field Experiment

Little research has examined the effect of women's hairstyles on people's behavior. In a field study, male and female passersby, walking alone in the street, were observed while walking behind a female-confederate who dropped a glove and apparently was unaware of her loss. The confederate had long dark hair arranged in three different hairstyles: one with her hair falling naturally on her shoulders and her back, one with her hair tied in a ponytail, and one with her hair twisted in a bun. Results reported that the hairstyle had no effect on female passersby's helping behavior. However, it was found that the hairstyle influenced male passersby with men helping the confederate more readily when her hair fell naturally on her neck, shoulders and upper back.

Although hairstyles or hair characteristics are a common striking and obvious feature of appearance, psychological research focusing on women's hair has received little attention (Hinsz, Matz & Patience, 2001). Most of the research conducted on women's hair has examined hair color. Several studies reported that men but not women helped a woman with blond hair more favorably (Guéguen & Lamy, 2009; Lynn, 2009; Price, 2008) suggesting that hair color is an important factor for men when judging the attractiveness of a woman.

An additional feature of hair appearance studied by scientists is hair length. Several studies have reported that women's hair length influences how they are perceived by an observer. Using photographs of women targets with hair length varying across experimental conditions, Bereczkei and Mesko (2006) reported that males rated the woman target with long hair as more feminine, determined, intelligent, independent and healthy while the target with short hair was perceived to be more honest, caring and emotional. Terry and Krantz (1993) reported that long hair was associated with decreased social forcefulness. These results seem to contradict those reported by Bereczkei and Mesko (2006) but could be explained by cultural or period differences. More than 10 years separated the two studies and the experiment of Terry and Krantz (1993) was conducted in the United States while the experiment of Bereczkei and Mesko (2006) was conducted in Hungary. More recently, Swami, Furnham and Joshi (2008) using line drawings of female bodies reported that short hair targets were rated as significantly more fertile than long hair. The authors also reported an interaction effect between hair length and hair color: males but not females rated a blond target with short hair to be less healthy than a target with long hair, while the reverse effect was reported with a target with dark hair. With more realistic photos of women's faces, Mesko and Bereczkei (2004) reported that long hair was associated with higher ratings of femininity, youth, health and sexiness. These effects were found both with low or high attractive targets. Again this apparent contradiction between the findings could be explained by cultural factors (Mesko and Bereczkei, 2004 for Hungary and Swami et al., 2008 for the United Kingdom) or the targets used (Swami et al., 2008 for drawings of female bodies and Mesko and Bereczkei, 2004 for real photos of women's faces)...

  

Full article at:  http://goo.gl/yURTcr

By:  Guéguen N1.

• 1Université de Bretagne-Sud, Lorient, France. 

More at:  https://twitter.com/hiv_insight

And: http://twitter.com/Prison_Health

The Relationship of Female Physical Attractiveness to Body Fatness

Below:  Evolutionary model. (A) Epidemiological data linking all cause mortality to body fatness (BMI) for female subjects minus the mortality for the class with the lowest mortality (data from Whitlock et al., 2009 for Caucasians; (Zheng et al., 2011) for Asians and Cohen et al., 2012; Cohen et al., 2014 for African Americans). The curves are the fitted third order polynomials (see text for details) (B) probability of nulliparity over entire reproductive age annualized per 1,000 population (open symbols) and probability of not having a second child if one child has already been born annualized per 1,000 population (closed symbols) as a function of BMI at age 20. Data are subtracted from the class with the lowest probabilities (data from Jacobsen et al. (2013)). (C) Combined effects of infertility and all cause mortality in relation to BMI (effective mortality risk per 1,000 population) for each ethnic group. The minimum point of the curve is at BMI = 23.18 for Caucasians, 23.12 for Asians and 22.45 for African Americans (see text for derivation details). (D) Combined effects of infertility and all cause mortality (as in c) as well as the impact of fatness on famine survival on the relationship between mortality and Body mass index (effective mortality per 1,000 population). The minimum points of the curves are at BMI = 24.78 for Caucasians, 24.72 for Asians and 24.05 for African Americans (see text for derivation details).

Aspects of the female body may be attractive because they signal evolutionary fitness. Greater body fatness might reflect greater potential to survive famines, but individuals carrying larger fat stores may have poor health and lower fertility in non-famine conditions. A mathematical statistical model using epidemiological data linking fatness to fitness traits, predicted a peaked relationship between fatness and attractiveness (maximum at body mass index (BMI) = 22.8 to 24.8 depending on ethnicity and assumptions). Participants from three Caucasian populations (Austria, Lithuania and the UK), three Asian populations (China, Iran and Mauritius) and four African populations (Kenya, Morocco, Nigeria and Senegal) rated attractiveness of a series of female images varying in fatness (BMI) and waist to hip ratio (WHR). There was an inverse linear relationship between physical attractiveness and body fatness or BMI in all populations. Lower body fat was more attractive, down to at least BMI = 19. There was no peak in the relationship over the range we studied in any population. WHR was a significant independent but less important factor, which was more important (greater r2) in African populations. Predictions based on the fitness model were not supported. Raters appeared to use body fat percentage (BF%) and BMI as markers of age. The covariance of BF% and BMI with age indicates that the role of body fatness alone, as a marker of attractiveness, has been overestimated.

Read more at: http://ht.ly/RPJDR HT https://twitter.com/NCBI

More at:  https://twitter.com/hiv_insight