Nice guys turn women off, sex study shows: Who turns them on?
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(CBS) Lose the smile. For guys eager to attract a mate, that might be a killer strategy, according to a surprising new study from the University of British Columbia. It showed that women find swaggering, brooding "bad boys" a lot more attractive than "nice guys."
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The study - published in the journal Emotion - revealed dramatic differences in the way men and women rank the sexual attractiveness of potential mates who display common emotions like happiness, pride and shame.
Though smiling is often considered essential when trying to make a good impression, the study showed that "men and women respond very differently to displays of emotion, including smiles," study author Jessica Tracy, a professor of psychology at the university, said in a written statement.
For the study, more than 1,000 adult participants were asked to rate the sexual attractiveness of hundreds of images of the opposite sex. The images showed people in displays of happiness (broad smiles), pride (raised head, puffed-up chest), and shame (lowered head, averted eyes).
Who did the gals go for? The study showed they preferred guys who looked proud or moody and ashamed. But the guys were most sexually attracted to women who looked happy, and least attracted to those who appeared proud and confident.
Tracy and her co-author, graduate student Alec Beall, said women may have evolved to find proud guys attractive because pride implies status, competence and an ability to provide for a partner and offspring. And previous research has linked smiling with a lack of dominance - which men seem to find attractive in a mate, but not the other way around.
But Beall pointed out in the statement that the people in the study weren't asked to evaluate men on the basis of whether they might make a good mate. "We wanted their gut reactions on carnal, sexual attraction," he said.
What do you think? Ladies, do you go for bad boys? And gentlemen, do you prefer nice girls?
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This is ridiculous.
I think it's amazing what passes for a true study of human behavior these days. I don't totally doubt that the authors/researchers' findings have SOME basis in reality, but what I DO doubt is just how objective this study really is.
I think that in many cases these findings are VERY subjective. After reading closely, I'm still not quite sure how being a sullen, frowny-faced, sour puss somehow equals "swagger" in the mind of the imaginary women that they are referring to. That's quite a leap, I'd say.
Besides, there IS such a thing as a guy giving a woman a "sexy smile", isn't it? Hell, I do this all the time "strategically" myself-----and with GREAT success (and I hear from my listeners all the time who tell me the same).
In my estimation, if women find a guy attractive, she doesn't really give a damn whether he approaches her SMILING, frowning, or with absolutely no expression on his face at all. All she mostly cares about is that he DOES go ahead and come her way!
For instance:
I couldn't imagine most women being turned off by guys who look like Brad Pitt, Denzel Washington, George Clooney, Shemar Moore, Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson, or "whoever the hell-else that they might find attractive"-----just because they had "too happy" a look on their faces when they saw them.
Sigh...I guess God forbid a guy actually approach some chick with a look on his face that looks like he may actually be enjoying being "alive".
Bottom Line:
If men spent more time continuously working to become men that they themselves are proud of being, the less time they'd spend trying to make themselves over into whatever the latest pop-psychology "says" that they should be. Why? Because no amount of smiling, brooding, or "FROWNING" is gonna attract women to them if they don't think of THEMSELVES as men worthy of having a quality woman in their lives.
Enough said.
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Perhaps these same "self-reliant" women are attracted to strong, capable, masculine men because they see so damned few of them.
It would be hilarious if it weren't so pathetic.
Still, despite their rarity there are "strong men" who are self confident, capable and decisive but at the same time are kind, humorous, mannerly, emotionally connected people. They don't seek to control others because they already control themselves. And they don't allow themselves to be controlled or held hostage emotionally either.
These men will never be mistaken for ill mannered, humorless, loutish, emotionally disconnected he-men who take themselves much too seriously. Nor should they be passed over or discarded as weak, ingratiating "nice guys" just because they have a sunny disposition and choose to smile now and again either. :-)
That's my view. Take it or leave it.
Drat! And here all this time I thought kindness, manners, self confidence without arrogance, a sense of humor and physical cleanliness went a long way.
Silly me.......
Being quick with a quip, especially a truly apt one, is a sign of intelligence. Well done! :-)