Your Face May Tell People What Kind Of Relationship You Seek

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Main Category: Sexual Health / STDs
Also Included In: Psychology / Psychiatry;  Women's Health / Gynecology;  Men's health
Article Date: 09 Apr 2008 - 12:00 PDT

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Whether you are looking for a long-term relationship or just a one-night stand may be written on your face for others to read, say researchers from Durham University (England), St. Andrews University (Scotland) and Aberdeen University (Scotland).

You can read about this study in Evolution and Human Behaviour.

Apparently, a man who has a large nose, small eyes and a square jaw gives out signals of being the type of person who would prefer a short-term encounter, rather than love. According to women, men with softer features are more likely to be after a long-term relationship.

Even though researchers found that men do seem able to identify women who are fancy-free, they could not specific which particular part of the face was responsible for this.

The study involved 700 young heterosexual adults, all in their twenties.

In one of the studies involving 153 people, 72% of them were able to identify accurately the sexual attitudes of men and women just by looking at photographs of their faces.

Women who seek short-term sexual relationships generally have wide eyes and large lips - men tend to find these types of women more attractive.

Men who give the appearance of preferring a long-term relationship are more sought after by women, the study found. The more 'masculine' a man is the less likely he is to be faithful and a good parent, women tend to think - this finding agrees with those of previous studies.

Surprisingly, both men and women generally go for people who are the opposite of themselves.

Team member, Dr. Lynda Bothered, Durham University, said that the initial impressions we get from looking at a person's face could be part of how we assess potential mates (or rivals) when we fist meet them. "These will then give way over time to more in-depth knowledge of that person as you get to know them better, and may change with age," Bothered added.

"Facial correlates of sociosexuality"
Lynda G. Boothroyd, Benedict C. Jones, D. Michael Burt, Lisa M. DeBruine, David I. Perrett
Evolution & Human Behavior - 27 March 2008 (10.1016/j.evolhumbehav.2007.12.009)
Click here to view abstract online

Written by - Christian Nordqvist
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