On Being Hot
We all know the ritual of The Bachelor or Bachelorette tv shows. We watch the season and then avidly discuss the suitability of the contestants for the lovelorn man or woman by spending significant time judging the behaviours and physical appearance of the cast.
Fans of The Bachelor franchise have been on a wild ride through COVID, with the dropping out of Clare Crawley, and Tayshia Adams picking up as the Bachelorette but with the cast of men picked out for Clare. With COVID-19 slowing filming and production, we’ve been waiting a long time to judge… I mean WATCH… the men and their suitability for the Bachelorette, whoever she may be.
The most dramatic season yet
This anticipation (and our obsession with the show) likely has something to do with us judging if it’s a fit with the Bachelor or Bachelorette not only based on personality, but also on level of attractiveness.
Are we being superficial? Do we really judge people that actively on level of attractiveness?
Today we ask: Does someone’s level of attractiveness dictate who they can, could, or do choose to date?
Inconvenient Truth Joke?
What worth has beauty if it is not seen? - Italian Proverb
Let’s get a few things out of the way here about attractiveness.
In our society, being more attractive is better than being less attractive. Research has found that attractive people are judged more favourably, are more likely to be hired for a job or paid more, and perceived to be more social, friendly, and warm. This holds across cultures and is called the attractiveness bias. All this to say we are judged by our appearance.
Biologically speaking, increased attractiveness increases the chances of higher quality mate selection. And research has found that attractive people are more likely to date attractive others.
On top of that, research has found a standard, culturally-independent sense of beauty, meaning that, other than holding for stylistic choices, we have a globally stable sense of what is hot.
So if all the ‘hot’ people are dating other ‘hot’ people, like we are seeing on The Bachelor, are all the other “less-than-hot” people just left sad and disappointed? Since we know everyone has a general sense of what’s attractive, do the normal-looking people have to do something in their minds to accept a less-hot partner?
This is exactly what a team of well-decorated researchers sought to find out (i.e., Leonard Lee from Columbia University; George Loewenstein from Carnegie Mellon University; Dan Ariely from MIT at the time; and, James Hong & Jim Young from HOTorNOT.com). The researchers were investigating if one’s own level of hotness impacts their perception of other people’s hotness.
Partnering with website HOTorNOT.com, they looked at member’s ratings of other people’s attractiveness as well as their requests to other members. This is what they found…
Poor sun :(
Not Hots Are Less Picky
They found that people were 130% more likely to accept a date invite in line with every one unit increase in that person’s level of attractiveness (so the hotter the person asking, the more likely someone was to say yes). On the flip side, they found that attractive people had a much lower propensity to say yes to the date requests from others; for every unit decrease in attractiveness of the person being asked, they were 25% more likely to say yes to date requests.
The perils of online dating
So normal-looking people were more likely to accept dates, and were less choosy about the date’s level of attractiveness.
Differences in Attractiveness Are More of a Problem for the More Attractive Person in the Pair
Differences in hotness between potential daters seems to matter. But would people have a problem with someone who is way more attractive than them asking them out? The researchers found that people weigh negative differences between themselves and the other person way more than positive differences. I.e., if you are the hotter person, the other person’s lack of attractiveness is a problem for you, and you are less likely to accept their request.
Do the Normal-Looking People Have a Different Sense of What’s Hot?
What about these normal-lookin’ folks’ sense of what’s hot? Did they shift their perceptions to convince themselves that the not hot people they were willing to date were actually hot after all?
The researchers found that surprisingly, one’s own level of attractiveness does NOT impact our evaluations of other people’s attractiveness. Attractive people and normal-looking people generally ranked others the same.
Obi-Wan is not into it.
What does this all mean?
When it comes to judging other people’s attractiveness, we use our own attractiveness as a reference point when considering if we’ll say yes to a date. We objectively know if someone is hot or not, but our willingness to date them (or not) is dictated by our own attractiveness.
So, if the not hot people find the other not hot people not hot, why would they date them? Clearly we see all kinds of people of varying levels of attractiveness dating and not hot people aren’t simply alone forever. How do the researchers explain this situation?
In a follow-up study, researchers found that not hot people place more emphasis on features other than physical attractiveness (i.e., hotness doesn’t count for as much in their evaluations). Less attractive people tend to put less weight on hotness, and more on other attributes like sense of humour. Attractive people tend to care more about hotness.
This might be why we become judgier than normal while watching The Bachelor
We don’t really have much to go on in our evaluation of contestant suitability except for their physical attractiveness and a few minutes of screen time. We don’t get the chance to form a connection with the contestant or even truly feel and understand the connection between the contestant and the Bachelor/Bachelorette. So out come the hotness judgements to make sure the strapping gentlemen are really good enough for our Tayshia.
You Might Be Judging Yourself More Harshly than Others
Okay, being honest, many of us are not exactly supermodels like the people we see on the Bachelor. Should we be living under a rock somewhere? No, no, no, my friends! We are judging ourselves too harshly! Though research has found stable perceptions of beauty and physical attractiveness, we still find misalignment in one’s self-judgement compared to others’ perception of your level of attractiveness.
You might judge yourself more harshly than others
Research has found that women tend to judge themselves more harshly than the judgements of their suitors. Swami and team conducted a study across 26 countries and found that women compare their body shape and size with a subjective perceived ideal body shape and size, and are more likely to think that prospective partners would prefer slimmer body shapes. It turns out, however, that when the prospective partners were surveyed, they actually preferred a curvier shape. So women are judging themselves more harshly than their prospective partners.
Research has also found that we judge our physical appearance more harshly than our partner does, and attraction has been shown to deepen once people get to know each other. Other characteristics can be found as attractive, like being altruistic is linked to increased attraction, and creativity in men has been shown to make them more attractive in the eyes of women.
What’s inside is important
Essentially, all is not lost. Our partners tend to like us more for our insides anyway, and if you’re still out there looking, there is definitely still hope.
Love,
