Men who look at beautiful women are not perverts. Scientific research from Amsterdam has this week confirmed that such men are simply behaving naturally. Nature works differently in women. They are certainly not blind to masculine beauty, but it’s not the first thing they look for.
We are talking about the first half-second that a beautiful person comes into a man’s range of vision. Men without exception will take a look. Behavioural scientist Hannie van Hooff of Amsterdam’s Free University has discovered that this happens completely without thinking:
“Looking at an attractive person is important for a man, because it provides him with information: is this person young? Is this person healthy? If the answers are ‘yes’, then the woman concerned should be able to provide numerous offspring.”
In other words, men’s Pavlovian response is decided by evolution. It serves the survival of the human species. That’s the reason why men can do nothing about that half-second of gawping at a person’s good looks.
The other side
Women’s behaviour is also decided by evolution, but for them the effect is different:
“According to the same evolutionary theory, it's more important for a woman to determine whether a person will be able look after her and any children she may have. That’s why, for her, the more important questions are: has he got status? Has he got ambition? Has he got money?”
Football girls
Vera Pauw served as coach of the national Dutch women’s football team from 2004 to 2010. She’s now involved with the organisation of the football World Cup for women under 20. She knows precisely how ‘her girls’ look at professional footballers, and she has a few things to say about Dr Van Hooff’s research.
It’s hard, for example, for her to accept that the young women judge their football heroes primarily on their capacities as potential protectors and fathers.
“I think the girls who choose football do that because of the sport, so the first thing they look at is the game, how skilled the player is. Of course, there’s talk about whether someone’s good-looking… but that’s not the main thing. I think that’s more the case with girls who don’t do football.”
The methodology
Dr Van Hooff has thoroughly researched the issue. In tests, she asked numerous subjects to fulfil tasks which had nothing to do with beauty or ugliness. Their brain activity was measured using EEG.
They were then shown pictures of beautiful and ugly members of the opposite sex. Men displayed a noticeable peak in brain activity when shown a good-looking woman.
Even though Ms Pauw has her misgivings regarding the female side of the research. She readily acknowledges that men – if only for an instant – have to look at a beautiful woman:
“No, I don’t find that at all surprising. I’m 47 and for me it’s getting more peaceful now that I’m beyond the child-bearing age. I really do notice that men look at me in a completely different way. I find it very pleasant that I’m no longer continually subjected to a kind of meat inspection.”
She’s got it spot on - the meat inspection. Even though men cannot control their spontaneous response to the sight of a pretty woman, they can choose to control their behaviour almost immediately. After half a second, Darwin can no longer be given the blame.
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Mirror is not nature, water is. Looking at ourselves into a bucket of water gives a sense of nature; making eye contacts with animals' eyes gives a sense of nature; human beings must take it naturally to get soles by reading each other's eyes. About reading eyes, minds, and soles, gender difference should not be used as an excuse if human nature is to be kept closer to nature. Girls canbe wrongly nurtured. A scientist's childhood affects future generations natures. To enjoy a slow and solid life, there's a lot to enjoy before body contact.
Nothing wrong with looking - but no touching. Just as women like to look at men.
Let me digest this passage one more time.
In Toronto, too many beautiful women are certainly blind to love and are not capable of recognizing digesting real smilers eyes. Perhaps they lost this one sense due to routine superficiality. I am 28, Chinese male, love prolonging eye contacts many times of half second; they female do not love at all. I am too sober to be able to fit in my alcoholic society. Even though I thought any woman might satisfy my sexual hunger but one kind of women who got no eye deactivated me every time. At present, I am into a lifestyle of withstanding unnatural encounters. I truely feel more sensible and loving, being sensible and loving is powerful. Nature is never wrong, human nature may be wrongly nurtured, legal wrongs are 100% wrong.
Do not insult Darwin by this kind of yellow journalism !!
A beautiful woman is a practical poet! Oh, thou art fairer than the evening air clad in he beauty of a thousand stars.
A beautiful woman is a practical poet! Oh, thou art fairer than the evening air clad in the beauty of a thousand stars.
women deserve more respect than RNW is giving them by publishing such pics that invite stupid comments from men..
Hm, this one certainly caught my eye. But then again, I used to be a meat inspector.
Concept of beauty of RNW: a partially clad woman in such pose...very poor selection of beauty. Are fully clad women posing gracefully, ugly?
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