The effects of resource availability and relationship status on women's preference for masculinity: An eye-tracking study
Abstract
Previous research has demonstrated that perceived availability of environmental resources
affects the mate choice of females. However, it is unclear whether women’s partnership
status influences the effects of environmental circumstances on masculinity preference. Further, the role of environmental scarcity on women’s gaze patterns when evaluating male
faces has not been investigated. The current study investigated how relationship status and
environmental factors affected women’s gaze patterns and preference towards masculinised
and feminised male faces. Twenty-two participants in a long-term romantic relationship, and
26 who were single, were primed with either a high (‘wealthy’) or low (‘scarcity’) resource
availability scenario. They then completed a facial masculinity/femininity preference task
while eye-gaze behaviour was measured. Women in a relationship (but not single women)
had an increased preference towards masculine faces in the scarcity condition, compared to
the wealthy condition; this preference was also reflected in eye gaze behaviour. In contrast,
single women had longer first fixations on feminine rather than masculine faces when
evaluating them as long-term partners in the wealthy condition, but no overt preference for
either face type. These findings reveal the importance of taking women’s relationship status
into account in investigations of the role of environmental influences on masculinity
Introduction
Previous research has found that women’s preferences for male characteristics vary
according to socio-ecological factors in the environment. In conditions of poor health
(DeBruine, Jones, Crawford, Welling, & Little, 2010), high pathogen load (Lee & Zietsch,
2011; Little, DeBruine, & Jones, 2011; Watkins, DeBruine, Little, Feinberg, & Jones, 2012),
societal inequality (Brooks et al., 2011), and high levels of male intra-sexual competition
(Little, DeBruine, & Jones, 2013), women prefer men with more masculine characteristics,
presumably because masculinity is associated with better protection of the female, and/or
because of potential genetic benefits to the offspring (although see Scott, Clark, Boothroyd,
& Penton-Voak, 2013). However, the putative benefits associated with masculinity have a
trade-off with an increased risk of aggression (Carre & McCormick, 2008) and promiscuity
(Varella, Valentova, Pereira, & Busaab, 2014). Hence, masculinity might be less highly
valued when environmental resources are scarce, as paternal support in this context would be
more important for the successful upbringing of offspring.
A number of experimental studies have indeed demonstrated that perceived
availability of environmental resources affects the mate choice of females. For example,
when primed with environmental scarcity (i.e., low availability of resources), women’s
preferences divert to male characteristics relevant to fathering ability (Lee & Zietsch, 2011),
and their choice for long-term partners shifts to men with higher levels of facial femininity
(Little, Cohen, Jones, & Belsky, 2007). Facial femininity in men may be an indicator of good
fathering skills (Moore, Smith, Cassidy, & Perret, 2009) - a trait which is more valuable
when resources are scarce. Watkins et al. (2012) tested whether female’s judgements of male
scarcity and pathogen threat. They found that although women reported stronger attraction to
more masculine men under conditions of pathogen prevalence (as opposed to resource
scarcity), they rated masculine faces as more dominant when concerns about environmental
scarcity were activated. Their results suggest that when resources are scarce, women may
display an enhanced sensitivity towards dominant faces, which may aid discrimination of
men who pose a risk to their resources, but have a preference for feminine males as potential
partners.
Besides extrinsic environmental conditions, other factors may affect women’s
strategically flexible preference towards male masculinity. For instance, Little, Jones,
Penton-Voak, Burt, and Perrett (2002) found that women in a relationship had an increased
preference for facial masculinity. This preference could be caused by potential genetic
benefits of extra-pair copulation with a masculine man, whilst receiving paternal and material
support from a stable relationship partner. In relation to environmental harshness, it is
possible that women have a preference for masculine faces when resources are scarce, but
only if they already are in a relationship. Previous studies that have investigated
environmental priming effects on masculinity preference have not taken into consideration
women’s partnership status (e.g., Lee & Zietsch, 2011; Little et al., 2007), therefore we
considered it important to test the effect of partnership status on environmental priming
effects in the present study.
