What Women Want – Desired Traits

Size and Strength

“When the great basketball player Magic Johnson revealed that he had slept with thousands of women, he inadvertently revealed women’s preference for mates who display physical and athletic prowess. The numbers may be shocking, but the preference is not. Physical characteristics, such as athleticism, size, and strength, convey important information that women use in making a mating decision.”

Physical size may matter to women in a way somewhat comparable to how breast size can matter to men. Both features are experienced as attractive by the other sex.

This leads us to the well-known frog example:

“The importance of physical characteristics in the female choice of a mate is prevalent throughout the animal world. In the species called the gladiator frog, males are responsible for creating nests and defending the eggs. In the majority of courtships, a stationary male is deliberately bumped by a female who is considering him. She strikes him with great force, sometimes enough to rock him back or even scare him away. If the male moves too much or bolts from the nest, the female hastily leaves to examine alternative mates. Most females mate with males who move minimally when bumped. Only rarely does a female reject a male who remains firmly planted after being bumped. Bumping helps a female frog to decide how successful the male will be at defending her clutch. The bump test reveals the male’s physical ability to perform the function of protection.”

Bump tests can be seen as a kind of stress test—can the individual withstand pressure or attack?

“A man’s size, strength, and physical prowess are cues to solutions to the problem of protection. My lab and others found that women judge short men to be undesirable as long-term mates.⁴⁶ In contrast, they find it very desirable for a potential mate to be tall, physically strong, and athletic. Tall men are consistently seen as more desirable dates and mates than men who are short or of average height.”

In essence: size matters.

“Tall men date more often than short men and have a larger pool of potential mates. Women solve the problem of protection from aggressive men at least in part by preferring a mate who has the size, strength, and physical prowess to protect them.

In addition to height, women are especially attracted to athletic men with a V-shaped torso, that is broader shoulders relative to hips.⁴⁸ Interestingly, these female preferences may have exerted sexual selection pressure on men, since modern men currently show upper body strength that is roughly twice that of women. It is one of the most sexually dimorphic attributes of the human body.”

Upper body strength appears to be a particularly attractive trait, shaped in part by female mate preferences.

“Tall men tend to have a higher status in nearly all cultures. “Big men” in hunter-gatherer societies—men high in status—are physically big men as well.⁴⁹ In Western cultures, tall men make more money, advance in their professions more rapidly, and receive more and earlier promotions.”

Physical size is linked to social status and the ability to acquire resources.

“Height constitutes a reliable cue to dominance in social interactions . . . shorter policemen are likely to be assaulted more than taller policemen . . . suggesting that the latter command more fear and respect from adversaries . . . taller men are more sought after in women’s personal advertisements, receive more responses to their own personal advertisements, and tend to have prettier girlfriends than do shorter men.”

One might even speculate that, if many women were poets, a great deal of poetry would be written about large men.

“A heavily muscled, imposingly built man is likely to accumulate many girlfriends, while a small man, deprecatingly referred to as a peritsi, fares badly. The mere fact of height creates a measurable advantage. . . . A powerful wrestler, say the villagers, is frightening . . . he commands fear and respect. To the women, he is “beautiful” (awitsiri), in demand as a paramour and husband. Triumphant in politics as well as in love, the champion wrestler embodies the highest qualities of manliness. Not so fortunate the vanquished! A chronic loser, no matter what his virtues, is regarded as a fool. As he wrestles, the men shout mock advice. . . . The women are less audible as they watch the matches from their doorways, but they too have their sarcastic jokes. None of them is proud of having a loser as a husband or lover.”

“Barbara Smuts argues that, consequently, during human evolutionary history physical protection from other men was one of the most important things a man could offer a woman. Given the alarming incidence of sexual coercion and rape in many cultures, a mate’s protection value may well remain relevant to mate selection in modern environments. Many women simply do not feel safe on the streets, and a strong, tall, athletic mate acts as a deterrent to other sexually aggressive men.”

