“Men fall in love through their eyes. Women fall in love through their ears.”
– Zsa Zsa Gabo
“It’s the relationships between people that are more important than the sort of far away fantasies of what the good life is, the world of supermodels and Bud ads.”
– Mira Sorvino
“I would be happy not even being a supermodel. Being able to get a taste of everything that I want a taste of makes me happy.”
– Summer Altice
One problem with many relationships is that people think that their soul-mate has to look like a supermodel (both male and female). People tend to chase their potential partners mainly because of their physical attractiveness, when they should be more focused on who would make a great partner or teammate. There’s more to this issue, and that is what we are going to discuss in this chapter.
Because of the power of the social media and some enduring stereotypes about the power of physical attractiveness, many people come to believe that their soul mate has to look like a supermodel. Think about it; pictures of supermodels surround us everywhere we go. They get an unbalanced abundance of our attention on many fronts. Supermodels are present where people go shopping. They line the walls of Target, the mall stores and even at Wal-Mart. Supermodels saturate our television programs.
During the 1990s, there was an attempt by some US corporations to use more regular-looking models in their advertising. One reason for this shift was to combat the rising incidences of eating disorders. Because people felt that they had to look like the thin models they saw in their social media, they were literally dying to be popular.
However, despite their good intentions, these advertising campaigns quickly faded as most advertisers kept on featuring skinny models in their ads. When the revenues of the politically-correct advertisers started to wane, they quickly reverted back to their old ways. Today, eating disorders have skyrocketed for women as well as for males. And there doesn’t seem to be any end to this phenomenon in the near future.
Nowadays, people seek out the most beautiful and handsome partners they can realistically attract. The draw is so strong that “normal” people are even having risky surgeries to help them attain the status and social power they associate with being physically attractive. Today, there is a surgical procedure to replace or enhance almost any body part that someone may want to “upgrade.”
But let me ask you a serious question: What are the chances that an actual supermodel can actually match up on all the desirable social characteristics that make a successful relationship? Think about the issue like this: all social phenomena are aligned on a basic bell curve distribution. In laymen’s language, this means that there is a mean (an average) on which most people are located. Out in each direction, the number of people that are near this average declines. So on both sides of the bell curve, the most outer extremes are called “outlier.”
In my decades of helping people with their relationship issues, many have pursued only A-list potential partners that are very physically attractive. But in the long run, most of these people were extremely disappointed when their own physical attractiveness began to diminish with age, and their supermodel partner traded them in for a newer and younger model. I hate to be the one to tell you, but if you live by “looks” you may also die by “looks.”
Why Is Physical Attractiveness So Important?
Dr. Rajiv Jhangiani and Dr. Hammond Tarry co-authored an informative piece on why people put so much value on physical attractiveness. In their article, they cut right to the chase:
“You might find yourself wondering why people find physical attractiveness so important when it seems to say so little about what the person is really like as a person. If beauty is really only “skin deep,” as the proverb goes, why are we so concerned with it?… One reason that we like attractive people is because they are rewarding.”
Jhangiani and Tarry then go on to discuss the many reasons beautiful people are socially rewarding. They came up with a name for stereotype. It’s called the “what is beautiful is good” stereotype.
One reason is simply because we enjoy being around them as well as looking at them. Just being near an attractive person can make us feel good about ourselves. After all, physical attractiveness can imply high status. And a consequence of being near someone with high status is that we like being around people who have it. In addition, the positive social status of attractive people tends to “rub off” on those around them (Sigall & Landy, 1973).
People are also attracted to beautiful people because they are seen to have more positive character traits. They are perceived as better relationship partners, as better friends; as smarter individuals; as being more sexually adept; among a list of other things (Eagly, Ashmore, Makhijani, & Longo, 1991).
Another huge benefit of being physically attractive is that people treat them more favorably as well as those that are closely associated with them. Beautiful people receive many social benefits from others. They are given better grades in school. They tend to do better on their job interviews. Beautiful people even receive more lenient sentences during court proceedings (Hosoda, Stone-Romero, & Coats, 2003). .
Most of us are aware of these stereotypes about physical attractiveness and thus, we make use of it whenever we can. People make a concerted effort to look their best on dates, at job interviews, and for court appearances.
Jhangiani and Tarry go on to claim that the “what is beautiful is good” stereotype may actually be a self-fulfilling prophecy. These results are probably partly the result of self-fulfilling prophecies. Since we expect attractive individuals to be more friendly and warm, and because they want to be around them, we ultimately treat good-looking individuals better than their unattractive counterparts.
