(Psychological) Distance Makes the Heart Grow Fonder

Abstract

Interpersonal attraction may be shaped by (a) one's psychological distance from a target (the subjective experience that a target is close to or far from the self) and (b) the perceived standing of a target on a trait relative to the self (as better or worse than the self). We propose that when evaluating a psychologically distant target, individuals may rely on abstract schemas (e.g., the desirability of a partner's traits) and prefer targets who possess more (vs. less) desirable qualities than themselves. However, when evaluating psychologically near targets, concrete contextual details of the environment (e.g., how a target's behavior affects self-evaluations in the moment) may determine individuals' attraction toward targets. Six studies revealed that when evaluating psychologically distant targets, men showed greater attraction toward women who displayed more (vs. less) intelligence than themselves. In contrast, when targets were psychologically near, men showed less attraction toward women who outsmarted them.

You should go for diversity, but I'd rather stay with similar others: Social distance modulates the preference for diversity

“…Research for example shows that when judging the abstract attractiveness of a potential partner (compared to judging the concrete attractiveness of a current partner), individuals use different cues (see Eastwick, Finkel, & Eagly, 2011;Eastwick, Luchies, Finkel, & Hunt, 2014;Park, Young, & Eastwick, 2015). Furthermore, different attributes SOCIAL DISTANCE AND PREFERENCE FOR DIVERSITY 45 could also lead to an increase or decrease of perceived diversity, which then in turn might motivate individuals to search for more different or similar team members.…”

Is it sexy to be sexist? How stereotyped humor affects romantic attraction

“…These studies also lacked a control condition, such that participants were always exposed to disparaging humorous, and never benign humor. Furthermore, although Studies 1 and 2 used distinct jokes, both focused on intelligence, a construct that is more favorably stereotypic of men (Cejka & Eagly, 1999), and that may hold costs for women in face-to-face romantic interactions (Park, Young, & Eastwick, 2015). Therefore, it was important to replicate sexist humor's effects on attraction even for jokes that focused on a distinct domain.…”

Starting and sustaining fruitful collaborations in psychology

“…As another example, I once contacted a faculty peer in the field to ask about their findings and discussed ideas for future studies; through these conversations we developed a collaboration based on our shared research interests and questions (e.g., Park et al, 2015Park et al, , 2023.…”

“…For example, I attended a talk by a social psychologist who was visiting my institution, and after conversations about common research interests and datasets that we had or wanted to collect, we collaborated on several projects and papers together (e.g., Park et al., 2009). As another example, I once contacted a faculty peer in the field to ask about their findings and discussed ideas for future studies; through these conversations we developed a collaboration based on our shared research interests and questions (e.g., Park et al., 2015, 2023).…”