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Chapter 5: Love & Marriage

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Chapter 5

Love & MarriageIntroduction 275

5.1 Evolution of Attraction 276Why are we attracted to some people more than others?

(a) Evolution and Behaviour 276(b) Testosterone and Attraction 278(c) Evolution and Attraction 280

5.2 Pheromones and Behaviour 283How might pheromones influence attraction?

(a) Pheromones: An Introduction 283(b) Androstadienone 285(c) Androstadienone and Attraction 286

5.3 Culture and Attraction 289How might cultural values affect attraction?

(a) Cultural Values 289(b) Mate Preference 291(c) For Love or …? 293

5.4 Communication and Relationships 296Why are some couples happier than others?

(a) Positive Communication 296(b) Negative Communication 298(c) Biology and Communication 300

5.5 Culture and Relationships 302How can cultural factors influence divorce?

(a) Culture and Relationships 302(b) Attitudes Towards Divorce 304

Conclusion 307

TE Final book.indb 274 10/4/17 8:57 AM

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Introduction

They met on the set of a Hollywood film, although he was still married at the time and she had kids from a previous marriage. Nevertheless, they got married, adopted 3 children and had three more of their own. In all, they shared their love and their lives with six children and were married for ten years. And then it was over.

We’re not going to analyze Brangelina. I introduce their relationship here because it contains many elements that we are going to look at in this chapter on love and marriage.

Firstly, Brad Pitt is widely regarded as an incredibly attractive man, and has been for the past 30 years. What makes him so attractive? Perhaps Pitt’s facial features and physique signify that he has good genes and this is why he is attractive. Angelina Jolie is rather beautiful as well, and although we won’t have time to investigate the feminine characteristics that males typically find attractive, it does make for interesting extended research if you’re interested.

Sadly, like many married couples, Brangelina’s love did not last. The significant increases in divorce rates in the US and many other countries has prompted extensive research into marriages in order to understand why some succeed and others fail. We are going to investigate some of this research to get an insight as to why some marriages might end in divorce, while others last a lifetime. As with other units, one of the important concepts we are investigating is the fact that if we can understand underlying origins, perhaps we can implement better treatment and preven-tion strategies.

But attraction and the prevalence of divorce are different from culture to culture. Would Bollywood experience rates of divorce as high as Hollywood? Also in this chapter we’ll be looking at how cultural values might be relevant in the study of the formation and dissolu-tion of marriages.

Romantic relationships are funda-mental to the human experience and so they’re worth exploring. In this chapter you’ll be exposed to a tiny selection of possible answers to some important questions surrounding love and marriage. As always, it’s important that you are basing your psycholog-ical understanding on the empirical evidence provided, and that you are thinking critically about your own understanding based on that evidence.

The role of attraction in relationships is just one topic we're going to explore in this chapter. (Image credit: Georges Biard, wikicommons.com)



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(a) Evolution and Behaviour

The biological purpose of life is to procreate. In other words, living organisms need to produce offspring so genetic material can be passed on from generation to gener-ation. If you think about it, if organisms didn’t reproduce then their species would become extinct. This biological purpose in life is not to be confused with the meaning of life; these are separate concepts altogether.

In the study of criminology we focused on understanding the biological factors that influence aggression and how these might be explained from an evolutionary point of view. That is to say, those biological factors increase our chances of survival, which increases our chances of being able to procreate, so these biological traits are more likely to be passed on. When small mutations in our genes result in behavioural changes that increase our chances of procreation they increase the likelihood of the new (mutated) genes being passed on to offspring. Over thousands of years these small mutations add up to significant developments. Thus, the process of evolution takes hundreds of generations as biological changes are a result of slight mutations in genetic material that compound over time.

Much like other biological aspects in our psychology course, evolution is another

one we have to skim over. To recap from earlier topics, the key concept for you to understand is that genes will be passed on if they affect our biology in a way that influ-ences our behaviour and increases our chances of survival.

In terms of evolutionary explana-

tions of behaviour we need to identify a particular behaviour that we can examine from an evolutionary standpoint. That is to say, we need to be able to explain how and why one particular behaviour could increase our chances of survival (i.e. passing on our genes). The fact that this behaviour has enabled survival is why it would be observable today. You could do this with many behaviours, but what’s important in psychology is that you have the research to support your explanation.

Fear, fear conditioning and aggres-sion are three such behaviours that could be explained from an evolutionary standpoint. The behaviour we are going to focus on in this section is attraction, and more specifically, physical attraction.

5.1 Evolution of Attraction Why are we attracted to some people more than others?

To procreate is a biological way of saying to have babies.

