It’s received wisdom that women are much more discerning than men, and that this is inherent and unchangeable and totally biological.
There is biology behind it, but it’s probably changeable by culture as well.
Except, no. Women’s reluctance to accept that kind of proposition is less about being inherently wired for romance and more about perceiving unknown men as dangerous
You’ve misrepresented that study.
You’re correct in pointing out some of the flaws of the Clark and Hatfield study, but the empirical observation that women are more selective on average has a lot more support than that. Looking at your link:
Women were much less likely than men to accept the coffeeshop proposition from a random person.
If the man is Brad Pitt or Johnny Deppp, women are just as likely to accept a coffeeshop proposition as men are from a random person or a celebrity
Men are more likely than women to accept a proposition from their best opposite-sex friend even though perception of danger was equal.
When you account for what the researchers euphemistically refer to as “perceptions of sexual capabilities,” women are just as likely to accept a proposition from their best friend.
In other words, women are more selective about casual sex partners, and more selective about who they think has “sexual capabilities.” My guess is that “sexual capabilities” here is a proxy for sexual attraction. That is, if you’re attracted to someone, you think they have more “sexual capabilities.” So yes, women are more selective about sexual attraction.
Which makes complete sense in terms of both evolved, unconscious assessment of risk and parental investment (women are the ones who get pregnant) as well as conscious assessment of what they should do based on culture and beliefs about sex. The latter is probably changeable with the culture.
See, right there you explicitly mentioned “perception of sexual capabilities” as the determining factor. And yet you ignored the possibility that our culture does not encourage their development in men.
I’m not sure what you’re saying. Do you mean our culture doesn’t do a very good job teaching men to be attractive?
“perception of sexual capabilities” has nothing to do with actual skills in bed, and everything to do with how (sexually and non-physically) attractive someone is.
… Because it obviously does not? Anyone who ever people watches when eating in town can tell this. That, and very few men ever get the One True Sex Tip. “your orgasm is a kill-switch on your libido. Everything you want to do tonight has to precede it, or it wont happen, or at least, wont be any fun.”.
Do you think this because of the Brad Pitt question? I actually think we have good evidence that our culture does not teach men how to (literally) please a woman sexually, nor require it, and that one man without training would find this far more difficult than an alien might suppose. We’d therefore expect any woman with a shred of rationality to expect less pleasure from the random “attractive” man the study asks her to imagine.
Given what you point out about perception of danger with the friend’s proposition, the following seems like at least weak evidence against the conflation of perceived sexual capability with attractiveness:
both women and men agreed that the female proposer would be better in bed, thought the female proposer was warmer and had higher status, and thought the female proposer would be more likely than the male proposers to give them gifts. Men and women also believed that female proposers were less likely to be dangerous than male proposers. In sum, both men and women agreed that the male proposers are less desirable than female proposers on dimensions of relevance to sexual encounters.
Do you think this because of the Brad Pitt question?
That, and the fact that the participants were asked to guess how good in bed their friend or a random person was. The qualities that make someone seem good in bed are also qualities that people find sexually attractive, e.g. confidence, fashion sense, dancing skill. Also, a big part of sex is mental, so people you find attractive will be better in bed.
I actually think we have good evidence that our culture does not teach men how to (literally) please a woman sexually, nor require it, and that one man without training would find this far more difficult than an alien might suppose.
What evidence? Books and webpages on the subject abound. Magazines are filled with articles on sexual skills. And like any skill, of course, it takes practice to develop, but our current culture is far more accepting of women explicitly communicating what they like than in the past; women are routinely encouraged to do so (though slut-shaming still exists).
I’m confused by the relevance of your “one man” link to partible paternity, which concerns the belief that a child can have more than one father.
We’d therefore expect any woman with a shred of rationality to expect less pleasure from the random “attractive” man the study asks her to imagine.
This makes sense, but isn’t the whole story. I would like to see answers to the following scenario:
A close and trusted friend of the same sex introduces you to an average looking person of the opposite sex, saying “This guy/girl is really good in bed. Trust me, we had a fling awhile back. You two should have some fun together.” The person says “I have been noticing you and I find you to be very attractive. Would you go to bed with me tonight?” Rate the likelihood that you’d accept.