From a female perspective, men are often valued as protectors, and physical weakness undermines this protective role.

This leads to the next point:

Good Health

“It may come as no surprise that women and men worldwide prefer mates who are healthy.⁵² In the thirty-seven-culture study, women judged good health to be anywhere from important to indispensable in a marriage partner. In another study on American women, poor physical conditions, ranging from bad grooming habits to having a sexually transmitted infection (STI), were regarded as extremely undesirable characteristics in a mate. The biologists Clelland Ford and Frank Beach found that signs of ill health, such as open sores, lesions, and unusual pallor, are universally regarded as unattractive.

In humans, good health may be signaled by behavior as well as by physical appearance. A lively mood, high energy level, and sprightly gait, for example, may be attractive precisely because they are calorically costly and can be displayed only by people brimming with good health.

The tremendous importance we place on good health is not unique to our species. Some animals display large, loud, and gaudy traits that are costly and yet signal great health and vitality. Consider the bright, flamboyant, ostentatious plumage of the peacock. It is as if the peacock is saying: “Look at me; I’m so fit that I can carry these large, cumbersome feathers, and yet still I’m thriving.” The mystery of the peacock’s tail, which seems so contrary to utilitarian survival, is finally on the verge of being solved. The biologists William D. Hamilton and Marlena Zuk proposed that the brilliant plumage serves as a signal that the peacock carries a light load of parasites, since peacocks who carry more than the average number of parasites have duller plumage. The burdensome plumage provides a cue to health and robustness. Peahens prefer the brilliant plumage because it provides clues to the male’s health.

Women are especially attracted to men who show two observable markers of good health—symmetrical features and masculinity. Bodies are supposed to be bilaterally symmetric, so deviations in symmetry represent errors a body made in constructing itself. These superficial errors may signal other errors made in constructing important systems, such as the immune system. Errors have two sources—genetic mutations and environmental stresses such as injuries or disease during development. More symmetrical men tend to be healthier and to experience fewer illnesses such as respiratory diseases, and women find them more attractive than their more lopsided peers.⁵⁵

Masculine features in men provide another set of health cues. These features include longer and broader lower jaws, stronger brow ridges, deeper voices, and the classic male V-shaped torso. Masculine qualities are primarily the product of testosterone production during adolescence when a male’s facial, body, and vocal qualities are forming. The problem is that too much testosterone can be bad for men, compromising their immune system and leading to shorter lives. So why do some men develop such masculine features? The theory is that only very healthy men, those with strong immune systems, can afford to produce a lot of testosterone during adolescence. Men with weaker immune systems cut back on testosterone production (not consciously, of course) to prevent compromising their already tenuous health. According to this theory, masculine features are honest signals of good health. And indeed, women find masculine features to be somewhat attractive in long-term mating, although they find these features even more attractive when choosing a casual sex partner.

In ancestral times, four bad consequences were likely to follow if a woman selected a mate who was unhealthy or disease-prone. First, she put herself and her family at risk of contracting the disease. Second, her mate was less able to perform essential functions and provide crucial benefits to her and her children, such as food, protection, health care, and child rearing. Third, her mate was at increased risk of dying, prematurely cutting off the flow of resources and forcing her to incur the costs of searching for a new mate and courting all over again. And fourth, if health is partly heritable, she would risk passing on genes for poor health to her children. A preference for healthy mates solves the problem of mate survival and ensures that resources are likely to be delivered over the long run.”

Given its significance, this argument warrants presenting the full set of paragraphs.

In a nutshell, women consistently judged good health to be an important, and often indispensable, attribute in a marriage partner.

Love and Commitment

“A man’s possession of assets such as health, status, resources, intelligence, and emotional stability, however, does not guarantee his willingness to commit them to a particular woman. Some men show a tremendous reluctance to marry or commit.”

