STUDY ANALYSIS: Women Prefer Feminine Men

The modern world is at war with testosterone

I like to say the modern world is at war with testosterone, and today’s new study illustrates that truth quite nicely, I think. It certainly looks to me like a study that’s trying to normalise the “nice guy” Reddit vision of masculinity as opposed to the more vigorous, thrusting variety associated with optimal testosterone. I’m certainly interested to know what you think once you’ve read this piece, so let me know in the comments.

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Today’s new study claims women prefer feminine men as partners more than masculine men, and they prefer them not just in the long term, for childrearing, but also in the short term too. But before you grab a subscription for Huel meal replacements and start boiling plastic bags and drinking the xenoestrogen-laced liquid, there are a few things you should probably know about this new study.

“Slightly feminine men have better relationship prospects with women without losing short-term desirability” is how psychology website PsyPost reported on this new study. Here’s their description of the study, including its genesis.

A recent study published in the Archives of Sexual Behavior has found that slightly feminine men tend to have better prospects for long-term romantic relationships with women while maintaining their desirability as short-term sexual partners. The findings provide initial evidence that genes linked to male same-sex attraction persist because they confer a reproductive advantage to heterosexual men by increasing traits associated with femininity and paternal care.

Same-sex attraction is a heritable trait, yet its persistence at stable rates of approximately 2-10% in the population poses an evolutionary puzzle. In theory, traits that hinder reproduction should face strong negative selection pressures. However, same-sex attraction persists, suggesting it may offer some evolutionary benefit.

“Darwin’s theory of evolution is one of the most elegant and well-supported theories ever posited. Few theories have such a substantial body of consistent evidence. Therefore, when phenomena appear to contradict Darwinian evolution, they are incredibly fascinating to me,” said study author Thomas Felesina of the University of Queensland.

“Exclusive same-sex attraction presents a Darwinian paradox: how does a partially genetic trait that significantly reduces evolutionary fitness remain in the gene pool at relatively high rates? Individuals exclusively attracted to the same sex tend to have far fewer children, so understanding how these genetic factors persist is a compelling question that drives my research.”

So the gist is, the researchers noted that genes that make men homosexuality persist in the population, despite—on the surface—being maladaptive, since gay men don’t reproduce. Therefore they must actually offer a reproductive benefit and we just haven’t found it yet.

From this starting point, the researchers devised three experiments to test whether feminine traits in men make them more attractive as partners.

The researchers conducted three studies to test their idea, called the “desirable dad hypothesis.” This hypothesis suggests that the same genes associated with same-sex attraction in men can also make heterosexual men more successful in finding partners by making them slightly more feminine. This increased femininity makes these men more appealing as long-term partners because they are seen as having better qualities for being good fathers.

In the first study, women were asked to assess personality traits associated with parenting via surveys. In the second, they were presented with male dating profiles classified as masculine, neutral and feminine and asked to rate them with regard to their prospects for relationships, both short- and long-term. And in the third, they rated the same profiles they’d seen in terms of their perceived parenting abilities.

The results of the three studies were a resounding “yes” to the question, “Do women prefer feminine men as partners and mates?”