An evolutionary explanation of behaviour is one that explains how a particular behaviour can help us to survive and/or pass on our genes. A deeper explanation would include how the biological traits that are likely to be passed on facilitate a behaviour that enables survival and/or procreation.

"Masculine" facial features include a square jawline and a low brow.


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Attraction to particular facial characteristics might increase our chances of having strong and healthy babies because they signal who has “good” genetic material. It’s important to remember that in human procreation, 50% of the genetic material comes from either parent, so we want to make sure we select our mate carefully. There’s an evolutionary advantage in procreating with someone who is going to increase the likelihood of producing healthy offspring. This is the key to attraction: we may find ourselves physically attracted to someone who shows particular characteristics that suggest they would be a good person to have babies with. Attraction to particular individuals may be a result of biological processes influencing our perception and judgement of characteristics that signify a beneficial mate who has the genes we want for our offspring.

Sex hormones like testosterone can influence physical development and appear-ance and in the next section we’re going to investigate female attraction to facial char-acteristics that signify varying levels of testosterone.

A mate in a human biological sense is someone we want to procreate with.

The BBC released a four episode series called “Human Instinct.” Episode 2/4 is called “Deepest Desires” and includes an exploration of sexual attraction and behaviours.

If you’re interested…

How might evolutionary processes influence attraction?

Guiding Question:

Critical Thinking Extension: Hypothesizing Missing Links: Many students make the mistake of trying to say how evolution can explain the behaviour without first explaining how evolution could explain the existence of the biological factor that is influencing behaviour. By this stage in the course you should have a sound understanding of how biological factors can influence our behaviour. So the chain of effect is that if we behave in a way that increases chances of survival, the biological factor that facilitates that behaviour will be passed on through our genes. And then the biological factor that was passed on will increase the likelihood of offspring behaving in the same way, and so on. This is quite complex to understand, but could you apply this explanation to one particular behaviour and its biological correlates?



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(b) Testosterone and Attraction

Testosterone is a sex hormone that is produced primarily in the testes of men, which is why it’s considered the male sex hormone. It is responsible for the physical changes during puberty that help a boy become a man. Some of the effects of testos-terone are the growth of body hair, broadening of the shoulders, deepening of the voice, and lowering of the brow and squaring of the jaw – essentially, the development of “masculine” features.

As you can see in the criminology chapter, high levels of testosterone may influence aggression, particularly in response to social threat. A male with high levels of testos-terone may be more physically capable of maintaining social status by facilitating aggressive actions and being competitive. A female might be attracted to high levels of testosterone as they signal an ability to protect and provide for her and her offspring. If a male can maintain high social status he will have access to more resources, which would be able to support the female as she carries and raises the babies. Remember, we are talking from an evolutionary point of view, so we have to think about what “social status” might mean over the past centuries.

Other studies also correlate secondary sex characteristics with good health and strong immune systems. A secondary sex characteristic is a visible physical trait that enables gender differences between males and females to be identified, without being directly related to sexual reproduction. Masculine facial features and other signs of masculinity that begin to occur at puberty are examples of secondary sex character-istics. One explanation for why masculine features signify good health is that they require high levels of testosterone. One explanation for this is that high levels of testos-terone suppress the function of the immune system, so only healthy males with strong immune systems would be able to cope with the release of high levels of testosterone that would be needed to develop strong secondary sex characteristics, like a masculine face (Little et al., 2011).

There is a lot of research investigating attraction. Specific research focuses on comparing how a female’s menstrual cycle may influence what she finds attractive. Several different studies have all shown that females tend to have a stronger preference for masculine faces around the time of ovulation, when they are most likely to become pregnant. Johnston et al. (2001) tested this by gathering 42 female participants from New Mexico State University in the lab and asking them to view male and female faces on a computer. The researchers created computer images that could be manipulated by the participants, so they could drag a cursor and make the faces more masculine or feminine. The researchers asked the participants to choose different faces that met different “targets.” For example, one of these targets was “an attractive male face,” so participants were asked to manipulate the face until it best met that description.

The results showed that when females were at the stage in their menstrual cycle with the highest chance of conception, they had a stronger preference for masculine faces. Of all the different targets (e.g. attractive female face, healthy looking male/female face, etc.) the stage of their cycle only significantly changed their opinion on the “attractive male face.” This suggests that the attraction to a masculine face was higher around ovulation and less at other times, and it was the only preference that was affected by the changes in hormones that occur during the menstrual cycle.

