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Categories: Online Dating Tags: date online, how to find a man, online dating advice
A friend forwarded me an article about looks on the dating site OkCupid.com. It blew my mind.
Okay, maybe it didn’t blow my mind, but it did validate everything that I’ve ever said about online dating. I’m going to do my best to summarize– and explain what you can learn from it. According to this article…
1) Men have a very fair assessment of women’s overall attractiveness. This doesn’t mean that they’re not shallow (they are), but rather, that they are consistent and reasonable in terms of “rating” women’s looks.
Like in a normal bell curve, 5% of the women were found to be the least attractive and 5% were found to be the most attractive, with most women falling in the middle 90%.
It’s women, not men, who have unrealistic standards for the “average” member of the opposite sex.
2) Women, on the other hand, rate 80% of men as below average.
Let me repeat: It’s women, not men, who have unrealistic standards for the “average” member of the opposite sex.
After coaching women for many years, I already suspected this, but this was a stark realization when you see just how few men you even find to be average looking.
3) This doesn’t let men off the hook at all. OkCupid reports that the most attractive women still receive 5X more email than average women and 28X more email than unattractive women. Literally 2/3 of male messages go to the best looking 1/3 of women.
As OkCupid observed, the medical term for this is “male pattern madness”.
4) Women engage in similar behavioral patterns, just not as extreme. The most attractive men get 11X more than unattractive men.
To sum up, women find most men ugly, but write to them anyway. Men find most women reasonably attractive but spend their time writing only to the hottest ones.
Yep, that sounds about right.
As for how this affects YOUR online dating experience?
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A few things. Looking at the pictures of their highly-rated and average males and females, I think I realized part of the problem. Could it be that the responders to their questionnaires were rather young, and that’s why the “hottest” guys appear 18-20 while OK Cupid’s employees who look to be at least mid-20s were even considered semi-decent? I thought the employees were far better looking than their high quality users. Just a thought. Though I’d also be curious if they had more stratified data (like having people rate people who are similar in age or in the age range that the person is willing to date, or by race, education level, etc.).
That being said, I do think women have unrealistic expectations about men’s appearance. I can think of a couple instances off the top of my head. Both men are balding, but professionals, super nice, intelligent, thoughtful, in good shape, and fun to hang around. I happened to e-mail one (we’re now married). I haven’t seen the other’s profile (he’s a friend from church) but, really? Women are overlooking such fabulous men because of their hair follicles?
I read this study about 2 weeks ago. I have always known that women were just as visual as men. We always have been. Although, there has been centuries of attempts in socializing us to ignore our natural tendency to be the visual creatures we are.
The study kind of hit home for me because I remember when I was OLD (in which I am planning to try again soon). I was often guilty of rejecting most of the men who contacted me based on their looks alone (I’ll admit that I do this offline as well). And yes, I was one of those women who only contacted the best looking guys on the site knowing I was competing with many other women for his attention. The crazy thing that I was so commitment phobic at the time that when they would reply I would freak out and sabotage it somehow out of fear that they could get me to commit. I think that people who have unrealistic expectations for who they are seeking out romantically may have some issues with commit. Or they are just not ready to forge a relationship with anyone. In my case, a few years ago if I had met the guy who possessed every quality I was looking in a man (in terms of looks, personality and social status) showed up, I would have ran in the other direction out of fear.
I know that fixating on looks alone isn’t the best strategy for finding a mate but if someone doesn’t appeal to me physically from the start in some way it’s hard for me to want to know them in a romantic way. I’m just being honest here. I may still have some growing up to do in this. But don’t get me wrong I am quite realistic about the kind of guy can attract. On one particular dating site, you have the option of having your pictures evaluated by other members, where you are rated on a scale of 1-10 in terms of looks. I thought what to heck — let them rate me. And as I remembered, my average rating was a 9, according to the others members. Now, I have always been aware of where I rate on the 1-10 scale, so I have always been really picky about men’s looks in which I ‘ll admit has done me a bit of a disservice over the years. But I feel like if I can’t date someone on my attractiveness level (another 9) I just won’t be happy with him. There it is I said it.
I’m surprised that the women surveyed find 80% of the men on the site below average. Are these men particularly unattractive or is there some new higher standard for average? Maybe it has something to do with the men’s pictures – they look average in person, but submit below average pic’s?
Ageing I’ve found is a great leveler. I haven’t found that many men over 40 “attractive”. Even fewer over 50. The ones I find “unattractive” are the guys missing teeth and the old hippies with long, thin grey hair tied back in a ponytail. All the rest look “average” to me. This is okay though because it’s where the “grow on you” part comes in. When you can no longer evaluate foremost on looks, you get better about evaluating on character.
