Modern Wisdom12 Key Factors That Determine Your Attractiveness - Macken Murphy
EVERY SPOKEN WORD
150 min read · 30,047 words- 0:00 – 5:30
What Actually Makes an Attractive Face?
- CWChris Williamson
Just be attractive, bro is like the biggest meme-
- MMMacken Murphy
Yes.
- CWChris Williamson
... in online dating-
- MMMacken Murphy
Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
... at the moment. What actually makes an attractive face?
- MMMacken Murphy
Well, there's a couple things that come up again and again in the literature, and then there's also a couple things that I think men think are very attractive and are surprised when they find out that women don't actually necessarily care about it. Now that- that's not to say, we'll, we'll get into the weeds, but that's, that's not to say that men are necessarily wrong to want to look like that, right? It's just that it's not the attractiveness component. So a couple things that come up a lot are averageness, right? And that's mathematical averageness. So having a nose that is of average size, shape, and placement. So some people think average and they're like, oh, normal. And it's like a person with a very average looking face, meaning a face that would be the result of a composite of many faces superimposed on each other, a person with that sort of face would look like a model, right? They, they, you- if you superimpose a set of faces, the face that results from it will be more attractive than any individual in that set, right? And they, they, we can talk if you want, uh, I know that you're interested in this sort of thing as to the possible evolutionary and also just social reasons why that might be the case. Uh, a quick two theories would be maybe average faces are easier to process, right? And the processing speed is pleasant. It's like, oh, there's nothing glaring here. And it's like, oh, I- I quite like looking at this. From an evolutionary perspective, it could be that the average four traits are the end result of sexual selection, right? So we're putting the cart before the hor- horse in the sense that the reason that the average nose is the average nose is because there's been so much historical selection on that shape, size, and placement.
- CWChris Williamson
On non-average noses, against non-average noses.
- MMMacken Murphy
Against, against non-average noses. So the reason that it's the average is because noses that are too big get cut out. So it's really the- there- there's some re- other reason why that size, shape, and placement is attractive. And it's become the average over... 'cause w- we are the end result of previous selection. So averageness comes up a lot. Another thing that comes up a lot is symmetry, right? Uh, symmetry is definitely attractive, right? A- a- and- and it's attractive on its own. It also seems to correlate with other m- matrices of attractiveness. But symmetry comes out again and again and again. If the left side of your face looks a lot like the right side of your face, then you're likely more attractive than you would be if you didn't have that. And, and with both of these things, with averageness, with symmetry, there, there are plenty of individual cases where people have very non-average traits and are still stunning, right? Uh, plenty of people are highly asymmetrical. I, I mean, some of our, our considered most, most gorgeous celebrities have, you know, very asymmetrical faces. But these traits do matter. Uh, symmetry, the standard evo explanation is that this is a signal of, let's say, robust underlying developmental qualities, right? The, the, that they were able to withstand the insults of their environment, right? At the very least, you know that they don't have some horrible injury to one side of their face or something like that. They didn't have some horrible illness. And they don't have, uh, certain heritable genetic disorders, right? And this is something that we'll likely talk about more. Why, why do we care about beauty at all? And it's partially because beauty seems to be a signal of underlying qualities that matter more, such as health, right? So I'll note that the symmetry studies have mixed results in Western populations, right? So it's like we know that symmetry is attractive, but there's a question of like does it actually correlate with healthiness? And, and that's not always the case. But it, it is the case, at the very least, that, look, if you've had a... Like, I've got a broken nose from boxing, right? That, that certainly made me less attractive than I would be if I had had a straight one. What does that tell potential mates? It tells them that something, you know, for some reason I couldn't handle it, right? Some- something went wrong for me at some point, right?
- CWChris Williamson
Mm-hmm.
- MMMacken Murphy
Uh, and, you know, certain heritable genetic disorders that presumably you wouldn't be excited to pass onto your offspring if you... A- l- all else being equal, those also co-vary with high asymmetry. And so symmetry, like when you see a symmetrical face, it's like, "Hey," you know, "hey, ladies, I don't have those disorders and, um, I don't have horrific facial trauma," right?
- CWChris Williamson
Have you ever seen Soft White Underbelly, that YouTube channel?
- MMMacken Murphy
I hardly watch anything.
- CWChris Williamson
Okay. Well, it's a very big channel and he has a 50 million play interview with an inbred family.
- MMMacken Murphy
Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
I highly recommend that you go and watch it.
- MMMacken Murphy
And one of the first things you'll notice when you see those people is that they have... Well, I don't know about this family specifically 'cause I haven't seen it, but they'll look, they'll look like something has gone awry.
- CWChris Williamson
Highly asymmetric.
- MMMacken Murphy
Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
Highly non-typical.
- MMMacken Murphy
Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
Like, I mean, one of the guys whose eyes are very, very wide apart, uh, like which... Uh, they may be the same distance apart from the center of his nose.
- MMMacken Murphy
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
Who knows? That might be-
- MMMacken Murphy
Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
... symmetrical, but it breaks the rule of very non-average.
