How Attractiveness Indicators Affect Our Mating Strategy
Mate preference is a term to explain strategies that both sexes embrace to choose their partners. It is known that mate preference may depend on many factors such as economic resources, high social status, good financial prospects, dependability and stability, preference for similarity, willingness to invest children, etc.
Evolutionary factors are used to explain mate preferences even today, and investigating them enables us to understand mating strategies in a better way. Sex is also investigated as it can be extremely influential in mating strategies because factors and strategies that individuals embrace highly depend on gender.
In this paper, I hope to discuss how physical attractiveness, measured by evolutionary factors, affects an individual’s mating strategies; and how different sexes embrace different mating strategies in terms of physical attractiveness. For this purpose, the preference of youth and waist to hip ratio will be investigated for men’s mating preferences whereas height, symmetry, and masculinity will be discussed for women’s sexual mating.
Height
Women’s mating preferences demonstrate that height, symmetry, and masculinity are significant indicators of mating. According to Beigel, body height is a significant component of attraction and attachment. He states that taller women are not attracted to a shorter man- this is kind of a rule of society. Thus, to test the importance of height, he created a survey that asked participants’ ideal qualities of a mate that they were looking for. Although he did not put any reference to height and participants were free to write what they wanted, 59% of the participants referred to height by indicating that males should be taller; and this difference was ranging between a minimum of 3 inches and a maximum of 7.5 inches. Another study by Samson et al. investigated the relationship between physical performance measures, age, height, and body weight and revealed that the reason behind attraction to height might be related to using height as an indicator of good health since height and weight affect muscle strength as well as health. This finding demonstrates that women are possibly attracted to taller men because height is a symbol of good health; so, it increases the chances for offsprings with healthy genes and a higher rate of survival.
Symmetry and masculinity
Symmetry and masculinity are other factors that influence women’s mating preferences. It is not surprising that facial attractiveness is an important component of overall attractiveness for women. Moreover, a symmetric body that a man has is an indicator of physical attractiveness as well as sexual good mating. According to research, men who have more symmetrical body features tend to attract women more in a sexual way than men who do not have symmetrical body features. Furthermore, research showed that men who have more symmetrical features are more likely to have more offsprings and less fatal diseases in Mayans in Belize. Yet another study found that British men who have higher asymmetric features had sperms that were less fertile.
All this promising research inspired Scheib et al. to conduct a study that examined women’s mate preferences by looking at the facial attractiveness and physical symmetry of men. In this study, participants were asked to rate the attractiveness of male images to understand whether symmetry is an important factor in mate preference. Also, participants rated each image without symmetrical cues by showing half of the face. As a final step, researchers identified a cue that might possibly affect attractiveness -which was masculinity- and it was measured by prominent cheekbones and longer lower face since cheekbones are an indicator of masculinity. Results showed that facial attractiveness is positively correlated to facial symmetry. Moreover, half-face attractiveness was also positively correlated with facial symmetry- which shows that symmetry is a significant factor that is related to facial attractiveness. Finally, an interesting finding was that masculinity was not only highly related to attractiveness but it was also positively correlated to facial symmetry.
To conclude, symmetry and masculinity attract women since they are sign of good health/healthy genes- which increases the chances of survival for the offspring.
Youth and waist to hip ratio
Different form women, men’s mate preference in terms of attractiveness depends on youth and waist to hip ratio. When we investigate mating strategies, age is an important factor that affects attraction. Many studies revealed that men prefer youth in females due to their reproductive advantages since females’ fertility highly depends on age. However, the key point for youth that attracts men most is reaching maturity. Men seem to prefer young women who have reached maturity. Yet, Symons found in his study that the most attractive age of women according to men should be around 23–28 ± 2.
This study was contradicting with the previous literature since maturity is usually gained at younger ages; ages that were obtained by Symons, 23–28 ± 2, were expected to be lower according to other studies. In order to test this ambiguity, many studies worked on this issue and it was found that males and females differ in age preferences. Females mostly prefer males who are relatively older than themselves- which means achieved status or resources are the priority of females. Males, on the other hand, prefer younger women regardless of their age which shows that the key point for men is the fertility of women- just like evolutionary sources suggested. Yet, there are some data that contradict the hypothesis that men prefer youth and fertile women. In this data older men prefer women that are no longer fertile instead of younger women. The reason behind this ambiguous choice might be that women that are no longer fertile look younger today compared to our ancestors which may cause men to prefer them. Also, as it was stated earlier, women prefer men slightly older than their age- so, those who are much older would not be picked as a partner which might lead these men to prefer women who have passed the age of fertility.
In short, the reason behind men’s attraction to younger women is female fertility because a fertile woman means more offsprings and higher chances of survival.
Lower waist to hip ratio
Another significant component that men are looking for in a woman is a lower waist to hip ratio since it influences physical attractiveness immensely. Singh’s study revealed that body fat distribution, which is measured by the waist to hip ratio, is a sign of female attractiveness and reproductive success. Moreover, it was found that waist to hip ratio is not only important because it is an indicator of reproductive success but also an indicator of youth, lack of long-term health risks, and sexual maturity.
According to Henss, males’ and females’ waist to hip ratio lies around similar numbers before puberty. However, after puberty, females’ waist to hip ratio starts to lower significantly such that it lies between 0.67 to 0.80 whereas a healthy man’s waist to hip ratio lies between 0.85 to 0.95. Therefore, attraction to lower waist to hip ratio is meaningful since a man can understand the female is sexually mature, fertile, and has less long-term health risks. This is explained by an evolutionary perspective because all of these factors are indicators of better chances for the offsprings’ survival.
Conclusion
In conclusion, physical attractiveness indicators highly depend on sex. Men are attracted to youth and waist to hip ratio whereas women are attracted to height, symmetry, and masculinity. When we investigate the evolutionary roots of these indicators, we see that height attracts women since it implies muscle strength as well as healthy genes. Moreover, symmetry and masculinity are positively correlated with attractiveness as they are also a symbol of healthy genes. On the other hand, preference for youth implies that men prefer fertile women which increases the number of offsprings. A lower waist to hip ratio preference by men again implies the preference for fertile women with less long-term health risks and better genes. Healthy genes increase the quality of offsprings whereas the fertility of women increases the quantity of offsprings. Overall, all of these factors increase the chances of survival of the offsprings.
By Enise Akay