@Lisa: And by restricting yourself to other “9′s” (who are often arrogant, narcissistic, players looking for younger women), you have all but sealed your fate.
Thanks for sharing what so many other women are too embarrassed to say. It’s valuable.
@Selena – yes – many men I have found are “lazy” about submitting attractive pics! One guy I actually dated had a photo that made him look a like a rather unsavoury inmate but the fact that I actually did go on a date with him was down to his engaging email and telephone personality/manner
Agree with Selena and Cecilia, I had the same thought as I was reading the article – maybe 80% of men on dating sites really do come across as unattractive, because of the photos they submit (basically, most guys post whatever the cat dragged in – squinting against the sun, zombie hands on their shoulders because they’d cut someone out of the picture, etc etc)? Recently, a guy wanted to meet me in person that I was very reluctant to go on a date with, because in his picture he looked – I kid you not – like a serial killer. It was a close up of a really dark, angry face, corners of his mouth turned down. The guy seriously looked like he was dismembering someone at the moment his picture was taken. In the end, I chose to meet at a crowded place on an early Saturday afternoon… and the guy looked nothing like his picture. Last I checked, he still has this scary photo on his profile. Guess guys don’t care as much as we do.
I agree, a statement like “women rate 80% of all men as below average-looking” shows women as pretty brainless – dumb chicks cannot even divide 100 by 2 without getting an 80 – so on the surface, it is easy to laugh off. But I have no problem believing that 80% of dating-site male photos really do look worse than an average male does in real life. Of course, the take-away for me is not to put much trust into profile photos, rather than “only email the 10% that managed to look well in their pictures” – now that is silly.
@Evan
I’m often surprised that most of what I write even gets published here. Thanks for allowing me to share.
Although, I may be not be speaking for all women, I know that most (not all but most) women think and feel this way. And yes, most of us are too embarrassed admits these things publicly. Thank god for the interwebs.
I really should rethink the only dating 9′s thing. That’s going to be difficult.
I really need help, don’t I?
Sigh. I deleted my OK Cupid account… saving up for Evan’s services
It’s true that a lot of men aren’t very smart with their profile photos. Which just adds to the issues already being discussed.
I read — and have read — A LOT of women’s profiles — and most women seem to be describing — in terms of looks — the SAME guy — a very George Clooney / Jon Hamm type guy — 6 feet plus, head of hair (no matter what age), athletic, handsome (“I want to feel goosebumps when he walks into a room” etc.).
I live on the Westside of LA and I rarely, rarely see any guys who come close to that type — I just came back from NYC and didn’t see any guys who looked like that…. I went to Woodland Hills and there was only ONE guy I saw at a two hour outdoor concert who didn’t look like Shrek — and he was maybe an “8″…. I think that all these women want the same three guys…
When I write to women in my “look range” (cute quirky girls, cute plain Janes — I, myself, fluctuate btwn a 7.2 and an 8.1), my odds are about the same if I write to a “8 to an 9″)
The top echelon of men don’t really need / use on line dating. The distribution is skewed to begin with.
You don’t have to publish this, it’s just for info: Your ‘like’ button doesn’t work on my Mac running Firefox.
I think this problem is far worse in online dating than in other situations. In “real life,” we might admire the 9 or 10 but probably would never approach them, while online, everyone seems to think they have a shot.
After a short time online dating, I quickly got over evaluating guys based on their photos, because they ALWAYS looked so much better in person. Besides, even though I need to be attracted to my mate, I also realize that the attraction won’t be based just on looks; I’ve gotta have the whole package!
So, in my world, average-looking guys who seem intelligent and show themselves to have the important qualities like loyalty and integrity quickly become a 10. But then, I’m old, and have never been particularly superficial, so probably not representative of anything.
Evan, I have my own theory about why this is (and I had read this okcupid blog post before).
If you give someone 4 or 5 stars, it sends them an email saying “Someone finds you attractive, play quickmatch” and it flashes up a bunch of users for you to rate. If I want the guy’s attention, I will give him 4 stars but if I think he is an attractive guy, but he is… too young/old or has clearly expressed different goals, then I will only give him 3 stars. Even if he has 5 star looks.
I don’t think I am the only female I know to do this, as I have heard friends say the same.