Importantly, it remains unclear in the literature the extent to which preferences for
masculine and feminine traits are influenced by conscious and non-conscious processes. For
example, studies have shown that the processing of subordinate facial information (such as
masculinity/femininity) might be under more conscious influences (Amihai, Deouell, &
Bentin, 2011). Further, it has been suggested that attractiveness ratings of a stimulus reflect
a more non-conscious measure of preference (Rupp et al., 2009). In the present study, we
wanted to investigate how priming environmental scarcity affects non-conscious (measured
by eye gaze behaviour), versus conscious (i.e., partner choice) perception of male faces by
women. Previous studies have shown that while preferences for sexual stimuli are reflected in
both conscious (overt preferences) and non-conscious (eye gaze behaviour) measures
(Burriss, Lyons, & Marcinkowska, 2014), eye gaze behaviour such as number and duration of
initial fixations, and total dwell time on the stimulus, may be the best indicators of
preference (Fromberger et al., 2012; Krupp, 2008). However, to our knowledge no studies
have thus far investigated the role of environmental scarcity on women’s gaze patterns when
evaluating male faces.
In summary, the present research investigated how environmental scarcity affected
women’s gaze patterns and preference towards masculinised and feminised male faces. We
expected that when primed with concerns about environmental scarcity, single women would
have an increased preference for facial femininity, and that this preference would be
manifested in eye gaze measures. Following Little et al. (2002), we expected that women
who are currently in a relationship would show an opposite pattern, i.e., show an increased
masculinity preference during environmental scarcity, coupled with increased fixation counts
and durations, and greater total dwell time, on more masculine faces.
Methods
Participants
Participants were 48 women (M = 21.94 years, SD = 5.75), recruited from a student
women were heterosexual, which was an inclusion criteria for the study. Twenty-two of the
participants were in a long-term romantic relationship, and 26 were single.
Stimuli
Twenty-five facial photographs were randomly selected from a larger pool of male
undergraduate students, and each image was transformed by ± 50% of the shape differences
between symmetrical male and female prototypes using the Psychomorph computer
programme (Tiddeman, Burt, & Perrett, 2001; for detailed morphing procedure and example
faces see Burris et al., 2014 ).
Procedure
Participants attended a single laboratory session. They were given a vignette to read,
randomised for depicting either a scarce (‘scarcity’ i.e., low resource availability), or a
wealthy (‘wealthy’, i.e., high resource availability), socio-ecological environment (see Little
et al., 2007 for full details of the prime). We also asked participants to rate on a 7-point scale
(from 1 = not at all, to 7 = very much so) how (i) physically safe, (ii) happy, (iii) healthy, and
(iv)financially secure they would feel if they were in the situation depicted in the vignette.
Participants then completed facial masculinity/femininity preference tasks in two
counter-balanced blocks for short and long-term relationships, while their eye-gaze (i.e., total dwell
time in milliseconds, fixation count in number of fixations, and first fixation duration in
milliseconds), was measured for 2000 ms per trial by an EyeLink1000 eye-tracker. Each trial
within a block was followed by a screen with a centrally presented ‘X’, and participants could
continue to the next trial by pressing a button on a hand-held controller. Participants were
asked via two-alternative forced choice to pick one of the two simultaneously presented
versions of the face varying in masculinity only. The area of interest was defined as the full
definitions of long- and short-term relationships (see, e.g., Little et al., 2013; Little et al.,
2007; Penton-Voak et al., 2003). The order of blocks was counter-balanced, so that some of
the participants completed the short-term block first, and others completed the long-term
block first.
Results
In order to check for the effectiveness of the prime, a series of independent t-tests
were run to test for differences in ratings of safety, happiness, health, and financial insecurity
between the two priming conditions. There was a significant difference for all of the ratings,
indicating that the scarcity prime indeed had the desired effect (see Table 1).