These results corroborate other similar findings that suggest hormones play a key role in attraction in two ways. Levels of testosterone can influence a male’s attractive-ness by signifying his suitability as a mate. Also, the hormonal changes in a female during the menstrual cycle may also affect what type of male face she is more attracted

You may be bored with testosterone and if you want a different hormone to study, make sure you study the role of cortisol in the stress response and its effect on memory and the hippocampus in the PTSD chapter.

As an alternative to testosterone, you could do some research on how estrogen may influence female characteristics and the effect this has on attraction in males. There is considerable research in this area.

Women are most fertile at the ovulation stage of their menstrual cycle.


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to, and might increase the chances that during the fertile stage of her cycle she will be more attracted to signs of good genes for procreation.

The US Documentary Channel released a 45 minute documentary called “The Science of Sex Appeal.” In this video you can see an interview with Lisa Debruine discussing studies similar to the one above. She is one of the researchers who worked with Jones in the above study and has conducted a lot of research in this field. This is one of many resources that explore the plethora of factors involved in attraction and sexual behaviour.


How might hormones influence attraction?

Guiding Question:

Critical Thinking Extension: Gender Bias: What do males find attractive? While this study deliberately has a limited gender perspective because it’s focusing on what females find attractive, it nevertheless limits our understanding of attraction in all humans by focusing on only one gender. It’s not a methodological limitation of the study because the aim of the study was specifically to focus on females, but it is a limitation of the applications of the study in understanding attraction across humans. One way of demonstrating abstract thinking skills is to raise these kinds of questions in your answers. Moreover, you could do some additional research into studies that investigate the types of faces that males find attractive.

Testosterone was chosen for this section as it has good connections other topics, including pheromones that you’ll learn about later in this chapter.



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(c) Evolution and Attraction

Johnston et al.’s study from the previous section may be criticized on the grounds that it was conducted in one particular culture. Just because these results were obtained in New Mexico, USA, does this mean they would be consistent across cultures?

While David Buss’ study (1989) doesn’t investigate the same specific variables as

Johnston et al., it does provide some insight into cross-cultural similarities in attrac-tion. By gathering data from 10,047 participants across 37 cultures, Buss was able to see if men and women around the world desired the same qualities in a mate.

He also hypothesized that gender consistency in attraction to particular charac-teristics across cultures would suggest an evolutionary explanation for this attraction. This is because if humans from many different parts of the world value the same traits in a mate of the opposite gender, it suggests that this attraction is not being influenced by cultural factors. It is far more probable that this attraction is operating at a biological level.

One of the first aims of the study was to compare the differences in preferences between men and women. Buss hypothesized that due to evolutionary pressures, males and females would prefer different traits and that this would be consistent across cultures. That is to say, males from all cultures would desire similar characteristics.

One of his hypotheses was that males would prefer a female who was younger. The results showed that this was the case and across all 37 cultures males preferred mates who were younger. This can be explained from an evolutionary perspective as females are most fertile in their early 20s, and fertility decreases after this age (Buss, ibid). From an evolutionary standpoint, males wouldn’t want to exert effort and resources into trying to procreate with a female who lacked fertility. The health risks of carrying a baby to full-term also increase with age, so from a male’s point of view it would be an advantage to have a youthful mate who has a higher probability of being able to take care of the offspring and ensure the successful passing on of genes.

Buss' study did find a cross-cultural similarity in gender preferences when it comes to age

If behaviour is consistent across cultures it may suggest a biological basis for that behaviour, as humans are biologically similar around the world.

Social status is important for many reasons. It’s important that you can understand how social status might be important for survival, including across different cultures and time periods.


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Even though Buss didn’t specifically predict it, the results also showed that across all culture females preferred a mate who was older. This could also be explained from an evolutionary perspective: having a higher social status would enable a male to provide better protection and resources for a female and her offspring. As there is a lot of physical investment in carrying a baby to full-term and raising a baby, a female would be at an advantage if she had a male who could provide and support her and her baby. An older male would have a higher probability of being higher in social status and rank, which might explain why females showed preference for older males.

There were some other interesting cross-cultural differences that were found in the study, and these will explored in the next topic. However, you may want to try to apply an evolutionary explanation to the following results:

• Females placed higher value on financial prospects than males • Males placed a higher emphasis on “good looks”• Males from 23 of the 37 cultures placed higher emphasis on chastity than females

The complete study of Buss’ is available online and the language is accessible for most IB students.


How does Buss’ study suggest that evolution can explain attraction?

Guiding Question:

Critical Thinking Extension: Area of Uncertainty/Alternative Explanation: While Buss’ study does provide some evidence to suggest that there is an evolutionary basis for mate preference and attraction, are there other possible factors that could explain these gender differences in preferences?