“Women sometimes derogate men for this hesitancy, calling them “commitment dodgers,” “commitment phobics,” “paranoid about commitment,” and “fearful of the M word.” “

Reluctance to commit is generally viewed as undesirable in a mate.

“Mark and Susan had been going out with each other for two years and had been living together for six months. He was a well-off forty-two-year-old professional, she a medical student of twenty-eight. Susan pressed for a decision about marriage—they were in love, and she wanted to have children within a few years. But Mark balked. He had been married before, and divorced. If he ever married again, he wanted to be absolutely sure it would be permanent. As Susan continued to press for a decision, Mark raised the possibility of a prenuptial agreement. She resisted, feeling that this violated the spirit of marriage. Finally, they agreed that by a date four months in the future he would have decided one way or the other. The date came and went, and still Mark could not make a decision. Susan told him that she was leaving him, moved out, and started dating another man. Mark panicked. He called her up and begged her to come back, saying that he had changed his mind and would marry her. He promised a new car. He promised that there would be no prenuptial agreement. But it was too late. Mark’s failure to commit was too strong a negative signal to Susan. It dealt the final blow to their relationship. She was gone forever.”

The Red Pill community would interpret this situation as evidence that a woman who pressures for marriage is already beginning to fall out of love.

“Women past and present face the adaptive problem of choosing men who not only have the necessary resources but also show a willingness to commit those resources specifically to them. This problem may be more difficult than it seems at first. Although resources can often be directly observed, commitment cannot. Instead, gauging commitment requires looking for probabilistic cues. Love is one of the most important cues to commitment.”

“Acts of reproduction, such as planning to have children, also represent a direct commitment to one’s partner’s genes. All these acts of love signal the commitment of sexual, economic, emotional, and genetic resources to one person.”

“Since love is a worldwide phenomenon, and since a primary function of acts of love is to signal commitment of reproductively relevant resources, women should place a premium on love in the process of choosing a mate. To find out if they do, Sue Sprecher and her colleagues asked American, Russian, and Japanese students whether they would marry someone who had all the qualities they desired in a mate if they were not in love with that person.⁵⁹ Fully 89 percent of American women and 82 percent of Japanese women said that they would still require love for marriage, even if all other important qualities were present. Among Russians, only 59 percent of women would not marry someone with whom they were not in love, no matter how many desirable qualities that person had. Although a clear majority of Russian women required love, the lower threshold may reflect the tremendous difficulty Russian women have in finding a mate because of the severe shortage of men in their country, especially men capable of investing resources. These variations reveal the effects of cultural context on mating.”

In Western and Central Europe, Russian women are often stereotyped as emotionally cold.

“Direct studies of preferences in a mate confirm the centrality of love. In a study of 162 Texas women college students, out of 100 characteristics examined, the quality of being loving was the most strongly desired in a potential husband. The thirty-seven-culture study confirmed the universal importance of love. Among eighteen possible characteristics, mutual attraction or love proved to be the most highly valued in a potential mate by both sexes, being rated a 2.87 by women and 2.81 by men (out of 3.00). Nearly all women and men, from the enclaves of South Africa to the bustling streets of Brazilian cities, gave love the top rating, indicating its indispensability for a committed mateship. Women place a premium on love in order to secure the commitment of men’s economic, emotional, and sexual resources.”

As Geoffrey Miller has argued, mate signaling can be understood in terms of broadcasting versus narrowcasting resources. From this perspective, perceived love in a male partner signals a willingness to concentrate resources on a single mate and her offspring rather than dispersing them across multiple partners.

“Two additional personal characteristics, kindness and sincerity, are critical to securing long-term commitment. In one study of 800 personal advertisements, sincerity was the single most frequently listed characteristic sought by women. Another analysis of 1,111 personal advertisements again showed that sincerity was the quality most frequently sought by women—indeed, women advertisers sought sincerity nearly four times as often as men advertisers. Sincerity in personal advertisements is a code word for commitment, and women use it to screen out men seeking casual sex without any commitment.”