I feel I’ve had more issues with men not looking as good as their photos, then with my own pickiness. When this happens, usually it’s because the photos are 10-15 years old, or the man has gained quite a bit of weight sine the photo was taken. And i agree with the poster who said that many of the most attractive and eligible men I’ve known don’t really use online dating.
I see what this post is getting at, but looks are so incredibly subjective, especially when you add in factors like race/ethnicity, height, etc… Secondly, I don’t believe that men’s ratings of women are “fair”. Fair according to who’s standards? It reminds of me of that bogus story about black women’s level of attractiveness that was recently posted on the Psychology Today website. The article was so offensive and off base that they took it down within 24 hours of posting it.
Trying to date and match yourself with someone according to a likert scale just seems arbitrary to me, just because one woman think’s a man is a “10″ doesn’t mean I’m going to think so. I think it’s good to approach a cross-section of men, even the ones who you don’t think are your type because someone might surprise you.
I didn’t have much success initially with OLD for this exact reason… looking too hard at the pictures. I agree with all of those who say that most men on OLD sites usually have terrible pictures, and often look a lot better in person. I think women are more likely to put their best photos on the sites, and sometimes even go and get a professional or semi-professional picture taken… while men rarely take a professional photo for anything unless it’s work-related!
I dropped my need to find super-duper attractive types when I got back out there… as long as he was physically attractive to ME, that was all that mattered, and I knew from experience that a lot of other factors could play into my overall estimation of attractiveness.
Everyone who meets my husband say he’s totally not my usual type. And it’s true, he’s not… but seeing that my usual type never exactly worked out for long-term relationships, why then was I so ready to cling to that?
I never got into OKCupid though. I think that site has TOO many little tests and ratings that make it more likely that you’ll pass on a potential Mr. or Miss Right.
Online dating is an alternate reality where a great catch is just an email away. You can filter prospective suitors by religion, race, education, looks, and profession while praying that members who make the cut are not so selective. You can write two sentences because that’s all most websites require. You can join a website without paying or you can mollify a concerned parent by accepting a gift membership. Your search can yield dozens of singles and you can ignore the thousands who were filtered out. If you are an educated professional in the urban northeast, you can ignore the demographics. Awesome singles who live hundreds of miles away become potential partners at the exclusion of blah singles who live five miles away. You can “date” without leaving the house. If you are unsuccessful, you can just lower lower your standards a smidgen because the frustrated masses want “above average”.
Well, I’ve personally been out with all types of guys, tall, short, fat, balding, thin. atheltic…yada yada yada…I am attracted to a wide range of guys for different reasons. I have also rejected tall, short, fat, balding, thin, athetlic guys. I personally think men have a more scewed view of women and their looks. And if a guy doesn’t have the super hot Maxim model woman he thinks he deserves, you can bet your butt he will spend the rest of his life with his sweet normal regular girl and lusting after the super hot Maxim model girl he thinks he deserves until the day he dies. Depressing but true. So if you are a regular attractive girl that isn’t super hot, you’re pretty much screwed either way.
Trenia #15
I also noticed that in the photo examples posted in the article, no one was over 30, and there were no people of color.
And it seems somewhat paradoxical to me that if men have such “realistic” and “fair” standards for women’s attractiveness, they are mostly contacting only the most attractive women.
Maybe something’s just wrong with me? Generally speaking, if someone is interested in me and seems to have enough in common with me (in terms of future plans, beliefs, morals, et al), I’ll go out with him. I’ve never turned someone down for a date unless the guy made me feel uncomfortable, initially (and maybe that wasn’t fair of me, I’ll admit).
None of the guys I’ve dated look anything like one another, as I’m not so much interested in a “look” or a “type” as I am who they are. A lot of my girlfriends will wonder why I’m with a guy because they’ll think he is “ugly” or “unattractive” or “not in my league.” But a guy’s looks haven’t ever been the top attribute I seek when searching for a partner.
I’m more of the girl next door type, so I’d rather be with a good hearted, fun loving, respectful caring man — and if he happens to be a 9 or 10, whatever. I’m not all that pressed. My boyfriend and I are kind of an odd looking couple by “conventional standards.” I am tall and thin, he is shorter and chubby — people compare him to Zach Galifianakis in terms of looks. But he’s the best boyfriend I’ve ever had and he makes me laugh constantly and treats me well. Because of those reasons, he’s sexy to me. Isn’t that all that matters? I love him to bits and I wouldn’t trade him for anything in the world. Not George Clooney, Brad Pitt, or whoever is popular these days. I’ve kind of stopped caring about what media influences are telling me is “hot.”