Buss’ study provides more evidence for the role of evolution in attraction.

Attraction is often a key factor in forming a romantic relationship. But is this the same across cultures? We'll explore this idea later in the chapter.



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Relevant Topics

• Evolution and behaviour• Hormones and behaviour• Formation of relationships

Practice Exam Questions

• Discuss one or more evolutionary explanations of behaviour.• Explain how one hormone may affect one behaviour.• Discuss the formation of personal relationships.• Discuss research related to the formation of personal relationships.

Research Methods

Johnston et al.’s study could be classed as a quasi-experiment as the variable that is having an effect is the female’s time of the menstrual cycle. The assump-tion is that physiological changes during this time influence what the women find attractive. While the effects of this variable are investigated, the participants cannot be randomly allocated to conditions and it is not the researcher who is manipulating the IV. This is why this study could be considered a quasi-experi-ment. This type of study can be useful in understanding the correlation between menstrual cycle and attraction to masculine faces as it can provide valuable data that supports evolutionary explanations of behaviour.

Ethical Considerations

Anonymity would be an important characteristic in any study where an indi-vidual is offering information about preferences to something as personal as what they find attractive. Imagine if they had a partner who was opposite to what they rated as being attractive. This could cause harm to an existing relationship.

Confidentiality (e.g. not telling people who participated in the study) might also be important as those in existing relationships may become jealous at knowing their partner was participating in a study about attraction.


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(a) Pheromones: An Introduction

We have looked at numerous examples of how chemical messengers may affect our behaviour. Hormones like adrenaline and testosterone are transmitted through our blood while neurotransmitters like serotonin are transmitted through the process of neurotransmission. There is also evidence to suggest that there is another type of chemical messenger that is transported in a different way.

A pheromone is a type of chemical messenger that is transmitted from one indi-vidual to another through the air and is detected through the sense of smell in the receiving individual. Their technical definition is: “substances which are secreted to the outside by an individual and received by a second individual of the same species, in which they release a specific reaction, for example, a definite behavior or a develop-mental process…” (Verhaeghe et al., 2013).

Pheromones have been studied extensively in animal research and there is consid-erable evidence to suggest that they do influence animal behaviour. But there is much debate as to whether or not they affect human behaviour.

Animals have a specific part of their olfactory system that detects most phero-mones and this is called the vomeronasal organ. Part of the reason why there is much debate as to whether or not pheromones influence human behaviour is that there is no evidence that the vomeronasal organ functions in the human olfactory system. We have this tissue in our bodies up until birth, but most of the evidence suggests it doesn’t function after birth. However, many animals detect pheromones through their sense of smell, so it is possible that humans may still detect pheromones through smell (Verhaeghe, ibid).

5.2 Pheromones and BehaviourHow might pheromones influence attraction?

The olfactory system is the name given to the parts of our sensory system that enables us to smell things.

During mating season many animals give off signals that try to increase the likelihood of procreation. Stags "roar" and spread their scent to attract females.



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There is evidence that suggests pheromones may play a role in the mating process of animals. For instance, studies as far back as the 1960s show that presenting a female pig with the scent of a boar (male pig) will result in the female adopting a mating readiness stance (Cutler, 1999). The specific pheromone that might have this effect has been identified as androstenone.

To see if vomeronasal organ tissue was required to detect androstenone, Dorries et al. (1997) blocked the vomeronasal organ in one group of domestic pigs. They admin-istered androstenone to this group, as well as to another group of control pigs. The results showed that there was no difference in the behaviours of the two groups of pigs as a result. This provides some evidence for the fact that the vomeronasal organ is not needed to detect pheromones. If this is the case, it could mean that pheromones might be able to be detected by humans through their regular sense of smell. Remember that humans and animals have very similar biological processes, which is why animals are often used in psychological research.

This section is designed to give you a general overview of what pheromones are and how they might work. The following sections provide you with more detailed information about how another pheromone, androstadienone, might work alongside secondary sex characteristics to signify good quality genes.

Even though humans’ vomeronasal organ apparently doesn’t function anymore, we may still detect pheromones through our sense of smell.

If you like newts, livescience.com has an interesting article called “Newt Pheromones Put Females into Mating Frenzy.”


How does the study on domestic pigs suggest pheromones may be capable of affecting human behaviour?

Guiding Question:

Critical Thinking Extension: Hypothesizing: You have probably learned by now that detailed explanations of variables and behaviour include providing explanations of how the variable influences the behaviour. Can you hypothesize how the detection of pheromones through the olfactory system may result in an observable action?


