The Psychology of Gender 4th Edition

Romantic Relationships 301

Given the choice between status and warmth,

both women and men chose warmth in short-

term and long-term relationships. Another

study examined the trade-off issue by giving

men and women varying “budgets” for mate

selection (Li & Kenrick, 2006). That is, par-

ticipants were asked to design the ideal mate

and given various amounts of “mate dollars”

to purchase these characteristics. With a small

budget, the typical sex differences prevailed,

with women emphasizing a mate’s resources

and men emphasizing a mate’s physical at-

tractiveness. With a larger budget, women’s

and men’s preferences became more similar—

especially in long-term relationships.

In conclusion, it appears that women

and men agree on the most important char-

acteristics a partner should possess, espe-

cially for serious long-term relationships.

Physical attractiveness and earning potential

are less important characteristics in a mate

but ones that heterosexual men and women

emphasize differentially—especially in the

context of short-term relationships.

Explanations. What is the explanation

for men’s preference for physically attractive

women and women’s preference for finan-

cially secure men? Here I review three expla-

nations; the central components of each are

highlighted in Table 9.2.

One explanation comes fromevolu-

tionary theory, which states that women

and men behave in ways that will maximize

the survival of their genes. Men value physi-

cal attractiveness and youth in their mates

because these are indicators of fertility. The

fact that people are better able to recall at-

tractive than unattractive female faces has

been considered evidence that physical at-

tractiveness has evolved as a cue to fertil-

ity in women (Becker et al., 2005). There is

no difference in the recall of attractive and

unattractive male faces. Women prefer mates

who have a high occupational status because

financial resources will help ensure the sur-

vival of their offspring. These ideas are based

on the parental investment model, which

states that women will invest more in their

offspring than will men because they have

less opportunity than men to reproduce.

If evolutionary theory can account

for sex differences in mate preferences,

women who are physically attractive should

be more likely than women who are physi-

cally unattractive to be paired with mates

who are financially stable. Because women’s

reproductive resources diminish with age,

and men’s financial resources generally in-

crease with age, evolutionary theory also

would predict that younger women would

be paired with older men. Indeed, there are

vivid instances of young attractive women

paired with wealthy older men; Hugh Hefner

and Donald Trump are examples of wealthy

men who have attracted numerous younger

and attractive women. Anna Nicole Smith

is an example of an attractive woman who

at age 26 married a 90-year-old wealthy oil

tycoon, J. Howard Marshall. However, the

young beautiful woman coupled with the

older wealthy man is the exception rather

than the rule. The idea that attractive women

will be linked to wealthy, high-status men

is known as the “potentials-attract hypoth-

esis.” This hypothesis was refuted in a study

of young adults who rated themselves on 10

attributes and then rated how much they de-

sired those attributes in a mate (Buston &

Emlen, 2003). There was no correspondence

between attractiveness in women and desire

for status in men or between status in men

and desire for attractiveness in women. In-

stead, the similarity hypothesis prevailed.

The higher respondents rated themselves on

an attribute, the greater their desire for that

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