- MMMacken Murphy
Yeah. And I've also heard, you know, I've heard doctors privately, you know, use the phrase funny looking kid, right? Meaning like not to make fun of them at all, but like, "Okay, we don't see anything wrong, but like for some reason this kid looks strange. Maybe there's something deeper here that should be looked at." But that's, that's obviously anecdotal. I'm more of a data guy. It's- it's interesting when the, when the anecdotes align. Um, but symmetry and averageness come up with the caveat that, you know, some people hear that, uh, you know, this is a sign of health and think that I think that health should be attractive, let's say. Um, I'm not in the should business at all. It's just cold what is, what is not. Now I want to talk... You a- you asked about men. A- and so one thing
- 5:30 – 13:56
Why Masculine Faces Can Cause Concern for Women
- MMMacken Murphy
that's interesting is that facial femininity in women, very attractive, very consistently, right?
- CWChris Williamson
What's femininity in your world?
- MMMacken Murphy
(laughs) Well, there's a few ways to measure it. Uh, but basically one way of thinking about it is you take the average set of faces of women and the average set of faces of men, or the average set of let's say males and females, right, in this specific case 'cause there, there are some differences between gender and sex. You take the average sets, you know, average faces of males and females and there's different traits in those groups that are typical. And if someone is... has more of those typical traits for one group, they'd be more masculine looking, right? And sometimes, you know, there are- there are other ways of looking at it. That's just one, right? And there, and there are different researchers who have very strong opinions as to like what facial masculinity actually should be, right? 'Cause some people say, well, you know, that's, that's, uh, that's...... that isn't, you know, a typical male face. But if you ask respondents, they all say it's masculine, right? So it's like, that is a masculine face because who decides what's masculine and feminine? We do, right? So facial masculinity though is interesting. So facial femininity is very attractive to men. Men love stereotypically girly, womanly faces, right? They respond very, e- heterosexual men respond to that quite strongly typically. Facial masculinity, despite all the Giga Chad memes and, uh, things like that and, and what we think might be attractive. You know, some studies find that women prefer facial masculinity a little bit. Some find that they prefer facial femininity, some find no effect, right? The latest Oxford Handbook of Evolutionary Psychology and Romantic Relationships, that's, that's the latest review that I'm aware of and they said, "Look, if anything, there's a slight preference for facial femininity in men as well," right? And that's a bit of a confusing result at first because it's like, well, facial masculinity, it's like tha- there are so many things that are attractive about masculinity, you know, like facial masculinity pred- predicts fighting ability, for instance, right? Um, it's, it's probably predicted by, you know, testosterone levels and things that are impressive signals in other contexts. So it's like surely women love, you know, a Giga Chad type face, women love a super masculine, uh, face and some super masculine faces like Henry Cavill, for example, are very attractive to women. I'm not saying that it, that it's a, a huge disadvantage or something. It's just not all else being equal preferred. And one common idea that you'll see in the literature is the masculinity trade-off hypothesis, right? So if you're mating as a woman, right? Think about this strategically, it's like, yes, there's all these perks that come with masculinity, but this is... You're picking a mate that you're probably going to have to co-parent with, right? You're gonna have to raise children with them and so maxing out on like the super alpha dude, right? Maybe for a one night stand, right? There's some indication for that. But if you're, you know, looking for hot guys for a long term relationship, uh, a prettier boy is more appealing because that might, uh, that might co-vary with traits that are, you know, less-
- CWChris Williamson
Yeah.
- MMMacken Murphy
... less dastardly, let's say.
- CWChris Williamson
That heavy brow ridge also means risky behavior-
- MMMacken Murphy
Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
... also means he's probably going to sleep with my sister.
- MMMacken Murphy
Yeah. Also means that he might lose his temper at you or your offspring and cause-
- CWChris Williamson
Understood.
- MMMacken Murphy
... horrible damage. Also means that he might get murdered because he can't stop mouthing off.
- CWChris Williamson
That's interesting that, um, it skews toward femininity, not just averageness in men-
- MMMacken Murphy
Mm-hmm. Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
... whatever the, the midpoint between femininity and masculinity is. Has that been tested for short-term versus long term, uh, casual versus, uh, long term?
- MMMacken Murphy
The masculinity thing?
- CWChris Williamson
Yes.
- MMMacken Murphy
Yeah. So there's mixed results on that. And I'll also note that the masculinity trade-off hypothesis is very much a hypothesis, right?
- CWChris Williamson
Mm-hmm.
- MMMacken Murphy
So, you know, it's tempting to... It's such a good story, right?
- CWChris Williamson
Right.
- MMMacken Murphy
It sounds so good-
- CWChris Williamson
Yeah.
- MMMacken Murphy
... that in every paper on this sort of subject, someone's going to talk about the masculinity because it's a fun story to tell.
- CWChris Williamson
I got to, I got to bring this up, like I didn't realize how fallible scientists were, especially those, even in evolutionary psychology, which is very rigorous. It hasn't been replication-
- MMMacken Murphy
The queen of the sciences. (laughs)
- CWChris Williamson
It hasn't been the replication crisis or anything like that.
- MMMacken Murphy
Unbelievable. Yeah. Except with the ovulation studies, don't forget.
- CWChris Williamson
Which we're going to get onto.
- MMMacken Murphy
U- yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
But if you come up with a sufficiently compelling name, God-
- 13:56 – 18:17
The Different Signals of Make-Up & Tan
- CWChris Williamson
- MMMacken Murphy
Et cetera.