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(b) Androstadienone

In the previous section you were introduced to a new kind of chemical messenger that is only recently being studied in some detail in regard to its effect on human behaviour. While the study on female boars might suggest that the pheromone andros-tenone may affect behaviour, it didn’t provide much insight into how it may affect behaviour in humans. The following study introduces a new pheromone that has been studied in humans and provides some insight into its role in the sexual behaviour of humans.

Androstadienone is found in male sweat and may help females in the process of selecting a suitable mate. Whereas testosterone may influence mate selection by providing visual signs of health and fertility, androstadienone may send signals through the sense of smell.

Studies have tested the relationship between smell and attraction by having males wear a t-shirt for a few days and then place them in a bag for females to smell. The results of this research suggest that humans may give off signals through smell that suggest if one is a good match to procreate with (e.g. Wedekind, 1995). But studies like this only show that smell might facilitate attraction and appropriate mate selection and they don’t necessarily investigate pheromones. I mention this study here because it simply provides some evidence that smell can affect attraction by providing a signal of good quality genes.

One study that did investigate androstadi-enone specifically was by Saxton et al. (2008) who conducted a study using androstadienone during speed dating tests. The researchers placed cotton wool under the nose of female participants. There were three conditions as the cotton wool either contained androstadi-enone mixed with 1% clove oil, 1% clove oil only, or just water. The

clove oil was used to make the control and the pheromone smell the same. This was hoped to isolate the chemical reaction as the factor affecting the behaviour, not the pleasantness or unpleasantness of the smell of the pheromone.

The results of two out of three of the studies showed that the females who were exposed to the androstadienone rated males as being more attractive than those that had just water or clove oil. This suggests that the pheromone androstadienone that is given off in male sweat may act as a chemical messenger to increase feelings of attrac-tion in a female.

But yet again we are faced with the issue that we’ve seen before: this research doesn’t fully explain how pheromones may affect our behaviour. In the next section you will see how androstadienone may work together with visual signals to send signals that facilitate mate preference.

Androstadienone is released under the arms of men and has the strongest impact on females.

Even though humans’ vomeronasal organ apparently doesn’t function anymore, we may still detect pheromones through our sense of smell.



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The New York Times has an article that explores the sweaty t-shirt study further called “Studies Explore Love and the Sweaty T-shirt.” While this study isn’t about pheromones, it could still be used in other parts of the course, including the formation of relationships, the role of genetics in behaviour and evolutionary explanations of behaviour.


How does the above evidence suggest that pheromones may influence human behaviour?

Guiding Question:

Critical Thinking Extension: Hypothesizing: From an evolutionary stand-point, could you provide plausible reasons why a sense of smell might be important for attraction? Hint: electricity.

(c) Androstadienone and Attraction

In the previous section you were introduced to the idea that attraction might be influenced by smell. Being attracted to particular smells might help us choose a quality mate. Androstadienone may affect the attraction of females through their role of signaling mate quality. This male pheromone has been shown to have a stronger effect than androstenone on female vomeronasal organs (Jennings-White, 1995 as cited in Cornwell). It also activates different parts of the hypothalamus in men and women (Savic, 2001), which could affect gender responses to this androstadienone.

Cornwell et al. (2004) exposed participants to male and female pheromones, including androstadienone, and compared the results. Their participants were 56 male and 56 female participants between the ages of 17 – 26 who were recruited from the University of St. Andrews, Scotland. While the study also measured male preferences in females, to be consistent, we will only focus on the female side of this study.

Participants were shown faces from a range of ethnicities and the faces ranged in appearance from 50% feminized to 50% masculinized. The women were asked to rate which face they would prefer for a short-term or long-term relationship. After they were shown the photos, they were asked to smell five different vials. In these were androstadienone, androstenone, a female pheromone, and two control oils (one was clove oil and the other was oil of cade).

The results showed that there was a positive correlation between the female’s preference of masculine facial characteristics and their preference for the smell of the androstadienone (the masculine pheromone). This suggests that preference for masculine facial characteristics corresponds with a greater liking for masculine smells.

Mate quality is another scientific term used to describe how suitable someone might be to mate with. Remember that “quality” refers to the suitability in being able to produce healthy babies that are likely to survive and be able to keep passing on genetic material.


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Dominance in this context is another way of saying the ability to maintain a high social status. It’s closely connected with aggression and competitiveness, which are also correlated with testosterone. For instance, the ability to display aggression might help maintain dominance.

How might androstadienone influence behaviour?

Guiding Question:

The researchers conclude that pheromones and facial characteristics might work together by revealing an individuals mate quality. For instance, if a male has high concentrations of androstadienone and a masculine face it could provide two indi-cators for a female that he has high testosterone levels. This could be an indicator of dominance and/or good overall health (Cornwell et al., op cit.).

