Chapter 3- Attraction

Similarity: Liking Those Who Are Like Us

"Birds of a feather flock together" We tend to like those who share the same: - Age, race, sex, education, religion, and social class - Attitudes and values - Personalities- if we're nice, dependable, dramatic, etc.- dramatic people will like other dramatic people - Race becomes important when one is thinking about marriage because they want kids to have same race as they do - *Key: the link between similarity and attraction is stronger for attitudes than for personalities. Those who share more similar attitudes the greater they will get along. - If we have opposing views, beliefs, attitudes, then we will bump heads with that person - Therefore, opposites do not attract.

Physical Attractiveness: Liking Those Who Are Lovely, Our Bias for Beauty

"What is beautiful is good" - We tend to automatically assume that those who are physically attractive also have other desirable traits such as agreeableness, extraversion and conscientiousness - They must be friendly, smart and lovely just because they are attractive - Those who are more attractive go further in the workplace, have the best first impressions - A beautiful face triggers a positive evaluation the instant we see it - Physically attractive people found to have the following characteristics: kind, strong, nurturing, outgoing, sensitive, interesting, poised, sociable, exciting date, good character. Also: more prestige, happier marriages, more fulfilling lives, et - Physically attractive people make more money and often promoted more than those who are average looking. On average, good-looking folks earn 230,000$ more during lifetimes than less lovely people do

Probability of Others Acceptance- Mate Value

- ** Our expectations regarding the probability of others acceptance are influenced by our mate value. - Mate value- our overall attractiveness as reproductive partners. Based on things like beauty, wealth, intelligence - Those with a higher mate value are more sought over by others and as a result, look for highly sought over individuals as well. These people don't just settle, they think they can deserve a lot so they are picky - People with a lower mate value are opened and more accepting to a variety of people - Playing hard to get does not work. What works is playing SELECTIVELY hard to get- that is, being a difficult catch for everyone BUT not the person you are trying to attract.

One Way Opposites May Attract: Complementary

- *We like responses from others that help us reach our goals, and partners occasionally "fit together" better when they behave differently - But most complementary behaviour is similar behaviour, with partners desiring the same goals and working together to attain them. People who are warm and agreeable are happiest when met with warmth and good humour in return - Ex: partners have the same goals like they both like to travel but one partner enjoys planning the vacation more then the other. Planning complements the relationship. ---> Add this all up and opposites may sometimes seem to attract, but birds of a feather are more likely to flock together. Similarity is usually rewarding; opposition is not

Dissimilarities May Decrease Overtime

- Couples who used to be very opposite, overtime become more similar - Shared experiences and a quest for compatibility can make partners more similar as time goes by - Opposites don't attract, but some opposites may gradually fade if a couple stays together for some other reason

Perceived Similarity Matters

- How much we think we have in common matters? - Perceived similarity is our perception of how much we have in common matters more than our actual similarity.... and partners routinely think they have more in common than they actually do. (MISATTRIBUTION) - Misattribution= thinking our partner will like something because we do but in reality they don't.

Matching in Physical Attractiveness

- Matching= people tend to pair off with others of similar levels of physical attractiveness - The more serious and committed a relationship is, the more obvious matching usually is. - In general, people seem to match their attractiveness with their partners

Familiarity: Repeated Contact

- Mere exposure, or repeated contact with someone usually increases or liking for him or her and value things of that person - Familiarity does not breed contempt/worthlessness - Even if we have never talked to this individual before, we tend to like faces we recognize more than faces that are unfamiliar Example of friendship choices in Campus housing due to how many doors away they lived, findings: - 1 door away- 41% said they were their closest companion - 2 doors away- 22% - 3 doors away- 16% - Another study, findings: the more familiar women were in the classroom, the more students were attracted to her.

Interactive Costs and Benefits of Beauty

- No correlation between a woman's beauty and how much time she spends interacting with men. Attractive women do get asked on more dates but plain women spend plenty of time interacting with men in group settings when others are around. - In contrast, mens looks are correlated with the amount of time he interacts with women. - Unattractive men spend less time interacting with women of any sort Costs of beauty: - Others lie to pretty people more often as they misrepresent themselves to sound more impressive so they can impress the attractive person - Gorgeous people are used to pleasant interactions with others but they tend not to trust others as much as less attractive people do. - If you're very attractive, you may never be sure whether people are complimenting you because they respect your abilities or because they like your looks