- CWChris Williamson
... I was thinking about the, my trip to Thailand, which I did a couple of years ago, and, uh... Get that in here, come on. Um.
- MMMacken Murphy
(laughs)
- CWChris Williamson
A- and I was, I, I was thinking about when I saw the girls behind the counter who make their faces lighter.
- MMMacken Murphy
Mm.
- CWChris Williamson
So whereas I'm from Newcastle in the northeast of the UK, girls make themselves orange.
- MMMacken Murphy
Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
What does that signal? It signals, look at all of the spare time I have.
- MMMacken Murphy
Mm.
- CWChris Williamson
I can afford to go away on holiday. I can to go Malia or Magaluf or Marbella or wherever, and I can catch a tan and lie by the pool because I have lots of spare time. I'm the sort of person that spends their time outside, I'm into fitness and health and all the rest of it. No one knows that it's come from a bottle and a, and a make-up row.
- MMMacken Murphy
Yep.
- CWChris Williamson
The converse is true in Thailand, because the indigent laborers that work in the fields get the tan-
- MMMacken Murphy
Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
... the most. So they countersignal by saying, "I don't ever go outside."
- MMMacken Murphy
"I don't work." Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
"Yeah, I have a white-collar job. I'm inside." So I think that with the stubble, total bro science hat on here, but yes, it signals could grow a beard, chooses not to. Why? Well, most people that lead, especially now, and it, we'll get onto this, like cultural mediation, I suppose-
- MMMacken Murphy
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
... which is interesting. But especially right now, many jobs, many jobs where you have an overbearing boss may have an issue, and there is this sort of vestige of you should be clean-shaven when you go to work.
- MMMacken Murphy
Mm.
- CWChris Williamson
My dad still has that.
- MMMacken Murphy
Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
My dad gets clean-shaven before he goes to work. That's just been ingrained in him-
- MMMacken Murphy
Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
... as one of the things that you do. So it's kind of a bit of a countersignal. It's like the red sneaker, referred to as the red-sneaker effect-
- MMMacken Murphy
Mm.
- CWChris Williamson
... as well, that, um, the more money that you earn, the more casually that you dress. You know, like, the guy with 17 letters after his name just says, "Just call me Jim."
- MMMacken Murphy
Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
Whereas, the dude that just has-
- MMMacken Murphy
Just got his PhD.
- 18:17 – 20:20
What Makes an Eye Attractive?
- MMMacken Murphy
Mm.
- CWChris Williamson
The internet is obsessed with it.
- MMMacken Murphy
Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
What does the literature say? Do I need to have hunter eyes or
- NANarrator
(laughs)
- MMMacken Murphy
Well, I mean, it's, it's, uh, I'm, I'm not aware of any specific literature on canthal tilt. I'm sure that there's someone who's, who's really dug into what makes an attractive eye. There, there are some things that clearly make an attractive eye, such as, um, having, you know, very, uh, a, a w- what they call, uh, I believe it's a limbal ring. Uh, I hope I'm pronouncing that correctly. The, the dark ring around the color, people respond to that. The light white, right? Having that really clear sclera, uh, people seem to really respond to that. Both of those are probably cues to health, although that's, that's still, you know, it's a putative indicator wh- it's, it's still being looked at. Eye color, very interesting. Basically, if you run a survey in the West, you know, like, what, what, what eye color is sexiest, a lot of people will s- like, and generally you'll find that people say, "Oh, I love blue eyes," right? It doesn't really come out in studies that there are strong eye color preferences. Uh, there, there seems to be a frequency dependent selection effect. One of my old mentors, uh, Alexandra Uhl, she looked into this and, and it does seem that, you know, if you're the only blue-eyed guy in the room, then you look better than if everyone has blue eyes, right? And if you're the only brown-eyed guy in the room, you look better than if everyone has brown eyes, and so on. But, which might maintain eye color diversity. Canthal tilt is interesting. I am... So there, there, there's definitely a lot of literature that I'm aware of on eyes, but canthal tilt seems to be a bit of a meme th- uh, I'm sure that there's some, I'm sure that there's some, uh, research on this, uh, that I'm just not aware of, but anecdotally people seem to respond to it and that said though, I, I've become kind of acutely aware of it, and there are plenty of, again, it's kind of like the averagist and symmetry thing. There are plenty of famous actors who are, you know, considered gorgeous by women who have a negative canthal t- who have a positive canthal tilt. So, or um, the reverse, whichever one's the bad one.
- CWChris Williamson
Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- MMMacken Murphy
They've got, they've got the, the kind of, um, sloping eyes.
- CWChris Williamson
Yeah. Why are
- 20:20 – 26:28
Why We Are So Drawn to Faces
- CWChris Williamson
faces so important? So there are many ways to display your lack of genetic mutation-
- MMMacken Murphy
Mm.
- CWChris Williamson
... or your fitness, or your robustness from the environment thus far in your life. It seems like an awful lot of what we do is centered around the face.
- MMMacken Murphy
Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
Why do we have a particular high degree of sensitivity and finesse, uh, and ability to discern when it comes to the face? Why is so much of what we do... Why is it not the hands? Why is it not the arms?
- MMMacken Murphy
Mm.