This eliminates the bias and is a much better version of the question. I predict that men are much more likely to accept in this scenario. If I’m wrong, this would be good evidence that women are not more selective when danger and sexual ability are taken into account.
the following seems like at least weak evidence against the conflation of perceived sexual capability with attractiveness
I don’t see how. Obviously if a straight woman is going to guess how good another woman is in bed, it won’t relate to how attracted she is to the other woman. Also, it’s not surprising that the average woman would rate an average woman as better at pleasing her than the average man: as you say, there is a popular conception that men don’t know how to please women, and women have an obvious advantage in familiarity with a female body..
There is biology behind it, but it’s probably changeable by culture as well.
You’ve misrepresented that study.
You’re correct in pointing out some of the flaws of the Clark and Hatfield study, but the empirical observation that women are more selective on average has a lot more support than that. Looking at your link:
Women were much less likely than men to accept the coffeeshop proposition from a random person.
If the man is Brad Pitt or Johnny Deppp, women are just as likely to accept a coffeeshop proposition as men are from a random person or a celebrity
Men are more likely than women to accept a proposition from their best opposite-sex friend even though perception of danger was equal.
When you account for what the researchers euphemistically refer to as “perceptions of sexual capabilities,” women are just as likely to accept a proposition from their best friend.
In other words, women are more selective about casual sex partners, and more selective about who they think has “sexual capabilities.” My guess is that “sexual capabilities” here is a proxy for sexual attraction. That is, if you’re attracted to someone, you think they have more “sexual capabilities.” So yes, women are more selective about sexual attraction.
Which makes complete sense in terms of both evolved, unconscious assessment of risk and parental investment (women are the ones who get pregnant) as well as conscious assessment of what they should do based on culture and beliefs about sex. The latter is probably changeable with the culture.
See, right there you explicitly mentioned “perception of sexual capabilities” as the determining factor. And yet you ignored the possibility that our culture does not encourage their development in men.
I’m not sure what you’re saying. Do you mean our culture doesn’t do a very good job teaching men to be attractive?
“perception of sexual capabilities” has nothing to do with actual skills in bed, and everything to do with how (sexually and non-physically) attractive someone is.
… Because it obviously does not? Anyone who ever people watches when eating in town can tell this. That, and very few men ever get the One True Sex Tip. “your orgasm is a kill-switch on your libido. Everything you want to do tonight has to precede it, or it wont happen, or at least, wont be any fun.”.
Do you think this because of the Brad Pitt question? I actually think we have good evidence that our culture does not teach men how to (literally) please a woman sexually, nor require it, and that one man without training would find this far more difficult than an alien might suppose. We’d therefore expect any woman with a shred of rationality to expect less pleasure from the random “attractive” man the study asks her to imagine.
Given what you point out about perception of danger with the friend’s proposition, the following seems like at least weak evidence against the conflation of perceived sexual capability with attractiveness:
That, and the fact that the participants were asked to guess how good in bed their friend or a random person was. The qualities that make someone seem good in bed are also qualities that people find sexually attractive, e.g. confidence, fashion sense, dancing skill. Also, a big part of sex is mental, so people you find attractive will be better in bed.
What evidence? Books and webpages on the subject abound. Magazines are filled with articles on sexual skills. And like any skill, of course, it takes practice to develop, but our current culture is far more accepting of women explicitly communicating what they like than in the past; women are routinely encouraged to do so (though slut-shaming still exists).
I’m confused by the relevance of your “one man” link to partible paternity, which concerns the belief that a child can have more than one father.
This makes sense, but isn’t the whole story. I would like to see answers to the following scenario:
A close and trusted friend of the same sex introduces you to an average looking person of the opposite sex, saying “This guy/girl is really good in bed. Trust me, we had a fling awhile back. You two should have some fun together.” The person says “I have been noticing you and I find you to be very attractive. Would you go to bed with me tonight?” Rate the likelihood that you’d accept.
This eliminates the bias and is a much better version of the question. I predict that men are much more likely to accept in this scenario. If I’m wrong, this would be good evidence that women are not more selective when danger and sexual ability are taken into account.
I don’t see how. Obviously if a straight woman is going to guess how good another woman is in bed, it won’t relate to how attracted she is to the other woman. Also, it’s not surprising that the average woman would rate an average woman as better at pleasing her than the average man: as you say, there is a popular conception that men don’t know how to please women, and women have an obvious advantage in familiarity with a female body..