Adolescent/Adult Development Early Adulthood: Psychosocial Development - Ch. 19

1. Adolescent/Adult DevelopmentEarly Adulthood: Psychosocial Development - Ch. 19 Mar 29-Apr 5, 2010 Class #27-30

2. Theories of Adulthood Many theories describe, analyze, and predict the transformations that occur during adulthood Different theories about psychological needs reach similar conclusions

3. Two basic needs: affiliation and achievement or affection and instrumentality Maslow: hierarchy of needs Erikson: intimacy vs. isolation Love and Work

4. Ages and Stages Patterns of the Past by 20s: identity by 30s: intimacy by 40s: generativity Adult lives today “are less orderly and predictable than stage models suggest”

5. The Social Clock Culturally set timetable that establishes when various events and endeavors in life are appropriate What are some of the appropriate timetables in the United States?

6. Choosing Young-Adult Friends Physical attractiveness Apparent availability (willingness to chat) Absence of exclusion criteria Frequent exposure to each other

7. Perspectives on Attraction • We are attracted to others with whom a relationship is directly or indirectly rewarding • All humans exhibit patterns of attraction and mate selection that favor the conception, birth, and survival of their offspring • Evolutionary perspective

8. Familiarity: Being There • Who are we most likely to become attracted to? • Two basic and necessary factors in the attraction process: • Proximity • Exposure

9. The Proximity Effect • The single best predictor of attraction is physical proximity, or nearness • Where we live influences the friends we make • College students tend to date those who live either nearby or in the same type of housing as they do

10. The Mere Exposure Effect • Contrary to folk wisdom, familiarity does not breed contempt • The more often we are exposed to a stimulus, the more we come to like that stimulus • Familiarity can influence our self-evaluations

11. Physical Attractiveness • We react more favorably to others who are physically attractive than to those who are not • Bias for beauty is pervasive

12. Is Beauty an Objective Quality? • Some argue that certain faces are inherently more attractive than others • High levels of agreement for facial ratings across ages and cultures • Physical features of the face are reliably associated with judgments of attractiveness • Babies prefer faces considered attractive by adults

13. The Physical Attractiveness (beautiful-is-good) Stereotype • People within a culture, assume that attractive people have the traits that are valued by that culture • Adults and children are biased toward attractive people • Even infants stare at attractive people longer than unattractive people! • Lessons begin early – how many ugly heroes are there in children’s tales vs. the number of ugly villains?

14. The Benefits and Costs of Beauty • Being good-looking does not guarantee health, happiness, or high self-esteem • Attributional problems with being good-looking: • Is the attention and praise one receives due to one’s talents or just one’s good looks?

15. Other Costs of Beauty • Pressure to maintain one’s appearance • In American society, pressures are particularly strong when it comes to the body • Women are more likely than men to suffer from the “modern mania for slenderness” • Overall, being beautiful is a mixed blessing • Little relationship between appearance in youth and later happiness

16. This appears to be conflicting research… • Simpson, Gangestad, & Lerma (1990) • People involved in serious relationships rate beautiful models as less attractive • Kendrick et al. (1989) • Men viewing ravishing nude models in magazines gave lower ratings to average-looking women including their own wives • Appears contrast effect is in place here

17. How important is intelligence? • Men and women differ in this criterion for sexual partners • But not for long-term partners

18. Kenrick, Sadalla, Groth, & Trost (1990) Kenrick, Groth, Trost & Sadalla (1993) • Students in these series of studies were asked: • What is the minimum percentile of intelligence you would accept in considering someone for: • A DATE • A SEXUAL PARTNER • A ONE NIGHT STAND • A STEADY DATING PARTNER • A MARRIAGE PARTNER

19. Minimum Intelligence Desired Women desire slightly above average for a single date 50th %ile AVERAGE DATE • 

20. And want more with increasing commitment 50th %ile STEADY DATE SEX MARRIAGE • 

21. Men have similar criteria for dates STEADY DATE SEX MARRIAGE • 

22. And for long-term mates STEADY DATE SEX MARRIAGE • 

23. But men’s criteria are considerably lower for sexual partners STEADY DATE SEX MARRIAGE • 

24. The differences are even more pronounced for one-night stands STEADY DATE SEX MARRIAGE • 

25. First Encounters: Liking Others Who Are Similar • We tend to associate with others who are similar to ourselves… • Byrne (1971): • We like people who we perceive as having similar attitudes to our own • Rosenbaum (1986): • Similarity does not spark attraction; rather dissimilarity triggers repulsion, the desire to avoid someone

26. The Evolutionary Perspective Revisited: Mate Selection • Men and women by nature must differ in their optimal mating behaviors • Women must be highly selective because they are biologically limited in the number of children they can bear and raise in a lifetime • Men can father an unlimited number of children and ensure their reproductive success by inseminating many women

27. The Burger King Study • Townsend & Levy (1990) • Who would you prefer: a well-dressed unattractive person or a good-looking person in a Burger King outfit???

28. Burger King study: • Townsend and Levy (1990) looked at the effects of male status and ornamentation. • First, males were pre-rated into 2 groups: • Handsome versus homely • Each were put into 1 of 3 costumes: • Armani suit with Rolex (high status), white t-shirt (medium status), or Burger King uniform (low status) • They then did the same for females

29. The Factor of Age. • Older males are significantly more likely to have achieved a sound economic and financial status than younger, inexperienced males. • Buss (1989): In a cross-cultural survey female preference was for someone around 4 years older. • Kenrick & Keefe (1992): Females consistently married males who were around 5 years older than themselves.