A lack of sincerity signals a preference for short-term mating rather than long-term commitment.

“People worldwide depend on kindness not from strangers, but rather from their mates. As shown by the thirty-seven-culture study, women have a strong preference for mates who are kind and understanding. In thirty-two out of the thirty-seven cultures, in fact, the sexes were identical in valuing kindness as one of the three most important qualities out of a possible thirteen in a mate. Only in Japan and Taiwan did men give greater emphasis than women to kindness. And only in Nigeria, Israel, and France did women give greater emphasis than men to kindness. In no culture, however, was kindness in a mate ranked lower than third out of thirteen for either sex. Women desired kindness in a mate especially when it was directed toward them, and less so when it was directed toward other people or other women, supporting the notion that women prize dispositions in men to commit their resources selectively rather than indiscriminately.”

Thus, unkindness is not, in itself, a desirable trait in a mate. Rather, women appear to prefer kindness that is selectively directed toward them, especially when combined with other valued traits. Kindness alone, in the absence of these traits, is insufficient.

“Kindness is an enduring personality characteristic that has many components, but at the core of all of them is the commitment of resources. The trait signals an empathy toward children, a willingness to put a mate’s needs before one’s own, and a willingness to channel energy and effort toward a mate’s goals rather than exclusively and selfishly to one’s own goals. Kindness, in other words, signals the ability and willingness of a potential mate to commit energy and resources selflessly to a partner.”

A highly disagreeable and self-centered individual is difficult to sustain in a long-term relationship.

“A lack of kindness signals selfishness, an inability or unwillingness to commit, and a high likelihood that costly burdens will be inflicted on a spouse. … Unkind men tend to be condescending, putting down their wife’s opinions as stupid or inferior. They are selfish, monopolizing shared resources. They are inconsiderate, failing to do any housework. They are neglectful, failing to show up as promised. Finally, they have more extramarital affairs, suggesting that these men are unable or unwilling to commit to a monogamous relationship. Unkind men look out for themselves and have trouble committing to anything much beyond that.”

More generally, highly disagreeable individuals tend to dismiss the opinions of others as inferior or unworthy of consideration.

“Because sex is one of the most valuable reproductive resources women can offer, they have evolved psychological mechanisms that cause them to resist giving it away indiscriminately. Requiring love, sincerity, and kindness is a way of securing a commitment of resources commensurate with the value of the resource that women give to men. Requiring love and kindness helps women to solve the critical adaptive mating problem of securing the commitment of resources from a man that can aid in the survival and reproduction of her offspring.”

This leads straight to the topic of deal breakers:

“The flip side of what women want is what women do not want—the proverbial deal breakers … the costs of making a poor sexual decision are typically higher for women than for men. Even the thought of tongue-kissing a sibling or parent typically evokes strong disgust in women. Alongside “beats me up,” “will have sex with other people when he is with me,” and “is addicted to drugs,” “is my sibling” is one of the most powerful deal breakers for women.

Most deal breakers, however, are simply the inverses of the qualities that women desire—lacking resources, drive, ambition, or status; lacking intelligence; being undependable or emotionally unstable; being small, weak, or feminine in appearance; being unhealthy or asymmetrical; being mean or cruel; and lacking love specifically for the woman doing the mate selecting.”

Thus, avoiding deal breakers is more critical than displaying exceptional qualities; the absence of fundamental traits effectively disqualifies a potential mate.

“Men strive to control resources and to exclude other men from resources to fulfill women’s mating preferences. In human evolutionary history, men who failed to accumulate resources failed to attract mates. Men’s more powerful status and resource acquisition drives are due, at least in part, to the preferences that women have expressed over the past few million years. To paraphrase the evolutionary anthropologist Sarah Hrdy, “Men are one long breeding experiment run by women.” “

Men have been shaped, in part, by female mate preferences. This naturally raises the complementary question: what do men desire? This question is taken up in Chapter Three, What Men Want.