Maybe that’s part of the problem with people’s expectations in a partner’s looks (media influences, I mean)?
There are definitely positives to online dating, and it’s one avenue to take on the search. However, I do think that the almost endless options, the one click away aspect, and the ability to sit in your own living room and come up with a million fantasies about people you’ve never met seems to exaggerate issues like looks.
Christina’s point about many folks not approaching the 9 or 10 in real life is totally true. It’s easier to approach someone like that online, sitting in your living room, where any rejection comes in the form of an e-mail a day or two or three later.
Just as it is easier to reject those who look “average” online with a single click, whereas if you met the same person at a coffee shop and started talking with them, you might find it much harder to say no. You might even be attracted to them. It’s less black and white in real life.
Okcupid is really the only dating website I use right now.
I am somewhat typical of women on this website & in the article above with one exception- I DO write to average Joes if there is something in their face/eyes that grabs me, I find attractive AND their profile is a killer in terms of intelligence/articulate/humor/what have you. I try like HELL to focus on guys my age (50s), but in the end write to the guys in their 40s. And last year, the year before, dated even younger here and there (2 cougar sites).
Why? Guys my age, few of them, have taken good care of their faces/bodies/spirit. Too many just look bad (esp. after age 53 or so) and/or are very controlling/manipulative/walking wounded. Or MERELY sexist/ageist given their generation I guess.
Now I’m walking wounded also (aren’t we all?), but I don’t PUNISH men for what my ex did or my last steady did. I am mature, I can put it in perspective. What I do do is bitch about it to my girlfriends and maybe my new date a little (my version of MY riot act I guess), but try to keep my mouth shut as much as possible after that…It’s like a little salvo I shoot off early in the relationship that most men ignore anyway I’ve found!
Too many men my age seem to have the attitude “By God this woman isn’t going to ___, ____, ____ like my first ex, my second ex, the last woman I dated did (feel free to fill in the blanks anyway you choose).
Re looks: Recently I started dating against type- a 9 years younger, formerly obese man who scored very similarly to me on okcupid (you are asked to answer up to 200 questions! so it’s similar to eHarmony maybe). OMG people! He’s such a sweet soul and treats me like a princess. He is also smart, funny, articulate, and an alpha male (which makes me weak in the knees). So I’m in heaven right now.
Should have done this a long time ago (date against type), but what happened with me was I got spoiled sorta dating younger, dating the “dashing”, good looking men ’cause I could I guess. I mean I got this email from okcupid telling me they would now send me better looking matches ’cause I scored high, looks-wise, by men rating women on their site.
I also got in the habit of dating good looking men for the simple reason my ex wasn’t good looking///So I have my reasons…..I am not usually, typically shallow- at all.
So I am like the typical powerful, “silver fox” male who, because he typically dates younger, trophy women, becomes addicted to them. A man’s career/salary matter less to me ’cause I’m like many women on here: smart, independent, good job….
But now I am breaking that pattern and dependency I think. As one online friend put it a while back “The good looking ones are practiced at loving and leaving”. So true.
Maybe what folks should do is read the profile first, then examine the photos. And always go with your intuition. I almost didn’t contact my current honey ’cause his pics were a bit goofy & cocky, but my deepest intuition said “Go for it”, so I did.
Finally, for the first time in two years I feel safe with this man, don’t feel nervous about the progression of the romance or my part in it much. It’s flowing without too much effort on my part which is NICE.
Angie #14
The problem with your theory is that 3 Stars qualifies as above average. Women rated 80% of men BELOW 2.5 stars. There is no getting around the fact that women on OKcupid are extremely harsh in judging men’s appearance.
a) Thanks to intense socialization beginning at birth and continuing throughout life, women spend a lot–A LOT–more time, effort and money making themselves attractive to men, a situation that most men feel perfectly entitled to, thus leading to today’s world where a 55-year-old sloth with a beer gut living in a trailer sends messages to beautiful young 28-year-old women with a graduate degree. In other words, hang on for it, *most men are less attractive than most women.* It does not make intuitively bad sense to me to find that most women rate most men as relatively less attractive in the world we live in.
b) let’s evaluate the methodology of the OKC article … oh, wait, we can’t, because it doesn’t give us the methodology. What exactly was the question posed to their participants? Was it based on the ratings in their website? That would be odd, because people rate profiles, not photos, on OKC. So did they do a special study and ask people to rate photos separately? In which case, were they asked to rate based on their own hypothetical “average” or just asked to give a number based on how attractive they found them personally? Huh. We don’t know. All right: what about their assumption that in a “realistic” world assessments of attractiveness should follow a bell curve?