30. Preferred Age Differences Buss (2001)

31. Actual Age Differences at Marriage Kenrick & Keefe (1992)

32. A Not Uncommon Result

33. Ability and Willingness to Provide Protection • Surveys consistently show that females prefer males who are socially dominant and have the respect of their peers. • Forming a relationship with a socially dominant male would confer greater direct access to resources and also raise the social status of the female. • Women pay close attention to how men interact with, and are treated by other men. • Sadella et al. (1987) made video’s depicting males and females engaging in dominant or submissive behavior with another male or a female. • Dominant behaviour increased the sexual attractiveness and dating desirability of the males, whilst female targets were unaffected.

34. Height • Height is associated with power and status and confers economic and social advantages. Taller men are perceived as being more dominant and we would predict that females should choose taller over shorter males. • Graziano et al. (1978) had women judge pictures of men who they believed to be short, medium or tall on attractiveness and dating desirability. Tall men were rated more positively than short men, though males of medium height were most preferred. • In a sample of over 4000 Polish men Pawlowski et al. (2000) found that height was significantly associated with the likelihood of getting married and having children. • Bachelors were significantly shorter than married men.

35. Facial Hair • In humans the presence or absence of head and facial hair provide strong social/sexual signals. • Facial hair is generated at puberty in the presence of testosterone and rate of beard growth is positively related to androgen levels. • It has been suggested that facial hair may have evolved as a dominance signal as it increases the apparent size of the jaw, itself a male secondary sexual characteristic. • Males with facial hair are rated as being more masculine, strong, potent, dominant and courageous, but also as lacking in self-control, dirty, aggressive and reckless (Reed & Blunk, 1990).

36. Facial Hair and Attractiveness? • Women often state that they do not find male facial hair attractive. • One study manipulated the extent of facial hair in Identi-kit pictures and found that attractiveness ratings increased as the quantity of facial hair increased (Hatfield & Sprecher, 1986). • There may be large cultural differences in this respect.

37. Cranial Hair • Muscarella & Cunningham (1996) suggested that male pattern baldness evolved as a signal of aging and social maturity. This may signal a male with enhanced social status but reduced physical aggression. • 6 male models with different levels of facial and cranial hair were rated on 32 social perception adjectives. • Males with facial hair and those with bald or receding hair were rated as being older than those who were clean-shaven, or had a full head of hair. • Beards and a full head of hair were also seen as being more aggressive and less socially mature, baldness was associated with less attractiveness and more social maturity.

38. Torso • Horvarth (1979) found that shoulder width was a strong positive predictor of the attractiveness of male figures. • Maisey et al., (1999) found that waist-chest ratio (WCR) was the principal determinant of attractiveness - males with an inverted triangle torso (narrow waist with broad chest and shoulders) were rated as being more attractive. • More recently, Hughes & Gallup (2003) showed that males with a high shoulder-to-hip ratio reported having sex at an earlier age, had more sexual partners, and more extrapair copulations. • A protruding stomach is seen as an exceptionally unattractive trait in men.

39. You Choose!

40. What do you find attractive in guys?

41. What do you find attractive in guys?

42. What do you find attractive in women?

43. What do you find attractive in women?

44. Athleticism • Physical competition is widespread in human societies and these ritualised encounters enable males to demonstrate speed, endurance, and strength. Sporting achievement is an honest signal of physical condition, motivation and competitiveness. • Faurie et al., (2004) predicted that: • Sports competitors should have more sexual partners than other people. • Number of partners should increase with performance level. • This should be particularly pronounced in males. • The predictions were confirmed in French students.

45. Facial Asymmetry and Health • Shackelford & Larsen (1998) measured the degree of facial asymmetry in students. • Greater asymmetry was related to self-reported depression, neuroses, inferiority, more physical health problems. • High FA males were also rated as being less attractive, less emotionally-stable, and less intelligent. • However, this link between facial symmetry and health is not always reported (Kalick et al., 1998).

46. Facial Symmetry and Attractiveness Buss, 1999 p 119

47. Influence of the Menstrual Cycle. • Penton-Voak et al., (1999): found that females preferred masculine-looking faces at ovulation, but less-masculine faces when non-fertile. • However, Koehler et al., (2002) asked non-pill-using females to rate the attractiveness of male faces varying in symmetry during menses and just before ovulation. • Females did have an overall preference for symmetry but this was irrespective of menstrual cycle phase.

48. Genetic Compatibility • Body odour serves as a cue for immunological health, Gangstead & Thornhill (1998) examined whether female olfactory preferences for male odour would favour the scent of more symmetrical men during ovulation. • For contraceptive pill users and females not ovulating, there was no relationship. • However, non pill-users when ovulating consistently preferred the scent of symmetrical men. • Herz & Inzlicht (2002) asked males and females to rank various physical characteristics in a potential partner. • While males where primarily concerned with physical attractiveness, females considered a man's smell to be more important than 'looks', 'money' or 'ambition'.

49. Ability and Willingness to Engage in Parenting • La Cerra (1994) presented pictures of males in several different conditions with children. • The picture of the male engaging in positive interactions with a small child yielded the most positive reactions. • The picture showing a male ignoring a child in distress led to the most negative ratings. • Women highly value characteristics such as ‘dependability’, ‘maturity’ and ‘emotional stability’. They may indicate that the male is willing to provide resources and continue his investment. • Expressions of love may be a signal of regular commitment and the majority of women require love for a long-term relationship.

50. To attract a female as a long-term mating partner, a male should.. • 1. Show evidence of ambition, hard work, and intelligence. • 2. Be generous (buy gifts, give to charity etc). • 3. Dress well. • 4. Be confident and assertive (around other males). • 5. Be taller than the woman in question. • 6. Be clean shaven and have a full head of hair. • 7. Have broad shoulders, be moderately hunky and have no beer belly. • 8. Be facially and physically symmetrical, and show good health. • 9. Be athletic and sporty. • 10. Smell ‘right’. • 11. Be nice to babies and children.