Some Types of Similarity Are More Important than Others

- Opposites may be innocuous/harmless if no one cares much about them - However, similarities in housework and gender roles do routinely matter. Couples with different perspectives on gender roles have a hard time overcoming this difference - Couples who are more alike and share household word equally tend to be content Sometimes people can seem like opposites (old-young), when really they are of similar mate value, just offering different assets - Men with status and money may pair off with young, beautiful women even when the men are not handsome. - An old and young couple are only opposite in the age dimension, but could be exactly the same or similar in all the other dimensions. - In terms of mate values they are not opposites. They bring to the table a different pile of assets. Old man brings money, young women brings beauty

Barriers: Liking Those We Can't Have

- Psychological reactance- states that when one loses freedom of choice, they strive to regain it. So we may want someone more if we are threatened with losing him/her. We want things more if we cannot have the, - Romeo and Juliet effect-the more parents interfere with their romance, the more the love teenagers feel for their partner

Preferences may be Evolutionary Based but Culture and Environment Counts!

- Standards of attractiveness are affected by changing economic and cultural conditions - During hard times when the food supply is low, women who are slender/thinner are perceived as less desirable than those who are heavier - Women that live in rural areas are more attracted to men with androgynous facial features than women in urban areas do. - Culture matters- some people prefer long necks, large bottoms - Black and Latina women in the U.S are more accepting of some extra weight than white women are

An Evolutionary Perspective on Physical Attractiveness

- Standards of who is and who is not attractive are much the same around the world - Babies are born with preferences for the same faces that we find attractive as adults- babies tend to focus more on attractive faces - People with symmetrical, attractive faces tend to enjoy good physical and mental health. - People with attractive waist-to-hip ratios tend to enjoy good physical health - Good looks matter more to people that live near the equator, where there are more (diseases) parasites and pathogens that can endanger one's health and one's beauty. At the equator, good looks matter even more than countries farther from the equator. (Looks matter because those who are attractive are healthier therefore the more attractive you are, the less you'll be affected by the parasites and pathogens at the equator) - Women's behavior and the way they dress are more promiscuous and they dress sexier when they are fertile

Stimulus- Value- Role Theory

- Stimulus (looks, age)- most important when you first meet the person. This draws you in - Value (similarities)- becomes important mid relationship when attraction depends on similarities in attitudes and beliefs as learn whether we like the same kinds of pizza, movies, etc. - Role (compatibility)- only later on does this become important when we come figure out if we want the same things in life, agree on basic parenting, roles in the house, etc. - This theory suggests that there are three different types of information about new partners that gradually unfold overtime... and dissimilarities can become apparent long after a relationship has begun.

Balance Theory

- Suggests people desire consistency amongst their feelings, thoughts and social relationships. When two people like each other their feelings fit together well and can be said to be "balanced" (people like when their feelings are balanced/the same as the other persons). - We prefer balance among our relationships. For that reason, we tend to like someone when we learn that he or she shares our dislikes for someone else.

Opposites DO NOT Attract

- There are several subtleties in the way similarity operates that may mislead people into thinking that opposites do sometimes attract - When people look for marriage partners the look for similarities - When they look for dating partners they could be more opened to opposites

Who's Pretty? Is beauty in the eyes of the beholder?

- There is much more agreement than disagreement from culture to culture and group to group about what faces and features are physically attractive - Babies spend more time gazing at attractive than unattractive faces Preferences: - Lesbians prefer more "masculinized"/androgynous faces- strong jaws, broad foreheads. Women who live in rural areas prefer more masculine faces as well. - Beautiful/heterosexual women attracted to those baby-faced features such as large eyes, small nose, full lips combined with signs of maturity such as prominent cheekbones, narrow cheekbones and a broad smile - HOWEVER, when women are fertile, they are more attracted to androgynous/masculinized faces BUT the rest of the month they prefer warmer, more youthful features (baby-faced w. signs of maturity).

Discoverring Dissimilarities

- This may take time to realize that your perceived similarity is false, you actually don't have that much in common than you thought you did - Fatal attraction- something that you used to like about your partner can gradually become one of the most obnoxious, irritating things we dislike about our partner

You May Be The Person I Want To Become

- We tend to like others that are similar to our IDEAL selves, that is, who have desirable qualities that we want but do not yet have - We may sometimes desire a partner that is someone who we would like to become rather than someone who is very similar to us now. - Not really a situation of opposites attract. Ex: having a partner that's out going and you're shy so you value that attribute in your partner.