Anyone?
Look up “Sturgeon’s Law”: 95% of anything is crap. This is applied to everything from the quality of science fiction books (original interpretation) to pop music to politics to science to experiments–there are all kinds of fields, from trivial to profound, with skewed distributions and the vast majority of entrants *legitimately* rating well below the mean. This doesn’t make science fiction readers, music fans, political afficianados or scientists morons, and it doesn’t make women crazy.
Is there any particular reason, other than the male ego, why women’s assessments of men’s attractiveness should not follow a long-tail distribution pattern, when so much else in the world does? Especially when apparently it does not alter their actual dating behaviour anything like the supposedly mathematically “fairer” men’s?
c) Evolutionary Psychology: Tons of scientific data over decades covering millions of years of behaviour not only for our own species, but for our closest primate relatives, shows this to be a consistent and perfectly rational strategy on part of both men and women: men (and other male primates) are less discriminating because the consequences of a bad choice don’t last long and aren’t serious. You get the wrong girl/chimp knocked up, you run away, she’s on her own. Every guy wants the hottest one because she’s presumably most fertile, healthiest, and most likely to successfully raise an infant to adulthood. The vast majority of males will not succeed in this, but are perfectly happy to settle for someone far less attractive (or several someones) if they seem like reasonable biological bets. Women, thanks to the investment not only of pregnancy but child-rearing, are vastly choosier–a single act can result in pregnancy and then we live with it for 18 years, whereas a guy can theoretically spawn 365 kids in a single year, none of which he necessarily needs to contribute to (anthropological studies show, contrary to pop assumption, that the average man in a hunger-gatherer society contributed about 10% or less of any one kill to his existing children or the women he had fathered them with–most of it went to higher-status males or other fertile females).
So where does this leave us? With a mildly interesting, two-year-old OKC study of questionable methodology and quality reporting on how millions of years of human evolution have not yet been trumped by modern cultural ideals of romantic love as a lifelong partnership between “soulmates” with no regard for the physical characteristics that traditionally resulted in successful reproduction; however the internet is allowing a larger field for these forces to play out, with predictable results.
Women may be harsh…I had an experience recently that illustrated this. I got a nice, brief e-mail from a guy with terrible pictures. You could barely see him in fact, it looked like they were taken in the dark. So I didn’t reply, I know..rude, right? Yes, c’est la vie.
Weeks later, I went to a party and met a friend of the hostess. We flirted a little, I thought he was very cute but I left early because I felt creepy flirting with a guy my friend may or may not have been dating. She introduced him as her friend, so I wasn’t given many clues.
A week or so later he emailed me on the dating site to say he had finally figured out where he knew me from and we’ve been out a couple of times. You’d think that would have taught me a lesson but it’s still difficult to get around some of the bad pictures.
I know everyone thinks they look good but dang some people my age (35!) look like they’ve been through the wringer. Since digital cameras were introduced, I think every woman grabbed one and started practicing being photographed, men apparently did not, they could learn a bit about flattering lighting, good angles…attractive clothing…
Ellen, good for you.
I think OLD is the best route for me because offline I rarely get approached and when I do, he’s a jerk with one thing on his mind. With OLD there were more men approaching me for dates and they weren’t all jerks and players. I have never approached a guy offline in my life but when I was online I made the first move a few times. I just couldn’t stand it when they would show up after misrepresenting themselves in their profiles looks-wise.
So, I agree with Christina as well. It seems that people find it easier approach others online.
Most of my posts have been mentioning this like forever !
Its not the only study done that confirms this.
Women agree on who the most attractive men are, but not the rest, skewing the average score downwards. On one of the other studies of on line dating it was clear that the women were ONLY responding to the most attractive.
Lisa will no doubt agree with this
Men however approached the women in direct proportion to how attractive they were. Average women WERE therefore contacted, just not as much as the most beautiful women. If 2/3 the messages are going to a 1/3 of the women, that sounds perfectly reasonable doesnt it.
Lets be realistic, the bottom 20% of the women are probably not in the game, but in any event are better off than the bottom 50% of the men !
Also to reiterate a point I’ve made before. A normal distribution curve shows that women are NOT being judged against some arbitrary media standard of beauty, but only against other “normal” women.
@24 – nomdegeurre
Actually, this is confusing b/c I just looked on OKCupid now, and you can’t give someone a zero, so I don’t know how people can score less than “1″, unless OKCupid has made changes since this blog post.
