Attraction on the Basis of Relationship Status

Attraction on the Basis of Relationship Status

Research has shown that the criteria women use to evaluate men’s attractiveness shift across the menstrual cycle (Gangestad & Thornhill, 1998). For example, when women are in the fertile phase of their cycle, they report greater attraction to men who display high intrasexual competitiveness (Gangestad, Simpson, Cousins, Garver-Apgar, & Christensen, 2004). We propose to examine female college students’ attraction to men based on the phase of their cycle and the men’s relationship status. In a between- participants design, female college students will either be told that a male confederate is single or in a relationship. We will then ask the female college students to rate their attraction for the confederate. We predict that female participants’ attraction to the confederate will vary systematically based on (a) the phase of their reproductive cycle, and (b) the relationship status of the confederates. Implications for evolutionary psychology will be discussed.