Women actually want a provider, says study into what created
the modern families
Tamara Cohen,Daily
Mail
Confident and cocky,
alpha males might have you believe that they could win the heart of any woman
they want.
But when it comes to
finding a mate, women are actually hardwired to go for a meeker, less macho
chap who is a good provider, a study suggests.
American researchers
have looked into the reasons why humans developed the two-parent nuclear
family.
Our primitive
ancestors would have inherited the social structure of the apes – a sexual
free-for-all with males fighting each other for mating rights.
But scientists at the
University of Tennessee, Knoxville, say a ‘sexual revolution’ occurred when
lower-ranking males who had no chance of winning a fight cottoned on to
providing food and care instead.
Their effort paid
off, as they got the immediate benefit of mating. And in the long run, females
decided they preferred being looked after and started forming long-term
relationships, the study found.
Sergey Gavrilets, an
evolutionary biologist, said this was ‘a foundation for the later emergence of
the institution of modern family’.
It made males more productive, as they wasted
less time fighting, and having two parents around meant offspring were more
likely to survive, the study suggests.
Professor Gavrilets
said experts have struggled to explain how the modern family arose, because
they thought if low-ranking males started providing food, the bigger ones would
just fight them off.
He said they did not
realise until now that female choice was the critical factor.
‘Once females began
to show preference for being provisioned, the low-ranked males’ investment in
female provisioning over male-to-male competition pays off,’ he added.
The study is
published in the Proceedings of the National
Academy of Sciences.
The study on early
human evolution demonstrates mathematically that the most commonly proposed theories
for the transition to human pair-bonding are not biologically feasible.
However, the authors
advance a new model showing that the transition to pair-bonding can occur when
female choice and faithfulness, among other factors, are included.
The result is an
increased emphasis on provisioning females over male competition for mating.
The effect is most
pronounced in low-ranked males who have a low chance of winning a mate in
competition with a high-ranked male, the study claims.
Thus, the low-ranked
male attempts to buy mating by providing for the female, which in turn is then
reinforced by females who show preference for the low-ranked, ‘provisioning’
male, according to author.
The study reveals
that female choice played a crucial role in human evolution and that future
studies should include between-individual variation to help explain social
dilemmas and behaviours, Mr Gavrilets said.
Happy family: It was
an early version of the 'sexual revolution' - where pair-bonding replaced
promiscuity, and pack battles for available females were replaced by an early
version of family life
Why it pays to give a
stranger a smile especially in cities
Rob Waugh,Daily Mail
Giving a stranger a
small smile or even just making eye contact as you pass can have a huge impact
on their feelings, scientists have revealed.
Researchers conducted
tests on hundreds of students to find out how tiny gestures affected people -
and found even the smallest amount of eye contact made them feel connected to
others.
'Ostracism is
painful,' said lead researcher Eric Wesselmann, a social psychologist at Purdue University
in Indiana.
'It's not a pleasant experience.'
The team hope it
could now help explain why people often feel lonely in large cities where
people rarely make eye contact.
They say that the
problem is worst in small towns.
'Lack of
acknowledgment may be more painful in some locations (e.g., small towns) and
may be normative and preferred in other locations (e.g., large cities),' the
researchers wrote.
Researchers also
believe that feelings of loneliness can have physical effects on people.
Previous research has
linked loneliness to a weakened immune system and a hardening of the arteries,
while other studies have found when a person is excluded, even in a computer
game, they feel worse about themselves and can be plunged into a bad mood.
The latest research,
presented at the annual meeting of the Society for the Study of Motivation, was
designed to find exactly what triggers the ‘connected’ feelings.
‘Some of my coauthors
have found, for example, that people have reported that they felt bothered
sometimes even when a stranger hasn’t acknowledged them,' said Wesselman.
The study was carried
out with the cooperation of 239 people on campus at Purdue University.
A research assistant
walked along a well-populated path, picked a subject, and either met that
person’s eyes, met their eyes and smiled, or looked in the direction of the
person’s eyes, but past them - ‘looking at them as if they were air,’ Wesselmann
says.
When the assistant
had passed the person, he or she gave a thumbs-up behind the back to indicate
that another experimenter should stop that person. The second experimenter
asked, ‘Within the last minute, how disconnected do you feel from others?’
People who had
received eye contact from the research assistant, with or without a smile, felt
less disconnected than people who had been looked at as if they weren’t there.
‘These are people
that you don’t know, just walking by you, but them looking at you or giving you
the air gaze—looking through you—seemed to have at least momentary effect,’
Wesselmann said.
‘What we find so
interesting about this is that now we can further speak to the power of human
social connection,’ Wesselmann says. ‘It seems to be a very strong phenomenon.’