Bad Romance
Sexual overperception: Power, mating motives, and biases in social judgment
Jonathan Kunstman & Jon Maner
Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, forthcoming
Abstract:
Results from 4 experiments suggest that power motivates heightened perceptions and expectations of sexual interest from subordinates. Having power over a member of the opposite sex activated sexual concepts that persisted across a temporal delay, indicating the activation of a mating goal (Study 1). Having power increased participants' expectations of sexual interest from a subordinate (Study 2) but only when a mating goal was attainable (i.e., when the subordinate was romantically available; Study 3). In a face-to-face interaction between 2 participants, power heightened perceptions of sexual interest and sexualized behavior among participants with chronically active mating goals (i.e., sexually unrestricted individuals; Study 4). Tests of mediation demonstrated that sexual overperception mediated power's effect on sexually tinged behavior. Through its capacity to induce goal pursuit, power can activate mating goals that sexualize interactions between men and women. This research demonstrates one route through which power might lead to sexual harassment.
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"He Loves Me, He Loves Me Not...": Uncertainty Can Increase Romantic Attraction
Erin Whitchurch, Timothy Wilson & Daniel Gilbert
Psychological Science, forthcoming
Abstract:
This research qualifies a social psychological truism: that people like others who like them (the reciprocity principle). College women viewed the Facebook profiles of four male students who had previously seen their profiles. They were told that the men (a) liked them a lot, (b) liked them only an average amount, or (c) liked them either a lot or an average amount (uncertain condition). Comparison of the first two conditions yielded results consistent with the reciprocity principle. Participants were more attracted to men who liked them a lot than to men who liked them an average amount. Results for the uncertain condition, however, were consistent with research on the pleasures of uncertainty. Participants in the uncertain condition were most attracted to the men-even more attracted than were participants who were told that the men liked them a lot. Uncertain participants reported thinking about the men the most, and this increased their attraction toward the men.
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Christopher Watkins et al.
Evolution and Human Behavior, January 2011, Pages 70-75
Abstract:
Kin recognition is an essential component of kin-directed adaptive behavior. Consequently, potential mechanisms of kin recognition, such as learning a kin phenotype from family members (familial imprinting) or self (self-referential phenotype matching), have been the focus of much research. Studies using computer-manipulated self-resemblance show effects for both same-sex and opposite-sex faces and have been interpreted as evidence for self-referential phenotype matching. However, more recent research on sex-contingent face processing suggests that visual experience with faces of one sex has little influence on perceptions of faces of the other sex, calling into question how self-referential phenotype matching can influence perceptions of opposite-sex faces. Because children resemble their parents, familial imprinting could influence preferences for self-resemblance, reconciling these seemingly incompatible results for sex-contingent face processing and effects of self-resemblance on perceptions of opposite-sex faces. Here we show that women's reported emotional closeness to their father, but not mother, is positively correlated with their preferences for self-resemblance in opposite-sex, but not same-sex, individuals. These findings implicate familial imprinting in preferences for self-resemblance in opposite-sex individuals and raise the possibility that familial imprinting and self-referential phenotype matching have context-specific effects on attitudes to self-resembling individuals.
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Robert Brooks et al.
Proceedings of the Royal Society: Biological Sciences, forthcoming
"We show that income inequality, an important determinant of both national health status and male-male competition and violence is a better predictor of national preferences for masculine faces, and that, in comparison to national health status, homicide rate predicts more variation in masculinity preferences. These findings do not preclude the possibility that some of the observed pattern of findings may come about through the effects of income inequality on national health, but they are more consistent with an intrasexual-competition hypothesis, in which women prefer cues associated with dominant men in environments where male-male competitive aggression has more positive effects on male wealth and status."
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Worldwide Trends in the Criminal Regulation of Sex, 1945 to 2005
David John Frank, Bayliss Camp & Steven Boutcher
American Sociological Review, December 2010, Pages 867-893
Abstract:
Between 1945 and 2005, nation-states around the world revised their criminal laws on sexual activities. This global reform wave - across countries and domains of sexual activity - followed from the reconstitution of world models of society around individuals rather than corporate bodies. During the post-World War II period, this process rearranged the global cultural and organizational underpinnings of sex, eroding world-level support for criminal laws aimed at protecting collective entities - especially the family and the nation - and strengthening world support for laws aimed at protecting individualized persons. To make our case, we use unique cross-national and longitudinal data on the criminal regulation of rape, adultery, sodomy, and child sexual abuse. The data reveal striking counter-directional trends in sex-law reforms, which simultaneously elaborated regulations protecting individuals and dissolved laws protecting collective entities. World-level negative-binomial regression analyses and country-level event-history analyses confirm our main propositions. The findings demonstrate a sweeping revolution in criminal-sex laws, rooted in the intensified global celebration of free-standing personhood.