From this study, we start to get a better understanding of how androstadienone might influence attraction. It could work like other signs of mate quality in that it shows potential female mates that the male giving off the scent of the androstadienone would make for a good mate because he has desirable genetic material (e.g. high levels of testosterone). So while facial characteristics can send a visual signal, pheromones may work by sending signals through the sense of smell.

It is important to note that there are numerous factors that influence attraction and we are only looking at a very select sample. Also, there are many individual differences in preference between males and females in attraction. We’ve looked at this from a biological view, but haven’t properly considered how other variables like cognition and culture may affect relationships. This will be the subject of the next topic.

These sections have addressed how pheromones may increase feelings of attractiveness. One study measured male responses to the smell of female tears. You can find a summary of the article online. It’s called “Woman’s tears contain chemical cues.”


Critical Thinking Extension: Ethics: Men and women have dreamed for centuries of a “love potion.” What are the possible practical and ethical implications of the findings from studies like Cornwell et al.’s?



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Relevant Topics

• Pheromones and behaviour • Hormones and behaviour


• Discuss evolutionary explanations of behaviour. • Explain one study related to pheromones and behaviour.• To what extent do genetics influence behaviour? • Explain how one pheromone may influence human behaviour.

Research Methods

Cornwell et al.’s study is a good example of a field experiment. A speed-dating situation is a naturally occurring event and the researchers manipulated the variable of detecting pheromones during participation in this event. By showing that pheromones might affect attraction in a real life setting, the study can add to the growing body of evidence that suggests pheromones affect human behaviour.


When conducting field experiments debriefing becomes incredibly important. The speed-dating study is a great one for discussing the role of debriefing. On the one hand, if a female’s perception of a male was altered because of the pheromone it might be beneficial to inform her of this. However, in doing so a potential future relationship might be jeopardized as she may disregard initial feelings of attrac-tion as just being a result of the pheromones. Would it be more ethical to inform the participants which group they were in, or simply say there were three different groups?


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(a) Cultural Values

The previous topics were designed to show you how biological factors may influence attraction. But only looking at personal relationships from a biological perspective is reductionist. Here you’ll see how cultural values may influence attraction and this section is designed to recap the concept of cultural values and Hofstede’s descriptions of cultural dimensions. What we think is important might be affected by our cultural environment.

In the previous section we examined biological origins of attraction and how hormones, face shape and genetics could influence attraction. But it is important that we don’t overlook the role of attraction in deciding to ask someone on a date, because after all, the formation of a romantic relationship most probably begins with the first stages of attraction. It makes sense if you think about it, but this is not always the case, like in cultures that have arranged marriages and we’ll look at those later.

Let’s first look at romantic relationships where people do get to choose whom they take on a date. It probably begins with attraction. When you hear the word attrac-tion you might be thinking about physical attraction. But attraction is more than just physical. Have you ever been physically attracted to someone you’ve just met and then after getting to know them you thought that you would never want to date them…ever? Or has the opposite happened? You thought, “well they’re not much to look at…” … but then you become good friends and you start hanging out and then you realise, “Hey, I think I'm in love.”

Again we are seeing in psychology and in relationships that it’s not just biology; getting to know someone could also affect our desire to form a romantic relationship with them. As we’ve seen in previous sections an influential factor in our thought processes can be our cultural background. Depending on the culture we’re from we may have different values and these values may affect our judgement. We’re going to look again at how cultural values could affect the way we think about a potential mate.

To recap, according to Hofstede’s descriptions of cultural dimensions there is a tendency in individualistic cultures to place higher value on independence and stress the importance of individuals taking care of themselves and their immediate family (e.g. husband, wife, kids, and parents). Having the power and the right to be an indi-vidual and to make your own decisions (individual autonomy) and self-expression are also highly valued.

On the other hand, in collectivist cultures people may be defined by their rela-tionships and their obligations more than by their personal achievements. Individual autonomy and self-expression are not encouraged and group harmony is more important than individual achievement. Individuals in collectivist cultures can expect their relatives or in-group members to look after them in exchange for loyalty to the group. Basically, a society's point on this continuum is reflected in what has more emphasis – “I” or “We”.

5.3 Culture and Attraction How might cultural values affect attraction?

A cultural dimension is a term used to describe two opposing sets of cultural values. Cultures may vary along the continuum of which set of values they most embody.

We can see in this section another example of how psychology is about understanding relationships: how we think may be affected by our cultural background, and this might affect our behaviour.