- CWChris Williamson
W- body shape, we'll get onto waist to hip ratio, all that stuff, like those things are important, but everybody knows that there's been a person who's maybe not been in the best shape ever, but just has a gorgeous face, guy or girl, and you're like, "Fuck."
- MMMacken Murphy
Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
Like, they're hot.
- MMMacken Murphy
Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
I mean, you know, they could do with hitting the gym, but they're hot.
- MMMacken Murphy
Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's, uh, that's interesting. I mean, I'm, I'm not sure that there's, that there's anything... I mean, we see that bodies become more important than faces for short-term mating, and faces become more important than bodies for long-term mating, and there's a huge... You know, I had a conversation with Tanya Reynolds about this, and it wa- it was like, why (laughs) like, why would that be the case? 'Cause as you say, both should be indicators of the same putative, um, uh, you know, underlying fitness indicators. I think that one thing that I would like to bring to this episode and kind of leave people with in this context and in others, is it's typically thought, and I think that this is in some contexts the right way to think about it, but it's typically thought that beauty is a component of your mate value, right? So it's like you've got your personality, you've got the, the things you do, you've got the resources, you've got your willingness to invest, da-da-da-da-da. Uh, then beauty is one of the list of things that you bring to the table. But really, I think a better way to think of it is that beauty is, and this, uh, I- I'm certainly not unique in thinking this way, beauty is a shortcut signal of your mate value, right? And so with facial attractiveness, right, one of the themes that's been coming up in every conversation we've had about this today is that it's signaling underlying qualities that are maybe more important, and the same thing with bodily attractiveness as well. And if you think about it, it's like some of the things that, some of the things that we do, it's like you can say, uh, you can feel hard done by, and I totally understand it, that it's like, why do people with, you know, why are, why are more facially attractive people, why, why are we thinking that we have better personalities, da-da-da-da-da, that sort of thing? But to an extent, it's like, well, if two people walk into a room and one of them, uh, you know, their, their hair is well-styled, well-groomed, right? They've got the perfectly manicured stubble, or they've got makeup that's been styled perfectly and their, uh, their outfit's on point and everything's just working. It's like, and then the other person comes in and they've literally put in no effort, they've got bed heads, their, their, uh, or their makeup's a mess, or they're, they're, they're not, uh, you know, doing the natural... Their nails are- aren't trimmed, their clothing is shit, right? It's like if you're looking at those two people, all else being equal, if you have to make a guess, like who's gonna be a better husband and father? Who's gonna be a better wife and mother, right? The person who is willing to do these extra things in order to socially signal, the person who has the excess time and resources to devote to those things. I don't think it's that. I don't think it's th- they're, they're probably quite conscientious, right? (laughs) That they're, that they're going to this effort.
- CWChris Williamson
Reliable, orderly.
- MMMacken Murphy
Yeah. So, I would say, uh, to the basic question of why, why do faces matter, it's the same reason bodies matter. It's the same reason that style matters. It's a signal of qualities that matter more to us. I mean, we think of beauty as this extremely shallow thing to care about, and to an extent it is, fair enough. But to another extent, the reason that we care about beauty in the first place is 'cause it often signals deeper things.
- CWChris Williamson
It's a reliable signal.
- MMMacken Murphy
Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
So, uh, it got me thinking there where you were talking about how, uh, specifically facial attractiveness and beauty is kind of a, an aggregate of a bunch of other things-
- MMMacken Murphy
Mm.
- CWChris Williamson
... that contribute to that.
- MMMacken Murphy
Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
It-
- MMMacken Murphy
And there's still a lot of mystery there.
- CWChris Williamson
In the same way as a bank account-... for a, especially for a man-
- MMMacken Murphy
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
... is an aggregate of a number of other things that he does.
- MMMacken Murphy
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
And so is having a good body for men and women, perhaps for slightly different reasons. For a man, it might be something like, uh, dominance, uh, aggression, but it's also other things like reliability, orderliness, ability to overcome pain, that's kind of sexy, agency, uh, uh, reliability, consistency, smarts to be able to actually understand what they're doing. And as with everything, uh, and I love the, I love the fact that we started with the averageness, because Fisherian Runaway is basically what Giga Chad is, right? It's just this inset, like the most muscular guy had the most muscular son, had the most muscular son, had the most muscular son, and then boom, you end up with Giga Chad. But what you actually look at is, for most people, there are traits that are good in moderate doses, and if you overshoot them, the same thing goes for the woman who's dolled up. It's nice that someone puts effort in, that the outfit works with the hair, with the makeup, with the nails, with everything else.
- MMMacken Murphy
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
But if you come in and you're completely caked-
- MMMacken Murphy
Mm-hmm.
- 26:28 – 31:34
Do Women Like Muscular Men?
- MMMacken Murphy
is a, there w- so this is a very complicated conversation, and I think, uh, I want to be careful about, again, conflating mathematical averageness with trait averageness, right? So with muscularity, it's a little, we don't see this preference for average muscularity, right? So we see a preference for average facial size, shape, placement of traits, right? But with muscularity, it's more complicated. I mean...
- CWChris Williamson
Do women like muscular men?
