Miller Intimate Relationships, 6/e

Chapter 3

Attraction

Copyright (c) 2012 by The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.McGraw-Hill/Irwin

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The Fundamental Basis of Attraction

A basic assumption:

We like those who reward us

…either because they treat us well, or simply because they are present when positive events occur.

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Proximity:Liking Those Near Us

We tend to like those who live and work near us.

Small distances have a larger influence on our relationships than most people realize.

• Convenience: Proximity Is Rewarding, Distance Is Costly

• Partners who are close at hand are able to provide us more benefits, at lesser expense, than distant partners usually can.

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Proximity:Liking Those Near Us

Familiarity: Repeated Contact

•Mere exposure, or repeated contact, with someone usually increases our liking for him or her.

Familiarity does not breed contempt.

• The more often women visited college classrooms, the better they were liked by those students – even though they never talked to anyone. (Moreland & Beach, 1992)

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Proximity:Liking Those Near Us

The Power of Proximity

At bottom, proximity accentuates our feelings about others:

If they’re likeable and pleasant, we like them better when they’re nearby.

But if they’re disagreeable or obnoxious, we like them less when they’re close at hand.

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Physical Attractiveness: Liking Those Who Are Lovely

• There’s a Bias for Beauty:

“What is Beautiful is Good”

We tend to assume automatically that attractive people also have desirable traits

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Physical Attractiveness: Liking Those Who Are Lovely

We may also confuse beauty with talent.

– Attractive people earn higher salaries at work.

– Attractive professors get better student evaluations.

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Physical Attractiveness: Liking Those Who Are Lovely

• Who’s Pretty?

Is beauty in the “eye of the beholder?”

Not really. There is much more agreement than disagreement

from culture to culture and group to group about what faces and features are physically attractive.

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Physical Attractiveness: Liking Those Who Are Lovely

Around the world, women are more attractive when they combine “baby-faced” features such as large eyes, a small nose, and full lips with signs of maturity such as prominent cheekbones, narrow cheeks, and a broad smile.

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Physical Attractiveness: Liking Those Who Are Lovely

Men with strong jaws and broad foreheads seem appealing when women are fertile…

…but women prefer warmer, more youthful features during the rest of the month.

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Physical Attractiveness: Liking Those Who Are Lovely

Most women find the masculine face on the right to be more attractive when they are fertile, but they consider the more feminine face on the left to be more appealing during the rest of the month.

Source: Little, Penton-Voak, Burt, & Perrett, 2002

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Physical Attractiveness: Liking Those Who Are Lovely

Attractive faces in both sexes are also:

• Average, possessing dimensions that are neither too large or too small, and

• Symmetrical, with the two sides of the face being very similar to one another

Beautiful faces combine the best features of individual faces in a balanced, well-proportioned whole.

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Physical Attractiveness: Liking Those Who Are Lovely

Look what happens when 2, 8, or 32 real faces are morphed together in composite images. “Average” faces are attractive faces.

Source: Rubenstein, Langlois, & Roggman, 2002Source: Rubenstein, Langlois, & Roggman, 2002

2- face composite 8-face composite 32-face composite

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Physical Attractiveness: Liking Those Who Are Lovely

Judgments of attractiveness are multifaceted:

– Height: both men and women prefer him to be taller than she is

– Smell: symmetrical people smell better• Heterosexual men think women smell better when

they’re about to ovulate

– Hair: men prefer women with longer hair

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Physical Attractiveness: Liking Those Who Are Lovely

• 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.

– People with symmetrical, attractive faces tend to enjoy good physical and mental health.

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Physical Attractiveness: Liking Those Who Are Lovely

• An Evolutionary Perspective on Physical Attractiveness

– People with attractive waist-to-hip ratios tend to enjoy good physical health.

– Good looks matter more to people near the equator, where there are more parasites and pathogens that can endanger

one’s health – and one’s beauty .– There are subtle but provocative changes in women’s

preferences across their monthly menstrual cycles.

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Physical Attractiveness: Liking Those Who Are Lovely

• An Evolutionary Perspective on Physical Attractiveness

The common preferences of modern men for symmetrical baby-faces and low waist-to-hip ratios -- and of modern women for symmetrical, dynamic men -- may be evolved inclinations that have more to do with human nature than with the norms of a particular culture.

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Physical Attractiveness: Liking Those Who Are Lovely

• Culture Counts, Too

– Standards of attractiveness are also affected by changing economic and cultural conditions.

– During hard times, when a culture’s food supply is unreliable, slender women are less desirable than heavy women are.

Environmental conditions work together with human nature to shape our judgments of who is and who isn’t pretty.

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Physical Attractiveness: Liking Those Who Are Lovely

• Looks Matter

– When people first meet, nothing else affects attraction as much as their looks do.

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Physical Attractiveness: Liking Those Who Are Lovely

• The Interactive Costs and Benefits of Beauty

– Looks have a larger effect on the social lives of men than women.

Unattractive men have fewer interactions with women than good-looking guys do.