I just logged back on, saw a pic of a guy who was really good looking, I clicked on his profile… I had given him 3 stars. Haha, then I reread his profile. Yup…. good looking, but no interest.
I agree with #25 Maeve. We (at least women) are rating profiles. Men are probably more likely to just rate looks.
Maeve@25
Well its not just this study, but many others that are all saying the same thing. If the studies were coming up with CONFLICTING results then you would have some right to challenge the study.
In any event you are aware that evolutionary psychology also seems to explain the observed behaviour of women in mating choice. However to my mind there is a problem. Women want the alpha male to get the best genes, but he is unlikely to stay around to look after the family. This has led some researchers to speculate that womens strategy was to find a beta male to support her and cheat on him ! You have rightly brought attention to the fact that the best hunters present the kill to the tribe, not to their offspring, which I guess is why women are attracted to men with status.
Clearly none of this works well in a monogamous society. So where does that leave us ? OLD cannot work for men, if women continue to follow this strategy.
@Zaq: Why do I get the feeling that when you’re referring to “women” you actually mean “hot women” and you want full access to all of them and the alpha males of the world should only get the women you don’t want. You can correct if I’m wrong.
I’m sure you know that men and women are hard-wired to be visual because that is how we are able to detect clear signs of good health and fertility (strong genes possessed by alphas). Like you said, it’s evolution, right? It’s extremely difficult for human beings to ignore their true nature. We can only be socialized to go against them. As women, we know intellectually that most alpha males won‘t make the best mates for the long haul, okay? But biologically it’s difficult for us not to desire these males.
I totally agree that women only seeking out alpha males for long-term relationships is not the best strategy for finding a good mate. I do believe that MOST women eventually settle for beta males.
Maeve said: (#25)
“Look up “Sturgeon’s Law”: 95% of anything is crap.”
Sturgeon’s Law is a paradigm, one possible perspective of viewing the world. It’s not any more accurate than a bell-curve view of the world..
But anybody who believes in Sturgeon’s law is going to be a horrible boyfriend/girlfriend.
Maeve said: (#25)
“This is applied to everything from the quality of science fiction books (original interpretation) to pop music to politics to science to experiments”
If you and I read the same middle-of-the-road science fiction novel, you’ll say it’s crap, and I’ll say it’s not great literature, but it was a fun read anyway. If our partners cook middle-of-the-road meals for us, you’ll think your dinner is crap, while I’ll appreciatively thank my fiancee for making dinner. For those of you who like to cook, would you rather cook for Maeve or me?
If 95% of people, places, food, music, movies and gifts are “crap,” then you are (justifiably) going to get a reputation for being ungrateful, difficult to please and difficult to get along with.
I’ve never dated a woman that I thought was crappy, but anyone who thinks 95% of everything is crap … they will be horrible to be around in general, especially as a partner. (To be fair, I have dated a number of women who were completely wrong for me, but they were decent or wonderful people in their own way.)
Maeve asked: (#25)
“Is there any particular reason, other than the male ego, why women’s assessments of men’s attractiveness should not follow a long-tail distribution pattern, when so much else in the world does?”
Yes.
First, you will be a happier person if you stop viewing 95% of everything as “crap” and start viewing at least 80% of everything as “decent or better.” (From my perspective, very little in life follows a long-tail distribution.)
Second, if 90% of women are pursuing 5% of the men, then either your odds of getting one of those men is rather small or your odds of sharing that man with other women is rather high. That’s the way the math works. (Actually those two options are not mutually exclusive.)
Finally, if you believe 95% of everything is crap, then 100% of men will find you unpleasant to be around on a long-term basis. The top 5% of men know they can do better than that. The bottom 95% are convinced they can do better, too.
Maeve said: (#25)
“This doesn’t make science fiction readers, music fans, political afficianados or scientists morons, and it doesn’t make women crazy.”
You’ve chosen an attitude that makes your world a mostly crappy place to live in, an attitude that makes you seek the men that you can’t get, and an attitude that people can’t stand to be around. That might not be crazy, but from my perspective it seems to be rather unwise.
@Maeve: I just read your comment (#25) (I don’t know how I missed it) and it basically broke down most of what I said in comment #32. Well done.
Lisa M
I don’t know why people are misinterpreting what I am saying. You want the best men. You have been designed by evolution to want the best men. I understand that. It is a powerful biological imperative.
I want younger women. It’s a powerful biological imperative. My testosterone levels will increase just being in the presence of fertile women. I cannot control it.
