Second, you seem to see the results as “evil” and “bad”. How exactly is it “bad”? What are you basing your opinion on? I mean, from a single male perspective it may be “bad”, but as a scientist (as you are respresenting on a scientific magazine blog), I don’t find this as bad or good, simply as true (or possibly true). Is it “wrong” that “example gender” has “example problem” while the other doesn’t? Is it wrong that human mating behaviour is as it is? No, it simply is.

If you don’t like the (said supported) “truth” of your subconcious, then recognize it, form and opinion (you have done) and behave the way you want to behave (regardless of your urges).

all human behaviour is “bad” from some point of view, is it any suprise this behaviour is “bad” to you?

And to control for the “pre-screened” hypothesis, they needed to include other forms of socially unavailable partners not related to being in a relationship with another woman. For example, one choice could have been a priest (or a priest in training who might conceivably be convinced to change his mind) or other vocation with a vow of celibacy.

CC

As a dedicated New Scientist subscriber–I am such a geek that my heart actually flutters when it arrives in my mailbox–I was disappointed to see them buying into the singlist party line here. Say it’s not so! = ( = ( = (

I feel a letter to the editor coming on. . . You all should write too!!

Christina

The first problem with this portrayal is that the study only examined college-age girls, many of whom still have a superficial, competitive, “high-school” attitude toward relationships and see dating as a big game rather than the prelude to something serious. So the results aren’t necessarily generalizable to older women.

Second, the researchers informed the students that they were selecting men from a dating database and that the man in question was “in a current relationship.” However, the media changed “current” to “committed,” “serious,” or even “marital.” Now, if a college-age guy was using a dating service and said he was in a “current” relationship, a lot of girls would assume it wasn’t too serious. Pursuing that guy is a lot different than pursuing a guy who’s been married for 10 years.

Third, the questions the researchers asked mostly had to do with how attractive the girls found the guy. There were only one or two questions asking them if they would be interested in actively pursuing him. These were all factored into the same composite score. The problem is that you can’t assume women will actually pursue attached guys just because they might find them more attractive.

Finally, the researchers didn’t clarify that they were asking if the girls would pursue the guy while he was in a relationship. There’s too much room for that question to be interpreted as a hypothetical (i.e., assuming you could, in a perfect world, would you be interested in pursuing this guy?). I know I wouldn’t jump to the conclusion that they meant while he was still with someone else! So, again, it might be stretching it to assume that these girls actually would pursue the guy while he was unavailable.

At the end of the day, we know one thing from this study–that college-age women find guys with relationship experience more attractive, which makes sense. We don’t know if they find guys more attractive when they’re currently in relationships because the study didn’t test for that. A better design would’ve included one single guy with no previous relationship experience, one single guy with previous relationship experience, and one guy currently in a relationship. That’s the only way to identify whether it’s relationship experience in general or current relationship status that attracts women. I’m willing to bet that the single guy with verified previous relationships would fare just as well or better than the “taken” guy.

Please pardon another dissenting opinion here (thanks, Sean), but I didn’t think the data was intrinsically weaker than any other survey based study, at least not from what I’ve seen so far, nor does the NS editorial spin seem particularly severe. Yes they took some sensationalistic liberties with their speculations on the implications that went beyond the data, but that’s why they’re a magazine not a science journal. Discover does precisely the same thing, as evidenced for example by the over-reaction on this page.

I am surprised at how much of a politicized sounding reaction this report got on this page and how little substantive analysis so far justifies the extreme tone of the reaction (”worst article or the week”). I’m looking very hard for some knowledgeable analysis of evidence and seeing only “I don’t like someone saying that women would do this,” and “it doesn’t seem logical to me.” Those aren’t substantive critiques of evidence, unless has somehow become a matter of opinion.

From what I see, it seems a perfectly reasonable, plausible hypothesis that under some conditions women may evaluate men favorably based on some signal that they are capable of committment, which happens to be provided by an established relationship. I don’t know if the current data really helps us evaluate that hypothesis yet, and certainly the article on this page didn’t help at all either.

This hypothesis is not all that different from the notion that men or women might be attracted to someone because they have cute kids, which people don’t seem to get so offended over. Or do they?

It may not be terribly easy to demonstrate, but it’s not impossible and it might be useful information, even if it were only true under certain conditions.

Maybe I’m missing something, and maybe the data will turn out to be worthless, but I don’t see that in any substantive form from the critiques here in any case, I just see a knee-jerk reaction.

As I said, I realize this is a dissenting opinion here, and I’m open to be persuaded if I’ve erred in my evaluation.

kind regards,

Todd

But this is unfortunately a problem with all sorts of these kinds of studies. Yes, it is an important caveat, but it is not unique to this study and in no way qualifies it as the “worst science article of the week.”

“If your man is not super attractive, other women may need him to be pre-screened before they’d think about going after him.”

Are you joking? Since 99% of men are not “super attractive,” this hardly changes the point at all.

You seem to be criticizing this article because you do not like its conclusion, but you aren’t giving any valid reasons for criticizing it. (”Hide-your-men-crazy-zombie-mate-poachers-are-on-the-loose “—seriously!?) I am not defending it, but kneejerk politics doesn’t belong in a science blog.