Friends with benefits II: Mating activation in opposite-sex friendships as a function of sociosexual orientation and relationship status
نویسندگان
چکیده
In selecting opposite-sex friends (OSFs), men prioritize physical attractiveness, whereas women prioritize physical prowess and economic resources. This parallel with mate preferences suggests mating mechanisms may partially drive OSF preferences. Selection would have favored activation of mating mechanisms when the probabilistic net benefits of pursuing a mating strategy with OSFs exceeded those associated with alternative strategies, such as platonic friendship. During human evolution, individual differences in sociosexual orientation and relationship status may have been recurrently linked to greater net benefits of pursuing a mating strategy with OSFs. We hypothesized these individual differences would predict individuals’ prioritization in their OSFs of traits desired in mates. Participants (N = 167) allocated ‘‘friend dollars’’ to design their ideal OSFs. Sex, sociosexual orientation, and relationship status predicted OSF preferences. Replicating previous research, men placed greater value than women on their OSFs’ physical attractiveness. Independent of sex, however, an unrestricted sociosexual orientation predicted prioritizing OSFs’ physical attractiveness. Sociosexual orientation also interacted with sex; among women, an unrestricted orientation predicted greater valuation of OSFs’ physical prowess. Results suggest mating motivations in opposite-sex friendship depend on interactions between sex, personality, and relationship status. 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
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