I am not trying to dissuade you from chasing alphas because I’m jealous of them. I believe you are projecting on to me your frustration that women who perceive themselves to have high mating value, are being asked to accept men of lower perceived value.
Whether or not you are a “9” or not is down to others to judge, but a true alpha male is not even a ”10”. He’s a “10,000”. He is so rare, that other men hardly ever come into contact with him.
Your value is tied to your age. As Joan Collins observed “beauty is like being born rich and becoming poor”
The tragedy is that many attractive women hold out for so long, that when they finally think of settling for the guy that has been chasing them for years, they find that he is now married to a much younger woman.
I don’t have the answer. I certainly am not impressed by others suggesting that in order to be successful in dating you have to ignore physical criteria completely
Maeve beats Karl hands down.
@Angie#30
Actually, this is confusing b/c I just looked on OKCupid now, and you can’t give someone a zero, so I don’t know how people can score less than “1″, unless OKCupid has made changes since this blog post.
I just logged back on, saw a pic of a guy who was really good looking, I clicked on his profile… I had given him 3 stars. Haha, then I reread his profile. Yup…. good looking, but no interest.
Whether you’re rating on a 0-5 scale or a 1-5 scale, 3 is still average. The women of OKC rate 80% of men BELOW average. Whether you give him a 3,4, or 5, it’s still placing him in the upper 20%. Women are almost as stingy with their 3 star ratings as the Ivy league is with acceptance letters.
I agree with #25 Maeve. We (at least women) are rating profiles. Men are probably more likely to just rate looks.
If that’s the case, women would also give higher ratings to men with well written profiles, i.e. a “3″ in looks would get a 4 or 5 rating. Which would significantly counteract any downgrading based on the written section of men’s profiles.
For what it’s worth, I read women’s profiles & when I don’t like what they’ve written, or I doubt that we’d have anything in common, I’ll give them a 3 even though they’re pretty. Likewise, I’ll give higher ratings to women with interesting profiles. I’m not saying a lot of men do this, but I’m definitely not the only one.
@ Sharon (#11):
Why would you think that the top echelon of women would be different than their male counterparts that don’t need/use online dating?
As far as pictures go, I find that women (Ashton Kutcher aside) are more likely to be taking pictures, and thus have a larger selection of pictures from which to select attractive shots. This doesn’t really excuse men from having poor photos, but when their selection is smaller, there are bound to be fewer nice choices.
The damage has already been done. Whether by accident or on purpose, women have gorged themselves on unrealistic expectations of what they find “attractive”. By all means, do not settle for an average guy, even if you are average. It will only end in misery for both of you.
There is nothing left to do but let the train run off the cliff into lonely, bitter old age for these women. It is unfixable. Periodically, a few of them will wise up and train themselves to be be humble and learn to destroy the unrealistic expectations that are destroying their chance at love and happiness.
The rest will watch shows like Mad Men and fantasize about Don Draper until they are old and ugly. Watch for life expectancies to drop in the future as legions of unloved men and unloved women die an early spiritual death followed closely by a physical death.
How did I miss this?
Anyway, you can check your personal ratings history on OKC by going to Connections → Notes & Ratings. Here’s mine:
★★★★★ 10 (1.6%)
★★★★ 62 (10.3%)
★★★ 106 (17.4%)
★★ 191 (31.4%)
★ 239 (39.3%)
Total: 607 (100.0%)
Embarrassing to say, but I’m not doing a whole lot better than the women when it comes to being too picky. The main reasons I rate so many people poorly are the following, in roughly descending order of importance/frequency:
Profile writing quality is poor (proxy for “low intelligence”)
Profile too short (< 400 words)
Obese
Single mother
God/religion/Bible mentioned more than once
Not a college graduate
This probably means I need to compromise more, but there is the issue that partners with similar characteristics report higher relationship satisfaction. I wonder if there are statistics that would guide me on which criteria would be good to relax.
I agree that women tend to go by selection criteria that doesn’t serve themselves well. But I’m not sure what this study proves.
For one thing, I’m not sure how the people on these online dating sites are representative of the general population. Or even representative of the general single population.
I write not to the women whom I think are in the “top 10%” (or 5% or 20% or whatever), but instead to the women whom I find attractive going from their profiles (and who, I think from looking at their preferences, might go for me). I’m not positive how all the other men rate the women I write to, but I do hope that I am able to outshine the competition and get the attention of these women. I will also admit that there is only a small percentage of the women on Match whom I want to write to.
