Age Variation in Mating Strategies and Mate Preferences: Beliefs versus Reality?:
http://www.epjournal.net/filestore/ep07179205.pdf
General Discussion
In Study 1, the majority of our college student participants believed that their peers
look increasingly toward long-term committed relationships as they near graduation.
Further, over half of the students also believed that emerging adults place increasing value
on partners’ internal attributes, and less emphasis on their physical attributes, as they near
college graduation. Although our participants did not spontaneously mention changes in the
reverse direction, a solid direction for future research would be to provide participants with
all possible directions of change (e.g., more emphasis on physical attractiveness as well as
less emphasis on physical attractiveness), and ask them to rate each one for the extent to
which they believe it occurs as emerging adults progress through their twenties.
Studies 2 and 3 of this research documented that emerging adults of varying ages,
and in varying stages of their education, did not vary systematically in their mating desires.
Consequently, the sex differences that were observed were of consistent magnitude across
age: In every age group, men invested more than women did in physical attractiveness,
expressed more interest in pursuing sexual opportunities, and (in Study 2) foresaw
themselves having more sex partners in the future. These findings coincide with those of
studies that have involved both college student and non-college student samples (Grammer,
1992; Pawlowski and Koziel, 2002; Shackelford, Schmitt, and Buss, 2005), and they also
fit with sex differences, across age groups, in sex drive (e.g., Klusman, 2006). We caution
against over-interpreting the findings on foreseen number of sex partners, because an
evolutionary analysis does not necessitate that men and women have any conscious
awareness of a desire for future sex partners. Notably, Penke and Asendorpf (2008) have
introduced a valid and reliable, differentiated measure of short-term sexual strategy that
does not include an estimate of future number of sex partners. We recommend its use in
subsequent research on short-term sexual strategy.
A couple of trends in the data highlight the need for future research in this topic
with broad, representative samples of emerging adults of varying ages. For example, in
Study 3, in which we acquired an internet sample through a variety of popular sites, we
found in the overall sample less emphasis on physical attractiveness with age, and greater
emphasis on emotional stability and intelligence with age. We are currently in the process
of designing a longitudinal study to investigate these trends further. That said, the primary
limitation of the current investigation is its cross-sectional design. Study 2 and Study 3 data
were not collected prospectively, and thus do not serve as clear indicators of stability in
mating desires and preferences over time. However, there is little reason to suspect cohort
effects. It is reasonable to expect that, in overall distributions, the 18 year olds in the
sample will be similar at age 25 to those participants in the sample who are currently 25.
Regardless, we hope that this initial research prompts researchers to conduct prospective
investigations of individuals’ mating desires and preferences. An initial sample of
graduating high school seniors, followed up at various points over a decade, could
determine whether and how various factors, such as education, marriage and divorce,
children, and changes to one’s mate value, are tied to change in men’s and women’s mating
orientations and mate preferences.
And that's the most interesting part:
Conclusion
We have documented that young adults believe that their peers’ mating desires and
preferences change as they move through their college years and approach graduation.
Specifically, young adults believe that their fellow counterparts become more long-term
oriented and less short-term oriented, and more invested in internal characteristics and less
invested in external characteristics (such as attractiveness). However, the findings from our
two subsequent studies of emerging adults of varying ages suggest that men’s and women’s
mate preferences, short-term mating desires, and long-term mating desires vary little
between the ages of 18 and 26; sex differences in short-term mating desires and in value
placed on a mate’s physical attractiveness do not vary with age, either. In 1994, writing in
reference to their 1988 national probability dataset out of the United States that revealed
consistent gender differences in marital preferences, Sprecher et al. (1994) concluded with
the suggestion that, “gender differences in mate selection preferences could narrow in the
next two decades as young males and females are socialized to value the same traits and are
presented with equal opportunities in the larger social structure.” (p. 1079). Our research,
two decades later and with samples clearly embedded in that egalitarian social structure,
has failed to support their prediction. Cross-cohort consistencies are suggesting stability
over time in men’s and women’s disparate mating desires, perhaps yet again offering
“testimony to the long reach of human nature.” (Pinker, 2002, p. 254). Only prospective
investigations will clarify whether and how mating strategies and partner preferences might
change within individuals over time.
Sorry for the bad paragraph's shape but it's copied pasted from PDF, you can read it properly from the PDF doc.
So...I think that "men and women's preferences change significantly over time" have been debunked.
27 Apr 2009, 5:04 pm
