A new study suggests that men are more attracted to “nice” women while the opposite is true when referring to how women feel about men.
According to the study — conducted by graduate and undergraduate students from the Interdisciplinary Center (IDC) Herzliya, the University of Rochester and the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign — heterosexual men were sexually attracted to the responsiveness of their female partners, while women felt less so for men possessing the same quality.
In other words, nice guys finish last, but nice women are okay. So if you’ve recently decided to file for divorce and are thinking of getting back out there, keep that in mind.
Here’s how the researchers reached their conclusions via Huffington Post:
They created three environments in which men and women would interact with one another and share a recent negative, personal experience. One simulation was face-to-face and the other two were online (the chat partner’s responses were manipulated by the researchers, but photos of supposed chat partners were given to participants). The male and female participants then rated how responsive, how sexually attractive and how masculine or feminine their partners were.
In all three experiments, men found responsive women to be more feminine and attractive, while there didn’t seem to be any link between responsiveness and women’s perceptions of masculinity or male attractiveness. What’s more, men found these so-called “nice” women to be more worthy of a long-term relationship. Those who were found to be “responsive” empathized with the complainant, saying things like “You must have gone through a very difficult time” (versus something along the lines of “Doesn’t sound so bad to me”) when their partner shared his or her negative event. This type of understanding is what the researchers categorized as “nice.”
When you finish with the divorce papers, there can be an immediate urge to overdo it on the “nice” stuff. It’s only normal. After all, if you were committed in your marriage, then it’s likely been a while since you went through the first stages of courtship.
While no one is saying you shouldn’t be responsive in future relationships, try to remember that, just like you, many have their guard up due to their experiences with relationships past. Some may even be recovering from divorce forms of their own.
But don’t get discouraged and fall in to the trap of thinking that you’ve got to act a certain way. Be yourself, and that will guide you to the right people.