Navigating Love's Spectrum

<p>Men and women have distinct preferences for certain traits in their romantic partners which can</p><p>be elegantly explained by evolutionary theories of sexual selection. Specifically men and</p><p>women highly value the mate characteristics of warmth attractiveness and resources in a</p><p>relationship partner which all enhance their reproductive fitness. By manipulating different</p><p>combinations of these attributes the current research aimed to examine thresholds of acceptance</p><p>and desirability in different temporal relationship contexts. It also explored the effect of a</p><p>previously unexplored cue to health a physical disability on mating preferences. In Study One </p><p>568 participants were shown a photograph of a stimulus person either with or without a</p><p>physical disability paired with manipulated descriptions of economic status and warmth. They</p><p>were asked to indicate their willingness to engage in both a short-term and long-term</p><p>relationship with the individual in the vignette as well as complete questionnaires on</p><p>sociosexuality and social desirability. The results showed the importance of warmth in the longterm</p><p>for both men and women the value of economic status for women in the long-term the</p><p>significance of health on short-term relationships and predicted individual variations according</p><p>to sociosexual orientation. However when the effects of social desirability were taken into</p><p>consideration health was not found to have an effect on the reported desirability of short-term</p><p>relationships. Study Two used a slightly different methodology to replicate the findings from</p><p>Study One with a different sample of 566 participants and explored the impact of heritability on</p><p>both short-term and long-term relationship preferences. The results from Study Two generally</p><p>replicated the results from Study One with the exception of health. The impact of a physical</p><p>disability whether inherited or not was not found to be significant in Study Two nor did social</p><p>desirability. By exploring the evolutionary logic behind disability-based prejudice in</p><p>relationships the current studies aimed to contribute to the existing knowledge on mate</p><p>preferences and deepen our understanding about the contemporary negative attitudes towards</p><p>relationships with individuals with disabilities.