Male Long-Term Mating Strategies

1. Male Long-Term Mating Strategies The Problems of Paternity

2. Foundation of Male Mating • Minimum investment • Considerably lower in human men than in women • In ancestral environment, men had relatively little to lose by copulating with a “less fit” partner • Male reproductive variance (e.g., Ismail the Bloodthirsty)

3. Why Invest At All? (1) • If there is little cost to reckless mating, then why adopt a long-term strategy? • Benefits to offspring (survival, future reproductive success) • Paternity certainty • Non-committing men would have suffered in mating market

4. Why Invest At All? (2) • Parental effort • Proportion of total reproductive effort invested in rearing and defense of offspring • Mating effort • Proportion of total reproductive effort invested in the acquisition & maintenance of sexual mates • Parental and mating effort often conflict

5. Reproductive Value • While fertility in men may decrease over the lifespan, it does so only slightly • Women, however, have a much smaller reproductive window • Men should be attuned to signals of a woman’s reproductive value • Number of children a person of a certain age and sex is likely to have in the future

6. Cues of Youth & Health • Men prefer • Slightly younger women than themselves • Particularly, women in peak reproductive age • Healthy women • Tradeoff between fecundity and fertility for long-term investors

7. Beauty Standards • May be both physical and behavioural • People of all ages (including infants) are capable of discriminating beauty standards • There is cross-cultural agreement on many standards (though variation as well)

8. Symmetry and Averageness • Fluctuating asymmetry is a marker of developmental stability • Low FA is seen as attractive • Increases with age • May be associated with psychological characteristics as well • Averageness is also preferred in mates

9. Waist-to-Hip Ratios (1) • Proportion of body fat is a variable beauty standard across cultures • At puberty, body fat distribution differs between boys & girls • In girls, fat is distributed around upper thighs, buttocks, and hips • This decreases the waist-to-hip ratio

10. Waist-to-Hip Ratios (2) • Male range: .85-.95 • Female range: .67-.80 • WHR is negatively correlated with • Fertility • Health • Has been demonstrated cross-culturally, though there is disagreement

11. Two Objections re: Ovulation • Buss may have mislead you on two points 1. There is no evidence that concealed ovulation was selected for; rather, “advertised” ovulation probably evolved 2. There is no evidence that men can detect women in their ovulatory phase

12. Paternity Uncertainty • Due to paternity uncertainty, men prefer • Premarital chastity • Sexual fidelity • Mother & her family put great emphasis on reassuring father of his paternal status • Men care more about the resemblance of offspring than women

13. Context Effects • Man’s status & prestige • High standards • Greater age discrepancies • Pin-ups & Centrefolds • Appear to have an effect of raising standards • Do not appear to elicit misogyny or violence, per se

14. The Wrap-Up • Minimum investment • Male parental investment • Parental effort & mating effort • Cues of youth & health • Symmetry, averageness, WHR • Concealed vs. advertised ovulation • Paternity uncertainty

15. Things to Come • Short-term mating • Costs & benefits • Adaptive problems • Evidence