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Kerstin Cyrus, Sascha Schwarz & Manfred Hassebrauck
Evolution and Human Behavior, January 2011, Pages 13-20
Abstract:
According to error management theory (EMT) [Haselton M.G., & Buss D.M. (2000). Error management theory: a new perspective on biases in cross-sex mind reading. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 78, 81-91], evolved psychological mechanisms can lead to systematic cognitive errors whenever costs of false-positive and false-negative decisions have been asymmetrical over evolutionary history. In a courtship context, sex differences in reading commitment intent in a potential partner seem to be a result of these psychological mechanisms. EMT predicts a bias in women toward underperception of men's commitment intentions. Haselton and Buss found evidence for a commitment-skepticism bias in studies testing young women. These findings have not been replicated yet in the published literature. The present two studies compared postmenopausal women with fertile women in a German sample, extending EMT with a life-history perspective. According to the original commitment-skepticism hypothesis, women err on the side of underestimating prospective mates' commitment to avoid the high costs of pregnancy without support. We hypothesize that for postmenopausal women the costs of errors would be more equal or possibly reversed, such that these women face greater costs of missed opportunities with investing partners who could assist them in caring for extant offspring and grand offspring than from falsely assuming that a partner was committed. Therefore, we hypothesize that commitment-skepticism will not occur in postmenopausal women. Confirming our predictions, whereas we replicated the commitment-skepticism in the younger sample, postmenopausal women did not show a bias toward underinferring men's commitment intentions.
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Ash Levitt & Lynne Cooper
Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, December 2010, Pages 1706-1722
Abstract:
Whether beneficial or harmful, cause or effect, the nature of associations between drinking and close relationship processes remains unclear. The present study examined these issues by using daily reports of alcohol use and relationship functioning from 69 heterosexual couples over 3 weeks. Multilevel modeling indicated that alcohol had both positive and negative effects on relationship processes and that effects were more positive for women, and when small amounts were consumed, partners drank together, or they consumed similar amounts. Interestingly, however, positive effects on intimacy and partner behaviors were not mediated by sexual contact. In the reverse direction, women were found to drink more than men in response to relationship difficulties and feeling disconnected from their partner (i.e., low intimacy). Overall findings indicate that associations between drinking and relationship processes are complex and bidirectional and that they may be more important for women than men.
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For my eyes only: Gaze control, enmeshment, and relationship quality
Raluca Petrican et al.
Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, forthcoming
Abstract:
Perceived closeness that preserves the distinctness of each partner enhances intimate relationship quality, whereas pseudocloseness or enmeshment-reflecting an inability to distinguish one's own thoughts and emotions from a partner's-may have more negative outcomes (R. J. Green & P. D. Werner, 1996). Two studies investigated whether a dispositional inability to differentiate self from other is manifested at the attentional level as reduced capacity to inhibit following the gaze of another (A. Frischen, A. P. Bayliss, & S. P. Tipper, 2007). Among healthy elderly spouses in Study 1, superior gaze control predicted superior sociocognitive functioning, and those with poorer gaze control abilities were perceived by the partner as constricting the perceiving partner's autonomy, which in turn predicted lower relationship satisfaction among the latter. Moreover, these links were mediated by enmeshment, as indicated by the percentage of "we"-focused versus "I"- or partner-focused thoughts and emotions in the partners' independent accounts of the same relationship events. Extending these findings in a sample of Parkinson's disease patients and their spouses, Study 2 revealed a biphasic effect of self-other differentiation on relationship dynamics: In the early stages of the disease, increased couple focus promoted superior relationship quality, whereas lack of self-other differentiation predicted poorer relationship quality later. Thus, dispositional variations in fundamental social-perceptual processes predict both close relationship dynamics and long-term relationship quality.
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Positive Illusions About a Partner's Personality and Relationship Quality
Dick Barelds & Pieternel Dijkstr
Journal of Research in Personality, forthcoming
Abstract:
Previous studies have shown individuals to hold positive biases about their relationships. The present study examined positive illusions about a partner's specific personality characteristics in relation to relationship quality and personality. Both partners of 120 heterosexual couples participated in the present study, making it possible to examine both partner and actor effects. Results showed that although, in general, individuals did not hold positive illusions about a partner's specific personality characteristics, positive illusions were positively related to relationship quality. In addition, interesting relations emerged between positive illusions about a partner's personality and both individuals' personality and marital duration.
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Language Style Matching Predicts Relationship Initiation and Stability
Molly Ireland et al.
Psychological Science, forthcoming
Abstract:
Previous relationship research has largely ignored the importance of similarity in how people talk with one another. Using natural language samples, we investigated whether similarity in dyads' use of function words, called language style matching (LSM), predicts outcomes for romantic relationships. In Study 1, greater LSM in transcripts of 40 speed dates predicted increased likelihood of mutual romantic interest (odds ratio = 3.05). Overall, 33.3% of pairs with LSM above the median mutually desired future contact, compared with 9.1% of pairs with LSM at or below the median. In Study 2, LSM in 86 couples' instant messages positively predicted relationship stability at a 3-month follow-up (odds ratio = 1.95). Specifically, 76.7% of couples with LSM greater than the median were still dating at the follow-up, compared with 53.5% of couples with LSM at or below the median. LSM appears to reflect implicit interpersonal processes central to romantic relationships.