According to research by Diener, Wolsic, & Fujita, 1995, studies indeed have found some substantiation for the idea that physically attractive individuals are in fact better at socializing, and thus are more popular and less lonely compared with less attractive individuals.
Ultimately, treating physically attractive people better may make them feel better about themselves and thus they are likely to develop more self-confidence in their personal and social endeavors. Nevertheless, our stereotyped expectations about the special distinctiveness of physically attractive and unattractive individuals tend to be much stronger than the real differences between them.
Mother Nature may also have something to do with people’s desire to date and marry physically attractive partners. Good-looks are something normally associated with youth. Hardly does someone envision an eighty-year old when they define someone as being good-looking. Mother Nature designed humans to procreate the species. Her ideal age for women to give successful birth was 22 years of age. Women’s hips are wide enough to give birth to a healthy baby. After thirty years old, a woman runs some risk to her baby’s and her own life by giving birth at such a middle-aged time in her life. Modern medicine has no doubt decreased this risk, but Mother Nature’s plan is still in place.
Younger fertile women need to look good to attract a healthy mate. After they successfully give birth, they no longer necessarily need to attract a suitor and mate with which to procreate. Thus, Mother Nature made women’s bodies get less attractive after she gives birth. As far as Mother Nature is concerned, the young mother has accomplished her goal of reproducing. Thus, according to Mother Nature, there is no longer a need for a mother to look sexy in order to attract a mate. A mother’s purpose is to raise healthy children. Such a task doesn’t require her to “look good” while doing so. So as you may have guessed, the term MILF is a rather recent invention.
Our society has artificially expanded the need for women (and men) to look physically attractive into middle-life and beyond. This phenomenon is a result of our social conventions and is correlated with the recently developed social media that puts and emphasis on physical attractiveness and youth as opposed to the normal aging patterns designed by Mother Nature. Look at older pictures from the turn of the 20th-Century. Mothers weren’t trying to look youthful to impress anyone. Their social status was derived from being a good mother and eventually a decent grandmother. They didn’t have to look good while serving as a good housewife.
Males, on the other hand, are also often consumed with their looks. However, in their cases, if they become financially successful, they can supplant the need to look good with the need to provide an extremely comfortable lifestyle for their wife and children. I guess you can say that it’s a result of the gendered double standard rearing it’s ugly head again.
CONCLUSION
Because of the power of the social media, many people come to believe that their soul mate has to look like a supermodel. Yet, what are the chances of an actual supermodel matching up on all the desirable social characteristics that make a successful relationship? In my decades of helping people with their relationship issues, many have pursued only A-list potential partners that are physically attractive. But in the long run, they were extremely disappointed when their own physical attractiveness began to diminish with age, and their supermodel partner traded them in for a newer and younger model. I hate to be the one to tell you, but if you live by “looks” you may also die by “looks.”
“She’s So Beautiful. Why Would Anyone Breakup With Her?”
During one of my college lectures, I used told a story about my younger sister who is a successful model, actress and game show personality. In the story I told, I casually mentioned that she had recently gone through a nasty breakup with a recent boyfriend of hers. I went on to tell the class about some of the details of the breakup. The lecture went over well, and the students seemed to understand the points I had been trying to convey to them.
After class, I would normally have a group of about ten or fifteen students hang out to chat about issues I had lectured about during class. This day was no exception. But what was an exception was that one of the male students seemed to be waiting impatiently to talk to me.
Using my peripheral vision, I kept an eye on him. Something seemed to be bothering him. He just seemed pensive about something. I will admit; his actions piqued my curiosity. However, I wasn’t sure whether or not this was a good thing or a bad thing. I would just have to wait to find out.
After what seemed like forever, I soon finished interacting with the other students in the group. Now it was this guy’s turn to chat with me about whatever it was that seemed to be bothering him. I took a deep breath and asked him, “How can I help you?”
It seemed like this student was having trouble formulating his thoughts in order to ask me about whatever it was that was concerning him. He could barely make eye contact with me. He kept looking down and away as though he wasn’t sure about something. Then he seemed to gather the confidence to just say what was on his mind and asked me in a dramatic and hurried manner, “Can you help me understand something you said during your lecture?”
“Of course I can. What did I say that needs clarification?”
The student was nervously rubbing his hands and asked me, “Your sister is so beautiful. Why would anyone want to breakup with her?”