Also, both sets of data are impacted by the fact that not all online daters participate in rating, or do so in the manner that the site intends. I find the concept of giving negative ratings crass, so I just “skip” and/or hide profiles of people I find unattractive. Other people on OKC don’t want to notify the person they’re looking at (which a 5-star rating automatically does), so they’re extremely stingy with high ratings. Others NEVER use the function. You’d have to find out what percentage of each gender rates and if they’re truly representative of the site’s users before making extrapolations about the user base, let alone the entirety of the world’s men and women.
I know I have always been attracted to men who had a certain “look.” They always reminded me in some way of the first guy I ever really wanted. He was never my boyfriend, but I pined for him for all 4 years of college (sort of like Emilio Estevez’ character in “The Breakfast Club”, but without the fantastic kiss at the end!).
Now, whenever I find myself attracted to a man, and I try to put my finger on *why* I’m attracted… it invariably dawns on me that the guy has the same walk, the same nose or hair or legs or something else that bears a strong resemblance to my “prototype” guy. I wish I could break the programming, but I feel like a baby duck that has imprinted on this one guy and can’t even see a guy if he doesn’t resemble the “original” guy.
I never saw him again after college, until just recently. I think I saw him in a restaurant having lunch with his brother or someone about a week ago. If it was him, he’s much grayer, very middle aged looking, and has put on some weight, although he’s far from obese.
This is actually a big relief to me, since now I can at least “update” my prototype to include heavier, greyer and older versions of the original guy. Not to mention extremely helpful, since I’m 42 and most of the men I see online are variations of heavier, greyer and older than my original “imprint”.
It would be nice if I could just shed the imprinting altogether, but it’s so ingrained and subconscious most of the time, I don’t really feel I’m in control of it. I had a huge crush on a coworker about 3 or 4 years ago. I couldn’t understand why I just felt so flushed whenever I was around him, and my throat would constrict and my mouth would go dry and I couldn’t speak to him. It took me a couple of weeks thinking about it, but I finally figured out it was because, of all the men I’ve met since college, he is the one who looked, walked, and talked the most like my original “prototype” guy.
I didn’t date the coworker (he was 10 years younger anyway), but it just goes to show, old flames just don’t die. I guess you have to just learn to live with them.
@ 32
” Why do I get the feeling that when you’re referring to “women” you actually mean “hot women” and you want full access to all of them and the alpha males of the world should only get the women you don’t want.”
Because you are indulging an ad hominem.
@ Lisa M.
“I thought what to heck — let them rate me. And as I remembered, my average rating was a 9, according to the others members.
Now, I have always been aware of where I rate on the 1-10 scale, so I have always been really picky about men’s looks in
which I ‘ll admit has done me a bit of a disservice over the years. But I feel like if I can’t date someone on my attractiveness level (another 9) I just won’t be happy with him. There it is I said it.”
Great reasoning.
Only one problem – guys are *generous*, and strategic when rating the attractiveness of women.
The sure way to gauge your *true* level of attractiveness, is to determine what level of male can you attract for a long-term investment(ie. marriage).
If you can score dates and sex with male 9′s, but only male 6′s want to marry you, then guess what your *true* value is(hint: it’s *not* a ’9′, like you might have been led to believe)?
@ Maeve
” Thanks to intense socialization beginning at birth and continuing throughout life, women spend a lot–A LOT–more time, effort and money making themselves attractive to men”
You couldn’t be more wrong(ie. anyone who knows anything about sexual biology knows that the energetic onus is *always* on the males in attracting females – where those females are the limiting sex).
Evidence?
Go to any gym, or hazardous profession, and observe the degree of sexual dimorphim, manifest in sexual competition(ie. where males are working far more vigorously – and hazardously – to embellish their status, for the sole purpose of attracting females).
Women, on the other hand, are shaving their legs and applying make-up(which is trivial by comparison), and increasingly can’t even be bothered to maintain energy balance(which is why in populations where women are competing harder for male attention, they are invariably *slimmer*).
Where males, on the other hand, have the burden of earning more, being lean(not just *slim*), being tall, and not being endomorphic(assuming the last two could be resolved by anything other than resequencing their DNA), etc, etc(you get the idea).
@ Jadafisk
“You’d have to find out what percentage of each gender rates and if they’re truly representative of the site’s users before making extrapolations about the user base, let alone the entirety of the world’s men and women.”
Parsimony resolves this dilemma by allowing us to take the assumption that females are more selective(in unifying a broad evolutionary synthesis), and thus conclude that females are tending towards a critical evaluation of the male user base, as the most likely explanation.