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Interpersonal Attraction - Coggle Diagram

- - - - Festinger et al. (1950) demonstrated that attraction and propinquity rely not only on actual physical distance but also on "functional distance", which refers to aspects of architectural design that determine which people you cross paths with most often e.g. living at the foot of the stairs or near the mailboxes meant that one would see upstairs residents quite often.
    - - However, there is a caveat: If the person in question is an obnoxious jerk, then the more exposure you have, the greater your dislike becomes. But in the absence of negative qualities, familiarity tends to breed attraction and liking.
      - E.g. Back et al. (2008): initial ratings showed that students who sat in neighbouring seats or in the same row had higher initial attraction scores that those seated far apart. A year later, they asked these students to rate the members of their original class again in terms of how much they liked them, how well they knew them, and to what degree they were friends. Once again, those who had sat side by side or in the same row the prior semester were significantly more likely to be friends a year later than those who sat far apart.
  - - - The more similar someone's opinions are to yours,
        the more you will like the person
        
        Newcomb (1961) randomly assigned male students at the University of Michigan to be roommates in a particular dormitory at the start of the school year. Would similarity predict friendship formation? Yes, men became friends with those who were similar in attitudes, values, and personality characteristics.
        
        In a study of gay men's relationships, those who scored high on a test of stereotypically male traits desired most of all a partner who was logical -- another stereotypically masculine trait. Gay men who scored high on a test of stereotypically female traits desired most of all a partner who was expressive -- another stereotypically feminine trait. Similar personality traits are important for heterosexual couples and for friends as well.
    - - We choose to enter certain social situations e.g. a class where we then find similar others. E.g. in a study of the patterns of students' friendships that focused on the effects of "tracking" (grouping students by academic ability), researchers found that students were significantly more likely to choose friends from inside their track than from outside it
    - - In a third study, participants arrived at a lab and were introduced to a partner who was already sitting. Handed a chair, they were told to have a seat, at which point the research team secretly measured how close to the partner's chair they put down their own chair. A separate set of researchers later evaluated photos of both the participant and the partner. Pairs judged as more physically similar had sat, on average, closer to each other.
      - People are also more likely to ask people who are similar to them in terms of attractiveness level on dates.
      - People also tend to be drawn to people who are more genetically similar to them. That is, friends tend to have similar DNA than do strangers. Christakis and Fowler (2014) found that participant shared more DNA with their friends than with strangers, to a degree that participants were as genetically similar to their average friend than they would be to someone who shared a great-great-great grandparent.
        
        It should be noted that this study was correlational. In addition, people tend to make friends with others who live near them, and individuals of similar genetic ancestry may be more likely to share such geographical propinquity. And perhaps certain genetic predispositions e.g. an athletic build and good lung capacity make people more likely to select certain activities and frequent certain locales. These explanations suggest interesting interactions between our genetic and social tendencies.
    - - While similarity is very important in close relationships, it is important to make a distinction between actual and perceived similarity
        
        It was found that in long-term relationships, individuals' beliefs about how similar they were to another person predicted liking and attraction better than their actual similarity did. Thus, feeling similar to another is what's really important -- so much so that we will sometimes create beliefs about the similarity between ourselves and intimate others even when they don't exist
      - A lack of similarity does appear to play an important role in one type of relationship. Amodio and Showers (2005) found that whether similarity or complementarity was important depended on the level of commitment research participants felt toward their romantic partner. If participants wanted a committed relationship, they chose a similar partner; however, if they felt a low level of commitment to the relationship, they favored dissimilar partners.
  - - - Whether the clues are nonverbal or verbal, perhaps the most crucial determinant of whether we will like a person is the extent to which we believe that person likes us
    - - However, not all respondents showed this bias to stare a bit longer at attractive faces. Participants who had previously been asked to imagine that someone whom they had a crush on also had feelings for them. As the researchers suggest, it makes sense that this type of interest from someone else would disrupt our otherwise default focus on attractive alternatives. More generally, few factors are stronger predictors of being attracted to someone than finding out that the person is attracted to you.
  - - - There was no great difference between men and women on this count. This is interesting as several studies have found that men and women pay equal attention to the physical attractiveness of others, but other studies have reported that men value attractiveness more than women do. A meta-analysis found that while both sexes value attractiveness, men value it a bit more. However, this gender difference was greater when their attitudes were being measured rather than their actual behavior. Thus, men may be more likely to say that physical attractiveness is important to them, but when it comes to actual behavior, the sexes are fairly similar in how they respond. Both genders rated physical attractiveness as the single most important characteristic that triggers sexual desire (straight men, gay men, and women)
    - - The media tells us that beauty is associated with goodness e.g. children's books and Disney movies tell us that heroines and princes have a specific look. The female protagonists have small, pert noses, big eyes, shapely lips, blemish-free complexions, and slim, athletic bodies.
        