- MMMacken Murphy
Yes. Yeah, yeah. I mean, th- there's some, some don't, right, but, but there, there's a variety of convergent f- And so I'm not speaking, I'm not saying that like all women prefer muscles, and I'm also not saying, as, as you noted, that, uh, as muscular as possible is optimal, right? In this... And it's also possible that, you know, a certain degree of muscularity is sexy in some context, but not in all, right? Like, the bodies that are popular in pornography might not actually look that great in real life, right? There's something about like the kind of super stimulus of like a super muscular lean dude, um, or someone who's, you know, had their body done to an e- uh, to an extreme degree that might work on camera, but not, you know, uh, in the real world. But in any case, muscularity, there is a recent meta-analysis that just got published on this. Uh, or I believe it just got published. It might be, you know, still in the kind of public (laughs) awaiting review sphere, but certainly, certainly the results are out. Uh, and they looked at kind of all the studies on predictors of mating success in all these different ways. And it just sort of is the case, right, uh, in- in the sense that re- regardless of what people say is attractive and what isn't, men who are muscular have higher mating success than men who aren't, right? And men who are more bodily masculine, in general, seem to have higher mating success. And so there's a couple different reasons why that might be. I mean, the first thought is pretty obvious. It's like maybe guys with muscles are just sexier, right? And there are individual studies where it's like you show women a bunch of bodies and you're like, "Who's hottest in this crew?" And it's like a guy who's more muscular than average and leaner than average, right? Not stage-ready bodybuilder, but certainly like pretty high standard, right? There's other studies that don't show that. But there are other ways in which, there are other ways in which muscularity can help you to compete for mates without making you more attractive. So, one route by which this could be the case, there was a really interesting study, uh, whi- which you might have already read. Uh, I'm sure one of your guesses-
- CWChris Williamson
David Putz?
- MMMacken Murphy
It might have been him. It was the frat boy study. So they studied a bunch of frat boys. Uh, I'll, I'll email this to you afterwards 'cause you're gonna like reading it. They studied a bunch of frat boys and they had them rate each other on like who would roll who basically, like who, who would be the best fighter, who's the most intimidating? That sort of question. I can't remember the scale items they used. And then they had women rate the frat boys as to like-
- CWChris Williamson
David Putz.
- MMMacken Murphy
Yeah, yeah, yeah. How hot are these guys?
- CWChris Williamson
Yep.
- MMMacken Murphy
And really weird result, how hot the women said the guys were didn't have, it wasn't a strong predictor of male mating success. Now, mating success is very hard to measure. They ma- they measured it by number of mates. So we'll, we'll talk about this more in a second, but at least in that study with those measurements, the intimidation factor was better, right? It was better than being hot. It was better to be scary than hot. And so, one potential idea is that if you're a super jacked, scary dude and you're talking to a girl at the bar, everyone else is like, "All right, that's, that may as well be his wife." Like I'm (laughs) like, "I'm not going anywhere near this situation. She's off limits." Uh, whereas if you're a super scrawny guy who is, you know, is frail, maybe, maybe, maybe not. That's one idea. But another idea, and this is, I think, another likely hypothesis, frankly, is that... And th- this goes back to the masculinity trade-off thing that we were talking about earlier, is that maybe the traits associated with accruing muscles are also the same traits associated with aggressive pursuit of short-term mating, right? And so measuring mating success with number of mates in that case, right? They didn't look at...... how good-looking were these girls, how intelligent were these women, how high mate value in general were these women, right? They- they didn't look at that. It was literally just, "How many people have you slept with?" Which, say what you will, I mean, that's an indicator of something. It's a- but it might not be that much more of an indicator than you're not an incel, right? Because after that, it's like, if you're- if you're at least at the bare minimum level of attractiveness to engage in short-term mating, and that- that's not a l- particularly low level, right? That is at least medium, surely. But w- if- once you're at that level, if you want to, in a modern mating market, you can have- you could have a one-night stand every week. So it's like, uh, it might not be that great of an indicator. But it is interesting.
- CWChris Williamson
What about weight, BMI, body shape-
- MMMacken Murphy
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
... for women?
- MMMacken Murphy
Well, I'll note briefly on BMI for men. It is interesting. There- there was a- there was a dating app dataset where it indicated that the best BMI to be as a man was about 27, right? Um, and it's- it's just hard to know how to interpret that because 27 could mean, like, "Oh, that dude is jacked." Or it could-
- CWChris Williamson
There's many ways to reach 27 BMI.
- MMMacken Murphy
There's- there's-
- CWChris Williamson
But that's a-
- 31:34 – 42:11
Do Men Like Heavier Women?
- CWChris Williamson
that's a flaw in BMI as a- a rule.
- MMMacken Murphy
Yeah. Yeah, and that's kind of why I wanted to introduce that, is that BMI is a great measurement of weight per height because that's the only thing it is, right? It's not a- it's not a great measurement of health. It certainly tells you something. It's not a great measure of muscularity. It certainly tells you something. Uh, uh, but it is interesting. So, I mean, we're speaking in a Western context and this is, um, uh, I just know that this is what's gonna happen. I'm gonna tell- I'm gonna talk about the actual findings from the anthropological literature on attractive body shapes and BMI in women. And a bunch of people in the comments are going to talk about how I'm pandering to women and I'm a simp and I'm just trying to make people feel better about
- CWChris Williamson
Fine. You're among-
- MMMacken Murphy
... the other way. Okay.