Proximity: Liking Those Near Us

- We tend to like those who work and live close to us - Small distances has a large influence on our relationships, larger than most people think - We have to be able to notice the person Example with student housing: - Friendship amongst students who lived in student housing was examined, findings: people were more likely to know and like residents of other buildings that were close to their own. People who lived close to each other much more likely to become friends than those whose rooms were further apart

Looks Matter

- When people first meet, nothing else affects attraction as much as their looks do... ...and this effect is obvious in speed-dating studies- people evaluate each other on their looks, especially during speed dating. - Looks is the first thing that draws people in - Men attracted to women that are slender, young and physically attractive - Women attractive to men that are tall, young and physically attractive

The Fundamental Basis of Attraction

A basic assumption, we like those who reward us: - Those who provide us direct rewards. Ex: making us laugh, doing nice things for us. - Those who provide us indirect rewards. Ex: being a good parent, (things not directly done to us but that makes us happy) such as hearing their name, etc. - The more direct rewards people provide us with, the more attracted we are - People are disproportionately likely to fall in love with someone who has name that resembles our own - We're often attracted to others who offer advantages that can benefit our offspring, even if having a baby is not even a thought in ones mind - Attraction depends on our individual needs, desires, preferences and the situation in which we find ourselves in.

So, What Do Women and Men Want??

Around the world, everybody prefers partners who offer: - Warmth and loyalty- being trustworthy, kind, supportive, understanding - Attractiveness and vitality- good-looking, out going - Status and resources- people like people who offer a good status and resources - These traits depend on if one is finding a partner for short term vs. long term. Both men and women are less selective when looking for a short-term, one time fling partner. For long-term partners: - Men want women who are moderately attractive, but they want all the warmth, honesty, humour, and intelligence they can get. - Women want men have moderate status and resources, but they also want all the warmth, honesty, humour and intelligence they can get - In North America overtime, women's expectations for looks and mens expectations for resources have increased - Women recognize that attractive, dominant, good-looking men who might make compelling lovers, often make unreliable long-term partners. Women attach more importance to warmth and loyalty than to good-looks - Men attend more to looks and women attend more to resources, but all in all, everyone wants a partner that is agreeable, loving and kind, and that is a fact.

Who's Pretty?

Attractive faces in both sexes are also: - Average, possessing dimensions that are neither very large or very small but average size. - Symmetrical, with the two sides of the face being very similar to each other- symmetrical faces are said to be "healthier", they don't experience as many diseases or any diseases like those who are asymmetrical - A waist-to-hip ratio of .7 seems to be attractive for women (curvy where the waist is 30% smaller than the hips) - A waist-to-hip ratio of .9 attractive for men (broader shoulders and muscles) - BUT at the group level, a man is not all that attractive to women if he is handsome but not successful. - The slimmer a woman's waist is, the more often she and her man have sex and the better his erectile is - Marriages more satisfying to both spouses when the wife is thinner than the husband. BUT, those wives that are too thin are not more attractive than those of normal weight - Taller men get more attention. Shorter men have to make at least 220,000$ a year to seem interesting to women - Symmetrical attractive people smell better than asymmetrical people - Women more attracted to men with longer hair.

Reciprocity: Liking Those Who Like Us

Most of us pursue partners that are most likely to return our interest Desirability= Physical attractiveness X Probability of accepting us - Desirability- how desirable one is, a potential desirable partner - Physical attractiveness- my physical attractiveness vs. their physical attractiveness - Probability of accepting us- if we are more attractive than them then they are more likely to accept us but if we are less attractive, there is less of a probability they will like us - *The most appealing potential partner is someone who is moderately active and seems to offer a reasonably good chance of accepting us.

Convenience: Proximity is Rewarding and Distance is Costly

Partners who are close at hand are usually able to provide us more benefits, at lesser expense, than distant partners can - harder to have rewards dating people that don't live in the same city as you - More rewards because it's easier to be around those near us - A separation can destroy a relationship, particularly if partners start dating other people who are close at hand - When soldiers return back home to visit, they often lose some of their autonomy and have to relearn how to comfortably depend on one another- distance is costly.

The Power of Proximity- Limits

Proximity and the familiarity that results can cause complications and make things worst when: 1) We live near disagreeable, obnoxious people 2) We meet someone on an online dating site then come face-to-face for the first time and its disappointing, proximity decreases attraction. 3) Long distance couples reunite after a period of time and it makes it hard coming back together as people have changed. - As we gain information about people we may find they are obnoxious, disagreeable, or inept and increased exposure to such people may lead us to like them less, not more. - Findings on residences: although most of their friends lived nearby, their enemies did too! - When people who have met online get together in person for the first time, they are mildly disappointed; the knowledge they have about each other goes up, but their perceived similarity to, and liking for each other goes down. When we find out who our online partners actually are opposed to who we thought they were- our attraction to them often declines.