We then conducted independent t-tests separately for partnered and single women to
investigate whether the priming condition had an effect on preference for masculinity. As
expected, participants who were in a relationship exhibited an increased overall preference
for masculinity in the scarcity (M = .61, SD = .12, N = 9) compared to the wealthy (M = .44,
SD = .15, N = 13) condition (t(1, 24)= 2.86, p = .01). Participants who were single did not
show differences in masculinity preference between the scarcity (M = .47, SD = .19, N = 15)
and the wealthy (M = .53, SD = .13, N = 11) condition (t (1, 24) = .94, p > .05)
We then ran a series of mixed 2 x 2 x 2 ANOVAs, separately for participants who
were partnered or single, with the between-participant factor of Prime (scarce, wealthy), and
repeated-measures factors of Mating Context (short, long), and Stimulus Face Type
(masculine, feminine), with total dwell time (in milliseconds), fixation count (number of
fixations), and first fixation duration (in milliseconds), as dependent variables. For
individuals who were in a relationship, we found a near–significant interaction between
Prime and Stimulus Face Type for the fixation count (F (1,20)= 3.64, p = .07, η2
p =.15).
SD = 0.60) than in the wealthy (M = 3.23, SD = 0.60) priming condition, irrespective of the
mating context. This indicates that, irrespective of the mating context, women who are
currently in a relationship fixate more often on masculine faces in scarce, rather than in
wealthy, environments. We did not find any significant interactions or main effects for
fixation count in single women.
For the first fixation duration, we did not find any significant interactions or main
effects for women who were in a relationship. However, for single women, we found a
significant interaction between Stimulus Face Type and Prime (F(1, 24) = 5.97, p = .02, η2 p =
.20). Single women in the wealthy prime condition had a longer first fixation on feminine (M
= 242.09, SD = 52.90) compared to masculine stimuli (M = 218.09, SD = 49.32) when
evaluating faces as long-term partners (t(10)= 3.88, p = .003).
For the total dwell time, we found a significant interaction between Prime and
Stimulus Face Type in partnered women (F(1, 20) = 6.13, 1, 20, p =.02, η2
p =.24). Partnered
women had a longer dwell time for masculine faces when evaluating them as long-term
partners in the scarce (M = .47, SD = .04) compared to in the wealthy (M = .42, SD = .05)
condition (t(22) = 2.37, p = .02). There were no significant interactions for single women.
Discussion
The current study tested how environmental scarcity and relationship status
influenced women’s gaze patterns and preference towards masculinised and feminised male
faces. Results from our eye-gaze and preference measures showed that environmental
priming (resource scarcity versus wealth) had an effect on masculinity preference, but
crucially the effect depended on the partnership status of the women. These findings highlight
the importance of taking the partnership status of women into consideration when
Partnered (but not single) women showed an increased preference towards masculine
faces in the scarcity priming condition, compared to the wealthy priming condition. Overt
preferences for masculine faces by women in relationships in the scarcity priming condition
were reflected in eye gaze patterns. Female participants in a relationship showed an increased
number of fixations and greater total dwell time on masculine faces in the scarce prime
condition. The number and duration of fixations on a stimulus are thought to be direct indices
of attentional allocation to that cue, given the close coupling between direction of gaze and
the allocation of attention (Hoffman & Subramaniam, 1995; Võ, Smith, Mital, &Henderson,
2012). Attention, as measured by eye gaze behaviour, has been shown to be preferentially
allocated to faces that are rated as more attractive (Shimojo, Simion, Shimojo, & Scheier,
2003; Valuch, Pflüger, Wallner, Laeng, & Ansorge, 2015). Therefore our eye-tracking data
provides strong data, complementary to the ratings data, to suggest that females in a
relationship, in the environmentally scarcity condition, exhibited autonomic, non-conscious,
preferences toward faces with more masculine traits.
