Good Enough for An Affair. Self–Enhancement of Attractiveness, Interest in Potential Mates and Popularity as A Mate

Abstract

Using data from the Berlin Speed Dating Study, we tested rival hypotheses concerning the effects of self‐enhancement of attractiveness on dating outcomes. Three hundred eighty‐two participants took part in one of the 17 speed‐dating sessions. After each speed‐dating interaction, participants indicated how interesting they found the respective person as a long‐term and short‐term partner. Using social relations analyses, we computed perceiver effects (being more or less choosy) and target effects (being rated as more or less interesting) of long‐term and short‐term partner ratings. Self‐enhancement was operationalized as the discrepancy between self‐rated attractiveness and four components of actual attractiveness (observer‐rated facial and vocal attractiveness, height and body mass index). Results indicated that self‐enhancers were less choosy with respect to their interest for short‐term partners, which was especially true for men, but more choosy with respect to long‐term partners. With regard to popularity as a mate, potential partners indicated that they found self‐enhancers more interesting as short‐term partners but not as long‐term partners. As self‐enhancement is a key component of narcissism, these results are consistent with findings that narcissists perceive many sexual affairs as an achievement, while preferring selected ‘trophy’ long‐term partners, and narcissists have a charming appeal for short‐term, but not lasting, social relationships. Copyright © 2015 European Association of Personality Psychology

Self-Enhancement and Psychological Adjustment: A Meta-Analytic Review

“…For example, SE has been linked to anxiety (Sedikides et al, 2004) and eudaimonic well-being (Aghababaei & Błachnio, 2015), which are relevant indicators of personal adjustment. Furthermore, SE has been linked to short-term mate appeal (Schröder-Abé, Rentzsch, Asendorpf, & Penke, 2016) and romantic relationship functioning (Murray & Holmes, 1997), which are relevant indicators of interpersonal adjustment. Future research may complement the present meta-analytic results with an examination of links between SE and additional indicators of personal and interpersonal adjustment.…”

Are narcissists more attracted to people in relationships than to people not in relationships?

“…Grandiose narcissists are perceived by others as sexy [ 22 ], which likely aids them in attracting short-term mates and possibly exciting sexual desire in others [ 23 ]. Likewise, people who engage in attractiveness self-enhancement are able to attain more (short-term) sexual partners [ 24 ], and grandiose narcissists are known to inflate their own ratings of attractiveness [ 25 ]. This might lead them to pursue short-term mates beyond those who are not actually available to them or “out of their league” [ 26 ].…”

Short term, long term: An unexpected confound in human-mating research

“…More often, presentation order was not specified explicitly and could, at best, be inferred from formulations such as "participants rated how attractive they found the person as a long-term mate and as a short-term mate". As far as I could establish, some of these studies started with the long-term context (Clarkson et al, 2020;Conroy-Beam & Buss, 2017;Donahue & Green, 2016;Margana et al, 2019;Schröder-Abé et al, 2016) and others with the short-term one (Cantú et al, 2014;Cowan & Little, 2013;Jünger et al, 2018;Lucas et al, 2011;Moore et al, 2013;Valentine et al, 2014).…”