When Are Male Artists Most Attractive to Women?

When are male artists most attractive to women?

To find the answer, evolutionary psychologists Martie Haselton and Geoffrey Miller recruited 41 women between the ages of 20 and 30 as participants. The researchers first recorded data on the timing of their menstrual cycles, then showed them profiles of two men.

The two men were virtually identical on most measures, differing significantly only in wealth and artistic creativity. One was exceptionally creative (let’s call him the “poor artist”), while the other was wealthy but only mediocre in artistic creativity (let’s call him the “wealthy philistine”).

After reading the profiles, the women first rated how much they liked each man on a scale from 1 to 9, then answered: “Which of these two men do you think would be more attractive for a short-term sexual relationship?”

The results were as follows:

The favorability ratings showed that the women’s feelings toward the “poor artist” were highly correlated with their menstrual cycles, while their feelings toward the “wealthy philistine” were completely unaffected by their cycles. Specifically, when the women were ovulating (the time when the likelihood of conception is highest), their favorability toward the “poor artist” reached its peak.

Their willingness to engage in a short-term sexual relationship showed a similar pattern: during ovulation, 92% of the participants chose the “poor artist” over the “wealthy philistine”, while outside ovulation, only 55% chose the “poor artist”.

The conclusion seems to be that when women are at the fertility peak of their menstrual cycle, male artists are most preferred.

What does this tell us?

Many studies on changes in mate preferences across the menstrual cycle have found that during ovulation—the fertility peak—women seem to place greater weight on men’s inner endowments, traits that directly reflect survival ability, such as health, strength, and good looks. Outside this peak, the weight given to outer endowments—traits that reflect survival ability more indirectly, such as wealth and status—increases.

This suggests that artistic creativity may also be a trait that directly reflects men’s inner endowments.

In the view of Leonard Mlodinow, author of Elastic: Flexible Thinking in a Time of Change, the inner endowment reflected in artistic creativity is a person’s ability to respond flexibly to change, because artistic creation involves a great deal of thinking beyond convention. In other words, artistic creativity is a concentrated expression of flexible thinking. And the ability to solve problems flexibly is an endowment that can directly improve survival ability. So when women are ovulating, the weight of this endowment becomes especially prominent.

References:

1.Martie G. Haselton and Geoffrey F. Miller, “Women’s Fertility Across the Cycle Increases the Short-Term Attractiveness of Creative Intelligence,” Human Nature 17 (2006): 50–73.

2.Mlodinow, L. (2018). Elastic: Flexible Thinking in a Time of Change. Pantheon.

Note

• This series of “New Findings in Psychology” articles consisted of short popular-psychology pieces and informal essays written at the time to accompany the related content of Zhichao Wei: New Findings in Psychology Course. They were published on the now-closed platform Făntuán, and the original link no longer exists.