These novel findings show an opposite pattern of results to previous studies that have
shown that priming of environmental scarcity increased female’s preference for feminine
male traits (e.g., Lee & Zietsch, 2011; Little et al., 2007), but crucially these prior studies did
not take into consideration women’s partnership status. The preference for masculine faces
by women in relationships that we found in our study in the scarce priming condition is in
line with the results of Little et al. (2002), who found that women had an increased
masculinity preference while in a long-term relationships. A plausible explanation for such a
preference is that females may be seeking good genes associated with putative extra-pair
copulations. Partnered women may subconsciously think that in their current partner, they
already have the required support for bringing up offspring, therefore can afford to have a
preference only under conditions of resource scarcity. This would indicate that the tendency
to seek extra-pair partners for genetic benefits is even more important when resources are
scarce, as offspring would inherit the genetic make-up associated with masculinity, thus
better equipping them to better survive in a hostile environment where the risk of extrinsic
mortality is greater (c.f., Chisholm, 1996).
In contrast, single women had longer first fixations on feminine rather than masculine
faces when evaluating them as long-term partners in the wealthy condition, despite the
absence of an overt preference for either face type. First fixations are thought to reflect initial
attention to emotional stimuli (e.g., Nummenmaa, Hyona, & Calvo, 2006), therefore the data
provides evidence that single women, looking for a partner in a resource-wealthy
environment, found feminine male faces more attractive to look at. Interestingly, this initial
attraction did not translate into an increased overt choice for feminine faces, reflecting a
potential dissociation between more conscious (i.e., actual choice), and non-conscious (i.e.,
first fixations) mating-related decisions (c.f., Rupp et al., 2009). Our data suggest that when
women can control their own resources they may exhibit an automatic attraction for males
who are “helpers in the nest” (Lu, Zhu, & Chang, 2015), and in this type of environment they
may not require their offspring to have the putative genetic benefits associated with
masculinity. This is in agreement with previous studies showing that, especially in wealthy
conditions, women favour characteristics associated with good fathering, rather than good
genes (Lu et al., 2015), although further research is need to elucidate the reasons why the
initial attraction as measured by the first fixation did not translate into a conscious preference
for more feminine traits.
Our study has several limitations that should be acknowledged. Firstly, we did not
control for menstrual cycle phase, which may affect women’s masculinity preference (e.g.,
investigations of environmental priming effects on eye gaze patterns. Secondly, our sample
size was relatively small, and contained unequal numbers of single and partnered women in
the two priming conditions. Nevertheless, our statistical analyses were sufficiently strong to
produce statistically significant effects at the conventional levels, and medium effect sizes,
indicating that the priming procedure had an effect on the gaze patterns and preferences.
Sample sizes similar to those reported here are not uncommon in eye-tracking studies (e.g.,
Dixson, Grimshaw, Ormsby, & Dixson, 2014).
In summary, our study was the first to employ eye gaze measures to investigate
environmental priming effects on single and partnered women’s preferences for facial
masculinity. We found that partnered women fixated on and chose masculine faces more
often than the feminine faces when evaluating them as partners in the poor environmental
prime condition. Further, single women had increased first fixation durations for feminine
faces in the wealthy condition, but no overt preference for either face type. We believe that
the eye-tracking methodology could be profitably applied to priming experiments on mate
choice, in relation to variables such as pathogen load (Lee & Zietsch, 2011), male-male
competition (Little et al., 2013), and the role of conscious versus non-conscious processes
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Table 1. Ratings of subjective feelings after exposure to the prime Mean (SD)
Scarcity Wealthy t
Finance 1.29 (.55) 6.13 (0.74) 25.67**
Safety 2.17 (0.64) 5.88 (0.85) 17.10**
Happiness 1.63 (0.71) 5.38 (0.88) 16.23**
Health 2.00 (0.88) 5.63 (0.89) 14.27**
