Mangy Male Lovers Take More Risks

Men's decision-making processes are so scrambled by pretty faces, they immediately start taking more risks, a study from Canada suggested this week.

Researchers at the McMaster University in Hamilton split the 209 men into two groups and showed each group different photos from the website Hot Or Not, one set being average girls, the other top rank beauties. The men were then offered either $15-35 the next day or $50-75 at an unspecified future date, to see if both sets took the logical option, of prompting for the later higher payment. Instead, the beauty group, chose the irrational first option, prompting study organiser Margo Wilson to suggest they'd been distracted by mild sexual urges.

Leeds University biologist Tommaso Pizzari offered up a different hypothesis, however, responding to the study in the New Scientist journal.

"If this is a response to sexual selection then you would expect men who are less attractive to take more risks," he said.

"If you have many attractive potential partners then it does not pay to take risks. If you are less attractive, with few potential partners, then it pays to take risks."

The Canadian study tested also women's responses to good looking compared to average men and discovered no significant differences, which correlated with a feature in the Observer, suggesting British women are increasingly seeking personal qualities such as empathy and fidelity over looks. Psychologist Oliver James suggested such approaches make sense.

"Therapists do regard sexually faithful people as mentally healthy. Let's put it this way: infidelity is often a sign of pathology (disease-Science Ed), ergo, fidelity is often a sign of mental health," he said.

"A secure, passionate attachment is a sign of your needs being met when you were small by your mother, and stable dependency is a sign of health."
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