Psychology 4000
Evolutionary Psychology
Dr Darren Hannesson
Lecture 9 – Problems of mating
Women’s long-term mating preferences:
Context effects
personal resource status
temporal context of mating
Female’
Female’s actual mate choices
empirical evidence
1
Long-term mating
Context effects on female mate preferences
The adaptive benefits of particular mate
characteristics could vary with a female’s
circumstances
to be most adaptive, then, preferences should be
sensitive to at least some potentially significant
contextual factors
Context effects on female mate
preferences
Personal resource wealth
Preference for resource related attributes might be
woman’
predicted to correlate inversely with a woman’s
personal resource wealth
2
Context effects on female mate
preferences
Personal resource wealth
structural powerlessness hypothesis
women value economic resources in a mate because our
societies are structured in a way that makes resource
acquisition more difficult for women than men
Context effects on female mate
preferences
Personal resource wealth
structural powerlessness hypothesis
Predictions
woman’
Preferences should vary with a woman’s resource wealth
Men’ man’
Men’s preferences should also be sensitive to a man’s
personal resource wealth
3
Context effects on female mate
preferences
Personal resource wealth
structural powerlessness hypothesis
Empirical evidence:
resource-
preferences of resource-rich women
Anecdotal observations
Research evidence
Context effects on female mate
preferences
Personal resource wealth
structural powerlessness hypothesis
Empirical evidence:
resource-
preferences of resource-rich women
preferences of college women
prospective income correlated positively with desire for
a resource rich mate
acceptable income threshold for a prospective spouse is
non-
higher than that set for non-college students
4
Context effects on female mate
preferences
Personal resource wealth
structural powerlessness hypothesis
Empirical evidence:
resource-
preferences of resource-rich women
preferences of college women
Bakweri society
women are wealthy
still value wealth in spouse
Context effects on female mate
preferences
Personal resource wealth
structural powerlessness hypothesis
Empirical evidence:
resource-
preferences of resource-rich women
preferences of college women
Bakweri society
Preferences of resource poor men
Resource related attributes are rated low
5
Context effects on female mate
preferences
Personal resource wealth
Why are women’s preferences for resource
related attributes not sensitive to personal
resource status?
Female resource wealth may have been rare during our
evolutionary history
Personal mate value may increase with personal wealth
thereby strengthening preferences
Can you have too much?
Context effects on female mate
preferences
Temporal context of mating relationship
short- long-
the motivation behind short-term and long-term mating
relationships is different and therefore likely to lead to
differences in preferences
traits specifically related to prolonged resource sharing
long- short-
should be at a greater premium in long-term than short-
term mating
6
Context effects on female mate
preferences
Temporal context of mating relationship
Empirical evidence:
67-
67-item survey
ambitious, college graduate, devoted, fond of children,
understanding, and responsible rated more highly for
long- short-
long-term than short-term mate
Context effects on female mate
preferences
Temporal context of mating relationship
Empirical evidence:
the 67 item survey
choice between pairs of photos study
5 pairs of photos of men accompanied by written
descriptions
they’
One group asked who they’d prefer as a spouse, the
other for a short term sexual affair
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Context effects on female mate
preferences
Context effects on female mate
preferences
8
Context effects on female mate
preferences
Temporal context of mating relationship
Empirical evidence:
the 67 item survey
choice between pairs of photos study
dependable”
“dependable” traits were chosen over physical
attractiveness 4 out 5 times for a spouse
Women’s actual mate choices
for preferences to have evolved they must have
had an impact on actual choices
a perfect correspondence not expected because:
perfect”
“perfect” mates are scarce
personal mate value can limit options
other humans can influence personal decisions
9
Women’s actual mate choices
Empirical evidence:
responses to personal ads
strongest predictors of getting many responses were:
age (older)
income (richer)
years of education (smarter)
Women’s actual mate choices
Empirical evidence:
responses to personal ads
marriages by women with high mate value
retrospective study
attractive women were married to men with higher
incomes, social status, and occupational prestige
10
Women’s actual mate choices
Empirical evidence:
responses to personal ads
marriages by women with high mate value
retrospective study
longitudinal study
attractiveness of teens was ranked
mate’
attractiveness correlated positively with eventual mate’s
status
true for both working and middle class women
Women’s actual mate choices
Empirical evidence:
responses to personal ads
marriages by women with high mate value
relative ages of marriage partners
worldwide average is 3.4 years
range is 2 to 5 years
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