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I can’t stress enough how important it is to remember that these are very broad generalizations and you need to remember that when describing these cultures and cultural values. Think about which cultural dimension you most identify with and how would you feel if someone said, “You’re from a collectivist culture so you don’t value self-expression”, or, “You’re from an individualistic culture so you don’t think about keeping harmonious relationships in your family.” We can and do make generaliza-tions in psychology – but we always have to make sure we remember they are in fact generalizations.

When you use the term group harmony, make sure you think carefully about what you mean. What group are you referring to? What does “harmony” look like in that group? Many students love to use this term, without fully considering what it means.

You can view interviews with Hofstede on YouTube or visit his website at geert-hofstede.com to learn more about cultural dimensions.


How might cultural values influence attraction?

Guiding Question:

Critical Thinking Extension: Economics and Culture: Part of understanding psychology is also connected to understanding other subjects. Economic factors can affect cultural values. Can you think about how and why economic factors may affect cultural values?


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(b) Mate Preference

In this topic we are going to revisit a concept closely associated with attraction, mate preference. In biological terms to “mate” means to procreate and so a “mate” in that sense means a person you would like to have babies with. In Buss’ study he investigated mate preference by gathering data on what types of characteristics were preferred when choosing a mate. From this study you were shown the cross-cultural similarities in mate preference, which provide evidence for evolutionary explanations for the gender differences in mate preference. However, Buss also gathered data on cross-cultural differences.

Buss measured mate preference by having participants fill out a questionnaire

asking participants questions about how desirable particular traits were (such a good looks, chastity, ambition, social status, financial prospects, etc.) They also gave them a list of certain characteristics and they asked the participants to rank them in order of how important they are when considering whom to marry. Examples of these char-acteristics were attractiveness, good earning capacity, and ambition. The data were analyzed and correlations between cultural dimensions and mate preference identi-fied. One of the correlations found was that females from collectivist cultures placed a higher value on traits like social status and ambition, when compared with females from individualistic cultures (Buss, 1989).

There are multiple possible explanations for the correlations Buss found and I will provide you with only one and do so on the proviso that you remember that this is just one interpretation. You are encouraged to challenge, disregard or elaborate on it. The key is that you understand from these results just how cultural values may affect the formation of relationships.

One possible explanation for the fact that females from collectivist cultures might place a higher value on social status and ambition could be based on the increased value placed on the thoughts, feelings and opinions of members of the extended family, which is valued more in collectivist societies. Because in modern society social status is obtained by wealth, in order to bring pride to the extended family it might

When identifying research methods there are often grey areas. For example, is Buss’ study an example of a correlational study or a natural experiment?

Our cultural values may influence how we think. This could affect how we view potential mates.



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be important to raise social status. For this reason if a man already has social status it might make him more attractive. Similarly, if he has ambition it might not matter if he doesn’t have status and wealth now, the ambition will increase the chances he will have in the future. Through being successful in terms of status and wealth a man may have a higher chance of bringing pride to the female’s family and/or raising the status of the entire family if a union is formed, thus making him more desirable. This would be considered important to the wider family. So this isn’t to say that status and ambition are not valued in individualistic cultures (remember that females across cultures valued these traits), but that it’s one possible reason why it’s more valued in collectivist cultures.

But this was only one explanation of one of the results. Could you come up with your own explanation of the results? And there were other results as well. The table below shows other results from the study.

Males Females

Males from individualistic cultures tended to place less emphasis on domestic skills.

Females from individualistic cultures tended to place less emphasis on ambition and financial prospects.

You’ll notice that these results can be examined from either viewpoint. That is to say, you could begin by thinking “Why might collectivist values place higher emphasis on social status.” Or, “why might individualistic cultures place less emphasis on social status?” An excellent explanation is one that could do both!

Buss’ whole article is available online for free (“Sex Differences in Human Mate Preferences”) and the language is mostly accessible for DP students.


How might cultural values influence mate preference?

Guiding Question:

Critical Thinking Extension: Tolerating Uncertainty: Many students want to make concrete statements and generalizations. Critical thinkers realize that the world is not black and white and that explanations of correlations are not always definitive answers. What are some reasons why we cannot make definitive claims about cultural values and mate preference based on Buss’ study alone?


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(c) For Love or …?

As you saw in the previous section, cultural values may affect the way we think about prospective partners for mating and marrying. Another important factor that culture may affect is how we think about the role of love in a relationship. Before we explore this idea, it might be worth taking some time to think about your own inter-pretation of the word “love.”

Throughout history and in many modern societies marriage is not about the love between two individuals, it’s about the union of whole families. Will you consider marrying someone you don't love, but who is chosen for you by your family?