I was stunned! I certainly didn’t see that one coming. It was obvious that this guy thought that a woman’s beauty was at the top of the list of their desirable personal traits. He didn’t ask if she was a good person. He didn’t inquire about the social dynamics involved with their clash of personalities. All he knew was that a guy should never breakup with a woman who was so stunningly beautiful.
I wasn’t sure how to explain the reality of how the world works during that short interaction with him. So I used some big-sounding words and some academic-sounding gibberish hoping that he would be satisfied with my answer and disengage from our conversation. My ploy worked. Although I could tell that the guy was still contemplating the issue as he exited the classroom still rubbing his head.
The next time I presented that particular lecture about beauty and its effects on relationships, I was sure to mention that often times, guys think that if they date or marry a supermodel, the rest of their male fantasies will fall into place. I hated to be the bearer of bad news, but I had to pop that fantasy bubble if I was going to have any real classroom credibility in the future.
Some of the most beautiful individuals are given “their way” so often that they come to expect it. (See the chapter on saturation/ deprivation) When great-looking people become used to people offering to do stuff for them, they often take advantage of such generosity. Thus, because they become used to such treatment, they may act in an inconsiderate manner about things that don’t serve their agenda
My sister that we were discussing gave me a picture of her to put in my university office. She wanted to hear what the cute college boys would have to say about it. And let me tell you, a good number of male students indeed asked about her. But something happened related to that picture that I hadn’t foreseen happening.
Many times, after viewing my sister’s picture, the guy would ask me to set them up with her. This happened on a regular basis. I would try and make excuses for why I didn’t want to set them up with her.
One of the reasons I didn’t want to set anyone up with my sister was because if they did get together, and then they experienced any relationship problems, it would place me square in the middle of their drama. Therefore, I would try to make up a few simple excuses as to why I couldn’t comply with their requests to date her. I managed to come up with some routine excuses that were my go-to whenever this happened.
Many guys assumed that I was just being the protective Hispanic older brother. I wasn’t. Quite frankly, as her brother, I had witnesses firsthand how she treated most regular guys. She was so used to her beauty translating into getting her way. Thus, she often acted in a selfish manner and was very inconsiderate when it came to stuff like being on time, or expecting guys to cater to her wishes. I’m not purposely “throwing her under the bus.” This happens to the most stunningly attractive individuals. Not all of course, but I would say it happens to the majority of them.
I realized that she had these character traits. Plus, she was my sister, and I had seen her growing up playing outside and being a normal young girl. Thus, I wasn’t memorized by her beauty. Yet, sometimes, she even expected me to give her her way, and to cater to her needs. However, that didn’t work with me. I had nothing to lose by not deferring to her every whim. If she was late, I would tell her about it. If she wanted a favor from me, she couldn’t just bat her seductive feminine eyes and have me jump at her every command. What was she going to do when I refused? Not date me?
I was also lucky enough to date a few stunningly attractive women during my life. So I wasn’t inclined to play the “give a hot babe her way in order to impress her” game. I appreciated their beauty, but it didn’t define our relationships. It was a nice compliment to their personalities, but it wasn’t the only glue that cemented our relationships together.
I was, however, able to observe how other guys acted around these pretty girlfriends. Guys would go to some great lengths to impress them.
One of the things that stuck out while dating and being in a relationship with such beautiful women was how “tough guys” would want to pick a fight with me so that they could steal them away from me. This happened more often than I can count. Having a beautiful girlfriend does have perks. Then again, being in a relationship with one also has its drawbacks. This issue is addressed in the chapter on passion.
REFERENCES:
Diener, E., Wolsic, B., & Fujita, F. (1995). Physical attractiveness and subjective well-being. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 69(1), 120–129;
Eagly, A. H., Ashmore, R. D., Makhijani, M. G., & Longo, L. C. (1991). What is beautiful is good, but…: A meta-analytic review of research on the physical attractiveness stereotype. Psychological Bulletin, 110(1), 109–128.
Hosoda, M., Stone-Romero, E. F., & Coats, G. (2003). The effects of physical attractiveness on job-related outcomes: A meta-analysis of experimental studies. Personnel Psychology, 56(2), 431–462.
Jhangiani, R., & Tarry H. (2022) Principles of Social Psychology – 1st International H5P Edition. https://opentextbc.ca/socialpsychology/chapter/initial-attraction/.
Sigall, H., & Landy, D. (1973). Radiating beauty: Effects of having a physically attractive partner on person perception. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 28(2), 218–224.
