Human Mate Choice, Evolution of

Easton, Judith A.; Goetz, Cari D.; Buss, David M.

doi:10.1016/b978-0-08-097086-8.81049-1

Cited by 12 publications

(18 citation statements)

References 100 publications

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“…One unexpected finding was the tendency for participants to rate the exploitability of men as being higher than that of women. This trend may reflect men's well-known motivation to pursue short-term sexual relationships (Easton et al, 2015;Schmitt & International Sexuality Description Project, 2003), but the results should be replicated before being interpreted as reliable.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 93%

“…One of the unique findings from the current research was that both men and women evaluated men with mental illness as more sexually exploitable than women with mental illness. These trends are consistent with men's increased interest in short-term sexual relationships but do not match women's dominant mating strategies (Easton et al, 2015;Jonason, Betes, & Li, 2019;Schmitt & International Sexuality Description Project, 2003). Evolutionary theory predicts that women seeking short-term sexual relationships should be motivated primarily by the opportunity to secure resources or offspring with desirable genes; unlike men, they tend not to reduce their mating standards for short-term sex.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 89%

“…Although the presence of mental illness can lead to immediate rejection, the overall evaluation of potential mates with mental illness still conforms to many standard predictions of evolutionary theory (Buss, 1999;Easton et al, 2015). When considering potential mates with mental illness, people tend to be more selective for long-term romantic relationships than for short-term sexual relationships, women tend to be more selective than are men, and people tend to select physically attractive mates over unattractive mates (Boysen, 2017(Boysen, , 2019.…”

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confidence: 77%

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Perceptions of people with mental illness as sexually exploitable.

Boysen¹,

Isaacs²

2022

Evolutionary Behavioral Sciences

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Exploitation of others is a method for acquiring the resources necessary for survival and reproduction. Both men and women agree upon a variety of specific cues that suggest women's vulnerability to sexual exploitation. The current research documented mental illness as an additional cue of sexual exploitability. Study 1 (N ϭ 189) demonstrated that people rate cues of sexual exploitability as significantly more typical of people with mental illness than people without mental illness. Participants in Study 2 (N ϭ 189) rated people with mental illness in general to be significantly more susceptible to strategies of sexual exploitation than people without mental illness. The method of Study 3 (N ϭ 189) replicated the results of Study 2 using specific mental and physical illnesses, illustrating that sexual exploitability is unique to mental illness. Study 4 (N ϭ 396) described a scenario of a man evaluating a woman for a short-term sexual relationship. Participants perceived a woman with a mental illness as significantly easier to exploit for sex than a woman with a physical illness or no illness. Study 5 (N ϭ 325) asked male and female participants to evaluate a potential mate with either a mental or physical illness, and perceptions of exploitability were significantly higher for the mate with mental illness. Overall, the results supported previous research documenting cues of sexual exploitability and extended those cues to include mental illness. Public Significance StatementHuman beings sometimes use others for short-term sex, and certain cues suggest sexual exploitability. Mental illness appears to be one of those cues. Men and women associate mental illness with exploitable traits and see people with mental illnesses as more exploitable than people with physical illnesses or no illness.

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Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 93%

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 89%

mentioning

confidence: 77%

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Perceptions of people with mental illness as sexually exploitable.

Boysen¹,

Isaacs²

2022

Evolutionary Behavioral Sciences

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“…If symptoms of an obsessive disorder lead to financial success, it can increase a potential mate’s desirability; if a personality disorder leads to lack of interpersonal commitment, it can increase a potential mate’s desirability for a short-term sexual relationship relative to if they had excessive desire for commitment. Although the effects of these variables on mate selection is well-established (Buss & Schmitt, 1993; Easton et al, 2015), discovering that traits associated with mental illness can signal value as a mate is a novel finding in the research literature.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Sexual stigmatization of mental illness: The impact of sex, mental illness, and evolutionarily salient traits on the evaluation of potential mates.

Boysen

2019

Stigma and Health

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The stigma toward mental illness includes a strong desire for social distance. However, there has been little research on how people’s desire for social distance applies to perceptions of people with mental illness as romantic partners. The current research used evolutionary psychology as a theoretical framework to investigate perceptions of people with mental illness as long- and short-term mates. Across three studies, participants evaluated descriptions of mates in terms of their potential for short-term sexual relationships and long-term committed relationships. Study 1 (N = 247) demonstrated that a diagnosis of bipolar disorder and promiscuous behavior during manic episodes lead to lowered evaluations of mates. Study 2 (N = 325) showed that a diagnosis of an obsessive disorder leading to low financial resources reduced perceptions of mate quality, but high financial resources caused by an obsessive disorder improved the evaluations of mates. In addition, a potential mate’s mental illness and financial resources affected women’s, but not men’s, evaluations of potential for a short-term relationship. Study 3 (N = 344) demonstrated that a mental disorder that increased a person’s need for relationship commitment decreased evaluations of potential for a short-term relationship but increased evaluations of potential for a long-term relationship. Across all three studies, people were more selective for long-term relationships than short-term relationships, and women were more selective than men. Overall, these results document the impact of both the label of mental illness and specific behaviors associated with mental illness on perceptions of mate potential.

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“…Analyzing contemporary views on sexual strategies for human mate choice Easton et al (2015) divide both women's and men's strategies into short-term and long-term mating. The "sexuality cores" designated here do not indicate any hominid long-term mating tendency.…”

Section: "Cores Of Sexuality" and The Patriarchatementioning

confidence: 99%

Hominid sexual nature

Mogielnicki

Pearl²

2020

Theory Biosci.

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The aim of the paper is to identify psychosomatic evolutionary adaptations of hominids, which direct them at maximizing their reproductive success, and on the basis of which their various social structures are built. Selected features of the hominid last common ancestor were extracted; by reducing the influence of the social structure, they were defined as the hominid "sexual nature"; these considerations were supported by the analysis of sexual jealousy as a function of socio-environmental conditions. The "sexuality core" of a hominid female was defined as "selective polyandry"-the female selects the best males among those available; and of a hominid male as "tolerant promiscuity"-the male strives for multi-male and multi-female copulations with sexually attractive females. The extracted "sexuality cores" condemn hominids to a patriarchal social structure and thus to sexual coercion and jealousy. The source of male sexual jealousy is limited access to females. Hominid female jealousy of the male results mainly from the need for protection and support. Hominids' social structures are determined by females' sexual selectivity or opportunism and by their continuous or periodic proceptivity and estrus signaling. Evolutionary functions developed by women: out-estrus sexuality, copulation calls, multiple orgasms, allow them to obtain the best possible spermatozoid. The institution of marriage blocks the influence of sexual selection in the species Homo sapiens.

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Human Mate Choice, Evolution of

Cited by 12 publications

References 100 publications

Perceptions of people with mental illness as sexually exploitable.

Perceptions of people with mental illness as sexually exploitable.

Sexual stigmatization of mental illness: The impact of sex, mental illness, and evolutionarily salient traits on the evaluation of potential mates.

Hominid sexual nature

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