In this section we’re going to continue our investigation into the extent to which

cultural values may influence the formation of a marriage. We’re going to look at the varying importance placed on love by some cultures over others. This also becomes important when we try to understand why marriages might be more likely in some cultures to dissolve (e.g. end in separation or divorce).

In cultures like Pakistan

and India, divorce rates are incredibly low when compared to places like the United States. There are multiple possible reasons for the differences in these divorce rates and once again it’s important to remember that we are only looking at a very limited scope of possible explanations.

Levine et al. (1995)

conducted a cross-cultural study on college students from eleven different cultures that

compared the importance people from different cultures placed on love when deciding whom to marry. The researchers measured attitudes towards the importance of love in a marriage by asking the following question:

• “Ifapersonhadallthequalitiesyoudesired,wouldyoumarrythemifyouweren’t in love with them?” The participants answered “Yes”, “No” or “Neutral” and the data were analyzed.

This question is assessing the extent to which love is a key ingredient in the decision to choose a marriage partner. What would your answer be? If you could “build” your dream life-partner that had everything, but for whatever reason you didn’t love them, would you marry them?

Levine et al. hypothesized that attitudes towards the importance of love in getting

married would be different in collectivist and individualistic cultures. The results did in fact find that participants from India, Pakistan and Thailand were the most likely to answer “Yes”, they would marry someone they didn’t love if they had all the right qualities. They also found a very strong correlation for love being a pre-requisite for marriage in individualistic countries like the USA, the UK and Australia. That is to say, participants from these countries were more likely to require being in love with someone in order to marry them. These results suggest that there is a correlation

When discussing concepts like love, it’s important to actually think about what the word means. There’s no point offering a definition here, as it’s one of those concepts that is better understood through reflection rather than explanation.

Would you marry someone who had everything you wanted in a mate, but you didn't love?



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between the culture someone comes from and the value they place on love when getting married.

One possible explanation for these results is based on earlier work by Triandis (2001), who has investigated Hofstede’s cultural dimensions. He proposes that in collectivist cultures, social norms and duty are more important than personal pleasure (Triandis, as cited in Levine et al.). This might explain why love is not as important to forming a marriage in cultures such as India and Pakistan: in these collectivist cultures other factors need to be taken into consideration when deciding whom to marry. Social norms such as the practice of arranged marriages and having parents and extended family members heavily involved in the match-making process mean that the individual’s choice in their partner is limited. They also might feel that it’s their duty to follow their parents’ wishes and agree to marry the person who has been chosen for them. And since love is a really about individual choice, we can see that love might not be such a factor when forming marriages in these cultures.

From this section it’s hoped that you have been able to see how cultural factors might also affect feelings of attraction and the formation of a marriage. These same variables will become important later in this chapter when we think about cultural factors that add to explanations of why marriages might end in divorce.

A common saying is that in individualistic countries people marry the person they love, in collectivist countries people love the person they marry.

The issue of arranged marriages is an important and often controversial one. There are many documentaries available online about this practice that you may be interested in watching. For example, there are at least two TED Talks that deal with this topic. One is for the case of arranged marriages ("Ira Travedi: The Case for Arranged Marriages") and the other is opposed ("Sabitina James: My Flight From an Arranged Marriage".)


How might cultural values influence the formation of a marriage?

Guiding Question:

Critical Thinking Extension: Population Validity: Like many other studies, Levine et al.’s 1985 study compared the preferences of college students. Could you explain why the results from this demographic might not be generalizable to older age groups? What variables might influence a change in perception as people get older?


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Relevant Topics

• Culture and behaviour • The formation of relationships• Interpersonal relationships


• To what extent do sociocultural factors affect the formation of relationships?• Discuss one or more influences of culture on behaviour. • To what extent do cultural dimensions affect one behaviour?

Research Methods

As with Buss’ research, Levine et al.’s study is another example of the value of using correlational studies when investigating behaviour across cultures. It’s impossible to isolate cultural values as an independent variable to be manipulated in the laboratory, so correlational methods must be used. By gathering data across cultures and using questionnaires to quantify behaviour, the researchers can draw conclusions about cultural differences in approaches to relationships.


An important part of informed consent is providing participants with the knowledge that their results will be anonymous and their participation confiden-tial. This is important from a methodological validity viewpoint, as it will increase the probability that participants will give honest answers. Participants from cultures that practice arranged marriages, for instance, may not feel comfortable expressing opinions that may go against this practice (e.g. in a study like Levine et al.’s). Assuring them before the study that their results will be anonymous and their participation confidential will improve the validity of the data and will reduce their psychological stress during the study.


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