Women Prefer Girly-Men, Says Study

In the midst of the summer TV doldrums, I accidently tuned in last night to the new game show, The Power of 10 (turn audio down) where I was pleasantly surprised to learn that 82 percent of Americans apparently told pollsters that they would prefer to be smart and ugly rather than good-looking and dumb. 

Anyway, a new study by British researchers finds that women don't go for guys with excessively masculine features–they judge them too prone to procreate and run. The press release for the report states:

Women see 'masculine' men as unsuitable long-term partners, according to research from the Universities of St Andrews and Durham. 

Conversely, the psychologists found that men with feminine facial features are seen as more committed and less likely to cheat on their partners.

The study, which is published in the current edition of Personality and Individual Differences, asked over 400 British men and women to judge digitally altered pictures of male faces made to look more masculine or feminine.  The participants were asked to predict personality traits including sexual behaviour and parenting skills based on what they saw. 

Men with masculine faces, with features such as a square jaw, larger nose and smaller eyes, were classed as significantly more dominant, less faithful and made worse parents than feminine-featured males.  They were also thought to have personalities that were less warm when compared to their `feminine' counterparts, who had finer facial features with fuller lips, wide eyes and thinner, more curved eyebrows.  The scientists say it gives further insight into what people see in others when choosing potential partners.

Whole release here.

Kudos to an anonymous St. Andrews alum for the link.