Sex Differences in Response to Deception Across Mate-Value Traits of Attractiveness, Job Status, and Altruism in Online Dating.

Sex differences in mate preferences are well established. It is also well understood that humans often seek to manipulate their standing on important mate-value traits. Yet, there is a paucity of work examining potential sex differences in response to deception along these important dimensions. In Study 1, a sample of 280 undergraduates (123 females) responded to a hypothetical online dating scenario asking participants to rank how upset they would be if deceived about a date's attractiveness, occupation, or volunteerism. Women ranked occupation deception as more upsetting than men did, and men ranked attractiveness deception as more upsetting than women did. Given potential measurement differences between forced-choice and continuous response options, Study 2 randomly assigned 364 undergraduates (188 females) to one of the deceptions conditions and asked them to report their level of upset and willingness to go on the date using a continuous response scale. Women were more likely than men to cancel the date if the deception involved volunteerism or occupation. There was no significant sex difference in the attractiveness condition. Neither mate value nor sociosexuality moderated the sex difference in the levels of upset due to the deception. Together, these findings demonstrate that women and men exhibit differences in the degree to which they become upset by opposite sex deceptions in online dating, regardless of self-perceived mate value and sociosexuality, in alignment with evolved sex differences in mate preferences.

An Experimental Test of Jealousy's Evolved Function: Imagined Partner Infidelity Induces Jealousy, Which Predicts Positive Attitude Towards Mate Retention.

Jealousy may have evolved to motivate adaptive compensatory behavior in response to threats to a valued relationship. This suggests that jealousy follows a temporal sequence: A perceived relational threat induces state feelings of jealousy which in turn motivates compensatory behavior, such as mate retention effort. Yet to date, tests of this mediation model have been limited to cross-sectional data. This study is the first to experimentally test this theoretical model. Men and women (N = 222) who were currently in committed romantic relationships were primed with an imagined partner infidelity (versus control) scenario. Participants then completed measures of state jealousy and intended mate retention behavior. Results found that those primed with the infidelity threat scenario experienced an increase in state jealousy, which in turn predicted more intended benefit-provisioning and cost-inflicting mate retention. Findings suggest that jealousy mediated the relationship between infidelity threat and intended mate retention behavior, supporting the evolutionary account of state jealousy.

Women's Romantic Jealousy Predicts Risky Appearance Enhancement Effort.

Human appearance enhancement effort has recently been considered from an evolutionary perspective as an adaptive and sexually dimorphic strategy for effective female intrasexual and intersexual competition. Most writing and research on the topic to date has focused on appearance enhancement as a means of mate attraction, with relatively less research examining its role in mate retention. The present study considered whether romantic jealousy, as a negative emotion experienced in response to perceived threat to a desired relationship, predicts costly and/or risky appearance enhancement independent of the closely related emotion of envy. In a sample of 189 undergraduate women, results showed that romantic jealousy and dispositional envy were positively correlated with one another. Results further demonstrated that romantic jealousy predicted women's positive attitude toward cosmetic surgery, willingness to use a one-week free tanning membership, willingness to use a risky diet pill, and intent on spending a greater proportion of their income on appearance enhancement, but not intended use of facial cosmetics. Results held independent of participants' dispositional envy, suggesting that romantic jealousy is a unique predictor of women's efforts at enhancing their physical appearance, which could extend into costly and physically risky mate retention efforts.

Perceived Mate Scarcity Leads to Increased Willingness to Mate Poach.

Mate poaching, where an individual attempts to attract a pair-bonded individual, is a risky mating tactic. Yet, it is surprisingly common. Although many studies have investigated individual differences in mate poaching, few have examined potentially relevant ecological factors, such as mate availability. In this study, 254 unmated North American adults were primed with either perceived mate scarcity or abundance, and subsequently completed measures of fear of being single, intrasexual competitiveness, and attitudes toward mate poaching. Results from a sequential mediation model revealed that men and women primed with mate scarcity held a more positive attitude toward mate poaching relative to those primed with mate abundance, and that this link was mediated by an induced fear of being single and intrasexual competitiveness. Our results suggest that mate poaching is a facultative adaptation of human mating psychology driven by intrasexual competitiveness that is activated in response to environments of low mate availability. It highlights the need for researchers to consider ecological cues when studying individual variation in mate poaching behavior.

Optimistic Environmental Messaging Increases State Optimism and in vivo Pro-environmental Behavior.

Despite recent empirical interest, the links between optimism and pessimism with pro-environmental behavior (PEB) remain equivocal. This research is characterized by a reliance on cross-sectional data, a focus on trait-level at the neglect of state-level optimism-pessimism, and assessments of retrospective self-reported ecological behavior that are subject to response bias. To attend to these gaps, 140 North American adults (M age = 34; SD = 11.60; 44% female) were experimentally primed with bogus optimistic or pessimistic environmental news articles, and then asked to report their levels of state optimism-pessimism, intentions to purchase green products, in vivo PEB (donating to WWF and providing contact information to join an environmental organization), and support for geoengineering technologies. Results confirmed that optimistic (versus pessimistic) environmental messaging enhanced the expression of state optimism, which then contributed to PEB and support for geoengineering. These results have important implications for the framing of environmental messaging intended to promote ecologically conscious behavior.