- CWChris Williamson
You're among great company here, dude.
- MMMacken Murphy
Yeah. No. I know. I'm just- I'm just saying that upfront to take some steam out of that, you know, silly response.
- CWChris Williamson
Dude. I- I don't know whether you saw... I gotta interject. I don't know whether you saw that me, you, William Costello, and Alexandra Dateside got lumped into a new term. Did you see this? We were given-
- MMMacken Murphy
Hmm. No.
- CWChris Williamson
... a name.
- MMMacken Murphy
I don't even wanna hear it. Tell me.
- CWChris Williamson
So here's the problem, and if you want to create a name to, like, bring people in and kind of mock them as- as someone-
- MMMacken Murphy
Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
You can't make the name sound cool.
- MMMacken Murphy
What did they tell us?
- CWChris Williamson
The intellectual manosphere.
- MMMacken Murphy
Oh, no. Oh, no.
- CWChris Williamson
We're part of the intellectual manosphere.
- MMMacken Murphy
Well, that- You know what's-
- CWChris Williamson
Or the academic manosphere is also thrown around as well.
- MMMacken Murphy
You know what's- you know what's- you know what's stupid about that? Is that most of my f- I- I can't really fit into that 'cause most of my following is women. So that's- so I'm just- you have to take me out. I've- I've- I'm- I'm the-
- CWChris Williamson
Uh, unfortunately, you're a part of it. You don't-
- MMMacken Murphy
Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
... get to choose.
- MMMacken Murphy
Okay.
- CWChris Williamson
Neither do I.
- MMMacken Murphy
The intellectual manosphere is, uh, yeah. What a- what a huge error to coin (laughs) a cool term.
- CWChris Williamson
What, to think that I'm intellectual and you're a part of the manosphere?
- MMMacken Murphy
Yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah. It's, um, yeah. Yeah. Well, I th- I think that you're not giving yourself enough credit. Um-
- CWChris Williamson
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- MMMacken Murphy
I think that you're- you're clearly a very sharp guy who knows literature better than many, um, better than many master's students, frankly. But...
- 42:11 – 46:10
Men’s Tastes Are Shaped by Social Ecology
- CWChris Williamson
male preference for female body size over time as, uh, gauged by BMI has, tends to... It, it, it's malleable.
- MMMacken Murphy
It, it varies based on your socioecolo- ecology and it varies on the individual level as well. Like if you're, if you grew up in a stressed, resource deprived environment, then yeah, you're probably going to prefer, uh-
- CWChris Williamson
Bigger women as you grow up.
- MMMacken Murphy
Yeah, probably. Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
I wonder-
- MMMacken Murphy
I think that there's enough evidence to say that-
- CWChris Williamson
So that would be fascinating to see how long it imprints just how malleable are you.
- MMMacken Murphy
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
Is there a period during your formative years if you were in poverty...... during your teenage years-
- MMMacken Murphy
Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
... uh, does that lock in-
- MMMacken Murphy
For the lifetime. I know, I know.
- CWChris Williamson
... a particular type? That would be fascinating to study.
- MMMacken Murphy
It is interesting. So this is why I love behavioral ecology, because they, they actually, they do something called the phenotypic gambit, where they say, "You know, everyone else can handle the mechanisms. (laughs) Well, we'll just figure out what's going on, what the relationships between variables are." Uh, so they-
- CWChris Williamson
You're right.
- MMMacken Murphy
... they, you know, they, they come in, like, kind of cowboys and just get the relationships done, uh, then leave the mechanisms. But it is interesting. It's like, you could have a cultural adaptation, where it's, like, cultures over time figure out, oh, you know, preferring lighter or heavier women makes a lot of sense, right? Or you could have individual level developmental mechanisms, right? Where it's, like, during development, your brain builds itself differently. And then you can also have these immediate cues. I mean, the hunger study, where it's literally before versus after dinner.
- CWChris Williamson
Yeah.
- MMMacken Murphy
Come on.
- CWChris Williamson
I mean-
- MMMacken Murphy
That's your brain imme- within an hour changing your mate preferences based on how hungry you are at the moment. Incredible.
- CWChris Williamson
Well, I mean, you know, two, uh, areas that I got fascinated by last year, uh, Candice Blake's sexy selfies study.
- MMMacken Murphy
Mm.
- CWChris Williamson
Right? Which is women responding to the local socioeconomic environment by-
- MMMacken Murphy
Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
... beautification and, and sort of posting, uh, photos with, I think she used, like, Instagram or something to kind of reverse engineer what that was.
- MMMacken Murphy
Yeah. So this was Twitter and Instagram, yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
Um, uh, that was one. And then just all of the sex ratio stuff.
- MMMacken Murphy
Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
Like, we, like plants, respond to our local ecology.
- MMMacken Murphy
Yes.
- 46:10 – 54:27
Is There a Generally Attractive Waist to Hip Ratio?
- CWChris Williamson
BMI, interesting for women, fluctuates over time. We respond to the local ecology. We respond-
- MMMacken Murphy
Yep.
- CWChris Williamson
... across life within situations as well.
- MMMacken Murphy
Yes, yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
What about waist-to-hip ratio?