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Why do men seek status? Fitness payoffs to dominance and prestige
Christopher von Rueden, Michael Gurven & Hillard Kaplan
Proceedings of the Royal Society: Biological Sciences, forthcoming
Abstract:
In many human societies, high male social status associates with higher fertility, but the means by which status increases lifetime fitness have not been systematically investigated. We analyse the pathways by which male status begets reproductive success in a small-scale, Amerindian society. Men who are more likely to win a dyadic physical confrontation, i.e. dominant men, have higher intra-marital fertility for their age, and men with more community-wide influence, i.e. prestigious men, exhibit both higher intra-marital fertility and lower offspring mortality. Both forms of status elicit support from allies and deference from competitors, but high status men are not provisioned more than their peers. Prestigious but not dominant men marry wives who first give birth at earlier ages, which multivariate analysis suggests is the strongest pathway between status and fitness in this population. Furthermore, men are motivated to pursue status because of fitness gains both within and outside of marital unions: dominant and prestigious men have more in-pair surviving offspring as well as more extra-marital affairs.
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The effect of body weight on adolescent sexual activity
Joseph Sabia & Daniel Rees
Health Economics, forthcoming
Abstract:
Recent research suggests that overweight females suffer penalties in the labor and marriage markets, while overweight males do not. This study explores whether similar gender differences in the effect of body weight exist in what Cawley et al. (2006) labeled ‘the adolescent sex market'. Drawing on data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health, we use fixed effects and instrumental variables identification strategies to estimate the relationship between body weight and sexual activity. We find evidence that increased body weight lowers the probability that female adolescents become sexually active. In contrast, there is little evidence of a causal relationship between body weight and sexual activity for male adolescents.
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Yen-hsin Alice Cheng & Nancy Landale
Perspectives on Sexual and Reproductive Health, forthcoming
Context: Being overweight influences adolescents' relationships by increasing their likelihood of experiencing social alienation and discrimination. Its role in sexual development is relatively understudied, as are potential mechanisms through which weight may influence early sexual activity.
Methods: Data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health were used in discrete-time event history analyses investigating the association between body weight, social relationships and timing of sexual debut among 8,197 respondents who were in grades 7-12 in 1994-1995 (Wave 1) and were young adults in 2001-2002 (Wave 3). Subgroup analyses explored gender and racial and ethnic variations in the association.
Results: Overweight adolescents were less likely than their normal-weight peers to report first intercourse between Waves 1 and 3 (odds ratio, 0.9). Characteristics reflecting social alienation, including having relatively few close friends and no experience with romantic relationships, were negatively associated with first intercourse among overweight youths. Results differed by gender and race and ethnicity. Overweight females had a lower likelihood than normal-weight females of experiencing first intercourse (0.8), but no such association was evident among males. Similarly, overweight white youths-but not those from other racial and ethnic groups-had reduced odds of sexual debut (0.7).
Conclusions: Future studies should seek to understand the broader implications of adolescent weight status for social relationships and subsequent development, and practitioners should apply this knowledge to prevention programs. Postponement of sexual activity may benefit youths, but potential benefits and risks may depend upon the social processes involved.
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A Cross-Cultural Investigation of Men's Judgments of Female Body Weight in Britain and Indonesia
Viren Swami, Grant Henderson, Deborah Custance & Martin Tovée
Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology, January 2011, Pages 140-145
Abstract:
Forty-seven men in Bali, Lombok, and Britain, respectively, were asked to rate a series of female images varying in body size for attractiveness. Between-group analyses indicated that participants in Lombok rated a heavier female figure as attractive compared with participants in Bali and Britain. In addition, participants in Bali and Lombok rated a wider range of figures as attractive compared with Britons. Results are discussed in relation to the globalization of the thin ideal.
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Defending girlfriends, buddies and oneself: Injunctive norms and male barroom aggression
Samantha Wells, Clayton Neighbors, Paul Tremblay & Kathryn Graham
Addictive Behaviors, forthcoming
Objective: Research has demonstrated that young adults tend to overestimate their peers' approval of risky behaviors (i.e., injunctive norms) and that perceived peer approval is associated with actual behavior; however, no empirical studies have assessed injunctive norms in relation to male barroom aggression. The objectives of the present study were to compare young men's own approval of male barroom aggression with their perceptions of approval by male and female peers and to determine the extent that perceived peer approval of male barroom aggression was associated with self-reported physical aggression at a bar, controlling for own approval and heavy episodic drinking.
Method: 525 young adult male university and community college students who reported drinking and going to a bar, club or pub rated their own approval and perceptions of peers' approval of bar aggression on items reflecting four domains of approval: (1) general approval, (2) defend self, (3) defend friend and (4) protect girlfriend.
Results: For all four domains, participants attributed greater approval to male peers than to themselves. Aggression was positively associated with own approval for all domains and with perceived male peer approval for general approval, defend self and defend friend, controlling for heavy episodic drinking and own approval of aggression. Perceived approval by female peers was not associated with increased likelihood of aggression.
Conclusion: The findings suggest that both perceived male peer approval and personal approval are factors associated with male barroom aggression and that addressing approval of barroom aggression is a critical direction for prevention programming.