Boy, you look great: Ok, I'll pay for our dinner date

William Atkins
Tuesday, 22 March 2011 02:43

Science - Biology

A study from the United Kingdom and Singapore found that attractive people are less likely to be willing to pay for the cost of a dinner while on a date with a perceived less attractive dating partner. But, guess what men? You still better have a lot of money in your billfold.

 

The paper on attractiveness and dating is entitled 'The Effect of Attractiveness on Food Sharing Preferences in Human Mating Markets' (www.epjournal.net - 2011. 9(1): 79-91).

It is published in the journal Evolutionary Psychology.

The research by these scientists sought to explain how ''¦ physical attractiveness affects food sharing by studying payment preferences for hypothetical romantic dinner dates (a hypothetical mating market).'

In other words, who pays for dinner may be based on which person looks the better.

The researchers looked at 416 participants in how they rated attractiveness of their partner while on a date; how they rated themselves on a date; and how they decided who was to pay for dinner on a date.

Here is what the researchers thought would happen before they conducted the experiment: 'We hypothesized that:

(1) men would be more likely to prefer to pay than would women,

(2) attractive individuals of both sexes would be less willing to pay, and

(3) preferences to enter an exchange would be influenced by the attractiveness of prospective partners such that (3a) men would prefer to pay for attractive women, and (3b) women would prefer to be paid for by attractive men.'

And, guess what? No surprise! All three hypotheses were verified by the results of the study.

The study states, 'Individuals with higher self-rated attractiveness were more likely to prefer that their date would pay for the meal, and we found clear sex differences in how the attractiveness of potential dates affected payment preferences.'

Specifically, 'Male participants preferred to pay for dates that had higher facial attractiveness, while female participants preferred that attractive men would pay.'

Page two continues with more information on dating and attractiveness.