- MMMacken Murphy
Waist-to-hip ratio, well, this is another one that's interesting, right? So I just spoke to Barnaby Dixon about it, and I, I feel like I'm getting myself in trouble. Uh, I will make a note just about behavioral ecology.
- CWChris Williamson
No, thi- this is an audience that has had every evolutionary psychologist on that I've been able to find. They're educated, they're balanced-
- MMMacken Murphy
No, no, but that's, but that's, that's, that's worse, because I'm about to say another thing where, you know, maybe I'm pushing back against psych. And maybe s- and a lot of, and I will note that a lot of evolutionary psychologists do actually think about things more in a behavioral ecology way.
- CWChris Williamson
Mm.
- MMMacken Murphy
Uh, almost despite themselves, right?
- CWChris Williamson
They just maybe don't attribute it to-
- MMMacken Murphy
Yeah, and so what behavioral ecology is ... So evolutionary psychology, just historically, it is the intellectual child of cognitive psychology and evolutionary biology at that time in history, right? And there's m- and I would say that most evolutionary psychologists have been psychologists who learned biological stuff later, right? Behavioral ecology is, uh, we call it human behavioral ecology, but it's really just, like, behavioral ecology is a standard powerful tool for studying animals. And it's just reapplying the same tool, the same set of principles to humans, right? So it's not really ... It's a, it's a, in some ways it's simpler, in some ways it's more complicated. Uh, and they're, they're, they're, the fields can complement each other in a lot of ways. They certainly inform each other in a lot of ways, and there are some individual evolutionary psychologists who have done incredible work that is very consistent with behavioral ecology, like Dalley and Wilson, the classic homicide studies with income inequality in Chicago. Fascinating and very, you know, beha- behavioral ecology-esque. You wanted to ask about waist-to-hip ratio, and, and I want to say that I love evolutionary psychology. Uh, but if you open an evolutionary psychology textbook, you'll generally read that it's a universal preference that men like this very, you know-
- CWChris Williamson
0.68? Is that the positive ideal?
- MMMacken Murphy
Yeah, about 0.7. Yeah. Uh, so po- so 0.68, sure. And it's interesting, because we see that in, you know, westernized college students, you'll see an even more extreme, you know, closer to Kim Kardashian type ratio, right? But if you go to - and this is, you know, this is still kind of in its nascent stages - it's possible that this turns out not to be true. But there is this other idea that it's like, well, maybe in a, maybe in a super rich western environment, that makes a lot of sense, right? But I was speaking to Barnaby Dixon, right? Who's the beard guy who we mentioned earlier. And I just asked him about this. I was like, "Is there, is there anything on variation?" Like, I know there's the BMI thing, but what about the ... And this was, this was off podcast.And I was like, "What about the waist-to-hip ratio stuff?" And he was saying that he has some indicative evidence that maybe in environments where women are doing more physical labor, that super wide hips, which makes it harder to run, harder to jog, harder to do athletics. I mean, if you look at, like, incredible female athletes, they often don't, you know, they often do have relatively, um, masculinized bodies. Um, maybe a more masculine figure in women is preferred as well. So it's like the waist-to-hip ratio stuff, it makes sense why it's attractive, right? It's like, it signals nulliparity, as we discussed, right? It becomes harder to maintain, you know, this Coca-Cola shape after you've had children, unfortunately, right? It become, it becomes more difficult as you age as well. And so it could be an honest signal to what we might call future reproductive potential, right? It also might be an honest signal to fertility. There's more mixed results on that.
- CWChris Williamson
I've seen a lot of mixed results on waist-to-hip ratios-
- MMMacken Murphy
Yeah. I know.
- CWChris Williamson
... association with fertility.
- MMMacken Murphy
I know. So-
- CWChris Williamson
Basically, like, zero.
- MMMacken Murphy
Yeah. So some people are like, "No, it is, it does associate. Maybe it just doesn't associate in a modern context, but it is legit." And then, which is possible, right? Um, and then there's other people who say, "No, that's just a bad idea," right? But the, but it, but it is true that it's like women who are, you know, who have the most, quote-unquote, "future reproductive potential" and are fertile, right? Um, women in their early 20s, let's say, are generally gonna have this, you know, crazy waist-to-hip ratio, and it becomes harder to maintain after they've had more kids-
- CWChris Williamson
Mm-hmm.
- MMMacken Murphy
... harder to maintain after they've aged. So it, so it does kind of make sense that it's like, okay, that's a signal. Again, it goes back to, like, signaling underlying qualities. Um, it does make sense that that's, that that's kind of what, what happens there. But then if you think about it more broadly, again, just stepping back and... You know, plenty of evolutionary psychological accounts are just correct, and there's certainly a huge contingent of people who think that they're always compatible with behavioral ecology. But this would be an area where it's like, well, maybe that's not representative of our ancestry actually. Maybe there's actually, we have a more modest preference in contexts where, you know, women are working all day, and you have to choose someone. Like, would, i- I don't know, it's like-
- CWChris Williamson
Well, I'm gonna guess, just to interject there-
- MMMacken Murphy
Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
... I'm gonna guess that the, um, wherever it was, West African, South African, uh, study that you looked at, uh-
- MMMacken Murphy
I didn't look at this study. I was talking about hemi. Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
Him. Uh, but for, uh, 38 BMI was the one that I was talking about.