        We often share criteria for defining beauty. Cunningham (1986) designed a creative study to determine these standards of beauty. He asked college men to rate the attractiveness of 50 photographs of women, taken from a college yearbook and from an international beauty-pageant program. He found that high attractiveness ratings for female faces were associated with large eyes, a small nose, a small chin, prominent cheekbones, high eyebrows, large pupils, and a big smile. They found that male faces with large eyes, prominent cheekbones, a large chin, and a big smile received higher attractiveness levels.
      - Cultural standards of beauty
        
        People's perceptions of what is beautiful is similar across cultures. In a study across countries, ethnicities, and racial groups, it was found that the correlations between participants' ratings were strong, ranging from 0.66 to 0.93. A meta-analysis of several studies by Langlois and colleagues (2000) also found evidence for cross-cultural agreement.
        
        Researchers have suggested that humans came to find certain dimensions of faces attractive during the course of our evolution e.g. infants prefer photos of attractive faces to unattractive faces, and infants prefer the same photos as adults. One aspect is beauty that is preferred in both men and women is symmetry, where the size, shape, and location of the features on one side of the face match those on the other. Evolutionary psychologists suggest that we're attracted to symmetrical features because they serve as markers of good health and reproductive fitness. E.g. composite photographs of faces -- composite photographs judged as more attractive than the separate faces that created them for both male and female photographs.
        
        This doesn't mean that we find "average looking" faces the most attractive, but rather, people with features that appear to be of average size and dimension. Perret et al. 1994) made this clear in a study that showed that people preferred composites of highly attractive faces more than composites of average attractiveness faces (in Britain and Japan).
        
        In the end, the crucial variable on which much of interpersonal attraction hinges may actually be familiarity -- "averaging" faces together produces one face that looks typical, familiar, and physically attractive. Research also uncovered a more startling familiarity effect: When participants rated the attractiveness of faces, they preferred faces that most resembled their own.
    - - Badr & Abdallah (2001) rated the physical attractiveness and health status of premature infants born in hospitals in Beirut, Lebanon. They found that physical attractiveness significantly predicted the health outcomes of these infants above and beyond factors such as their medical condition. The more attractive the infant, the more quickly he/she gained weight and the shorter the stay in the hospital. The reason was because neonatal nurses responded more to the "prettier" infants and gave them better care.
        
        Other benefits: People of above-average looks tend to earn 10% to 15% more than those of below-average appearance. College professors perceived as attractive tend to receive higher student evaluation ratings. Attractiveness also helps win elections -- Berggren et al. (2010) found that ratings of attractiveness were the best predictors of the actual number of votes each candidate got in real Finnish elections. A higher beauty rating predicted an increase of between 2.5 and 2.8 percentage points in the vote total for female candidates and between 1.5 and 2.1 percentage points for male candidates.
      - Many studies have found that physical attractiveness affects the attributions people make about others (and vice versa). Specific example of the halo effect: a cognitive bias in which the perception that an individual possesses one positive characteristic makes us more likely to believe that he or she also possesses other (unrelated) positive characteristics. We tend to attribute to beautiful people other good qualities, including some that have nothing to do with their looks, buying into a "what is beautiful is good" stereotype.
        
        Meta-analyses have revealed that physical attractiveness has its largest effect on attributions related to social competence: The beautiful are thought to be more sociable, extroverted, and popular than the less attractive. They are also seen as more sexual, happier, and more assertive. A study of dating websites found that users who posted more attractive photos were also rated as having written more attractive profile descriptions.
        
        These stereotypes operate across cultures. E.g. college students in South Korea were asked to rate a number of yearbook photographs. Both male and female participants thought the more physically attractive people would also be more socially skilled, friendly, and well adjusted -- the same group of traits that North American participants thought went with physical attractiveness. But they differed in some other traits they assigned to the beautiful, highlighting differences in what is considered important in each culture. For American and Canadian students, included traits of personal strength; for Korean students, included integrity and concern for others.
        
        The stereotype that the beautiful are particularly gifted in the area of social competence has some research support. Highly attractive people do develop good social interaction skills and report having more satisfying interactions with others than do less-attractive people.
        
        A leading explanation is that because the beautiful, from a young age, receive a great deal of attention that in turn helps them develop good social skills (self-fulfilling prophecy)
        
        Researchers gave men a photo and a packet of information about a woman whom they were about to have a phone conversation (the photograph was either of a woman rated as attractive or unattractive, and was not the person they were actually speaking with). The men who thought they were talking to an attractive woman responded to her in a warmer, more sociable manner than the men who thought they were talking to an unattractive woman. The men's behavior influenced how the woman behaved: When independent observers listened to a tape recording of only the woman's half of the conversation (without knowing about the photograph), they rated her as more confident, animated, and warm than they rated those woman whose male partners thought they were unattractive. Subsequent studies have found similar results with the gender roles reversed.
  - - - Males' reproductive success is measured by the quantity of their offspring; they pursue frequent pairings with many females to maximize their number of surviving progeny.
        
        Buss (1988b): men look for a woman who appears capable of reproducing successfully.
      - Females' reproductive success lies in successfully raising each of their offspring to maturity. They pair less frequently and only with carefully chosen males, because the cost to them of raising and ensuring the survival of each offspring is so high.
        
        Buss (1988b): women look for men who can supply the resources and support she needs to raise a child.