– Attractive people tend to be a little happier than unattractive people are, but they don’t trust other people as much.

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Physical Attractiveness: Liking Those Who Are Lovely

• The Interactive Costs and Benefits of Beauty

Contrast effects may lead us to underestimate the desirability of many people we meet.

Unrealistic media portrayals of very attractive models make real people seem unfairly plain by comparison.

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Physical Attractiveness: Liking Those Who Are Lovely

• Matching in Physical Attractiveness

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.

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Reciprocity:Liking Those Who Like Us

Most of us pursue partners who are likely to return our interest.

Desirability = Physical x Probability of

attractiveness acceptance

Most men will not ask a woman for a date unless they think that she’s likely to say “yes.”

Mate value: overall attractiveness as a reproductive partner.

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Reciprocity:Liking Those Who Like Us

Most people find it hard not to like those who like them.

Balance theory suggests that we prefer consistency and symmetry in our relationships…

…so we like those who like us, and dislike those who dislike us.

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Similarity:Liking Those Who Are Like Us

Birds of a feather do flock together.

We tend to like those who share our:• Age, race, sex, religion, and social class• Attitudes and values• Personalities

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The Influence of Individual Differences

The greater the proportion of attitudes people share, the more they like each other:

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Similarity:Liking Those Who Are Like Us

Well, then, do “Opposites attract” ?

No.

But there are several subtleties in the waysimilarity operates that may misleadpeople into thinking that opposites

do sometimes attract.

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Similarity:Liking Those Who Are Like Us

• Matching Is a Broad Process

People pair off with others of similar “mate value,” but the specific assets they offer each other may be very different.

Around the world, it’s common for rich men to pair off with gorgeous women even when the men are not handsome.

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Similarity:Liking Those Who Are Like Us

Discovering Dissimilarities Takes Time•It may take a while to find out that we don’t have as much in common as we assumed.•Stimulus-value-role theory suggests that there are three different types of information about new partners that gradually unfold over time. •Fatal attractions occur when something about a new partner that is appealing and attractive gradually becomes one of the most obnoxious, irritating things about that partner.

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Similarity:Liking Those Who Are Like Us

• Perceived Versus Real Similarity: Misperception Lingers

We rarely get to know our partners as well as we think we do…

…and we usually think we have more in common than we really do.

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Similarity:Liking Those Who Are Like Us

• You May Be the Person I Want To Become

We tend to like others who exhibit desirable qualities that we wish we had.

We may sometimes prefer a partner who is someone we’d like to become to one who more closely resembles who we really are now.

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Similarity:Liking Those Who Are Like Us

• Dissimilarity May Decrease Over Time

Shared experiences and a quest for compatibility can make partners more similar as time goes by.

Opposites don’t attract, but they may gradually fade if a couple stays together for some other reason.

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Similarity:Liking Those Who Are Like Us

• One Way “Opposites” May Attract: Complementarity

We like responses from others that help us reach our goals, and partners occasionally “fit together” better when they behave differently.

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Similarity:Liking Those Who Are Like Us

Why Is Similarity Attractive?

• It’s reassuring to encounter others who share our points of view.

• We anticipate friendly interaction with similar others.

• Interaction with similar others does tend to be more fun.

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Barriers:Liking Those We Cannot Have

• The theory of psychological reactance states that when people lose their freedom, they strive to regain it.

• The Romeo and Juliet effect: The more parents interfere with their romances, the more love teenagers feel for their partners.

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Barriers:Liking Those We Cannot Have

• Potential partners also get prettier at closing time.

As the end of a night approaches, unattached bar patrons consider the remaining members of the other sex to be more attractive than they seemed to be earlier.

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So, What Do Men and Women Want?

Around the world, everybody prefers partners who offer:

• Warmth and loyalty

• Attractiveness and vitality

• Status and resources

How much of these qualities are required depends on whether one’s interests are short-term or long-term.

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So, What Do Men and Women Want?

• Both men and women are less selective when they’re picking a partner for a casual fling than for a lasting union.

• For long-term mating:

Men insist on moderate attractiveness, but they want all the warmth, honesty, humor, and intelligence they can get.

Women insist on moderate status and resources, but they want all the warmth, honesty, humor, and intelligence they can get.

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So, What Do Men and Women Want?

• Attraction isn’t so mysterious after all.

Men attend more to looks and women attend more to resources, but everybody wants partners who are agreeable, loving, and kind…

…and men and women do not differ in this regard.

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For Your Consideration

Rasheed introduced himself to Rebecca because she was really hot, and he was mildly disappointed when she turned out to be a little suspicious, self-centered, and vain. On the other hand, she was really hot, so he asked her out anyway. Because she was impressed with his designer clothes and bold style, Rebecca was intrigued by Rasheed, but after a few minutes she thought him a little pushy and arrogant. Still, he had tickets to an expensive concert, so she accepted his invitation to go out on a date.

In your opinion, what does the date—and the future—hold for Rebecca and Rasheed? Why?