- MMMacken Murphy
Oh, oh, yeah. The South African, Zulu. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
Yes.
- MMMacken Murphy
That, that's a, that's not him, yeah.
- 54:27 – 1:02:12
What Role Does Height Play in Attraction?
- CWChris Williamson
height play in attracting men and women for men and women?
- MMMacken Murphy
Yeah. It's interesting. Well, I think that, let's, let's get men out of the way. Let's, let's get the, uh, you know, since-
- CWChris Williamson
Just like the blue-pilled cuck that you are, let's get men out of the way and get onto women.
- MMMacken Murphy
Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
We're in good, we're in good company. It's fine.
- MMMacken Murphy
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. No. (laughs)
- CWChris Williamson
(laughs)
- MMMacken Murphy
The, well, this is, this is one of the things that I say where people are like, "He's black-pilled." And it's like, okay, that's, uh, I'm, I'm so upset that that's the- (laughs)
- CWChris Williamson
What-
- MMMacken Murphy
... that's the, that's the direction.
- CWChris Williamson
No, if you can-
- MMMacken Murphy
But-
- CWChris Williamson
If you can manage to thread the needle between all of the pills at once-
- MMMacken Murphy
Yes. Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
... if you can be bigoted and cucked in the same podcast-
- MMMacken Murphy
(laughs)
- CWChris Williamson
... that means that you're doing something right.
- MMMacken Murphy
(laughs) Okay.Sure.
- CWChris Williamson
And you've managed to do both so far, so well.
- MMMacken Murphy
Yeah, what a disaster. That's um... Yeah, so I'm, I'm upset. As long as, you know-
- CWChris Williamson
Everyone's upset with you.
- MMMacken Murphy
As long as extremists on both sides and, you know, reasonable people. Uh, so well, height actually, I think that... I don't think I'm going to say anything particularly surprising. Every inch that... If you're a shorter guy, every inch that you add, and this is based on a couple of different data sets, I'm not just looking at one study here. Uh, you know, looking at things like just women's stated preferences, uh, women in speed dating studies, women in dating app swiping, right. Dating app filters, as well as response to, you know, online ads for, you know, like, "I'm single," that kind of thing. So there's a bunch of different evidence that women like a very tall man who is not too very tall, right? So if you graphed women's height preferences, it would look kind of like a candy cane, right? Where it's like, if you're, if you're very short then adding a few inches really increases your attractiveness. Like the difference between being 5'4" and 5'8", that's a big deal, right? That's, that's going from a bit of a problem to actually probably not that much of a problem. Then it starts to taper off around 6'1", right? So it's like you're getting... Every inch is sick, and then around 6'1", it starts to taper off. Which is hilarious because, you know, the average height of American men, I think is about 5'9", and on dating apps, I think it's about 6'1". I'll have to double check that. Which is just ridiculous.
- CWChris Williamson
(laughs)
- MMMacken Murphy
Height inflation is such a disaster.
- CWChris Williamson
Yeah.
- MMMacken Murphy
I'm considering getting leg extensions just 'cause-
- CWChris Williamson
Height-flation and hoeflation.
- MMMacken Murphy
Yeah. Yeah, so yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
The two, the two maladies of 2024.
- MMMacken Murphy
Yeah. So the... Once you get to around 6'1", you start to get kind of diminishing returns per inch, and that seems to settle down around 6'3". 6'3" to 6'5", there seems to be about, you know, even it doesn't seem like being... Maybe 6'5" is better, maybe it's not, but it doesn't seem to be that big of a deal whether you're 6'3", 6'4", 6'5". Then around 6'6", 6'7", 6'8", that's when it's like, okay, this is definitely not optimal, right? This is not ideal. But again, it's like a candy cane. So it comes down, but you're still better off being like basketball player tall than being 5'10", right? And it's interesting because this, this data converges with a very funny anecdotal experience. I know one of the only men ever to lie about his height on a dating app to make himself shorter. Uh, he's 6'6" and he claims that he's 6'5" because he's like 6'6" just scares them away.
- 1:02:12 – 1:12:14
What Happens When the Female is the Breadwinner
- CWChris Williamson
that being said, there's some pretty scary stuff that I'm sure that you've seen. Increases in domestic violence have been going up in line with the decrease in hypergamous dating. So, that would suggest that perhaps men whose partners earn more than them, that they are concerned and no longer financial prisoners-
- MMMacken Murphy
Mm-hmm. Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
...may be resorting to a cost-inflicting as opposed to a benefit-affording mating strategy.
- MMMacken Murphy
That... Yeah. I mean, that's extremely depressing and, uh, that- that's a- that's a horrible thing to hear. I'm not aware of that data. And this is-
- CWChris Williamson
William Costello taught me about it.
- MMMacken Murphy
Yeah. This-
- CWChris Williamson
You can t- You can ask him about it at dinner tonight.
- MMMacken Murphy
Yeah. Yeah, yeah. So this is something, um... This is something that I'll just kind of flag up front, is that a lot of especially just kind of internet characters are very willing to speak at length about subjects that they know incredibly little about. And (laughs) well, you- well, you know quite a bit through talking to people, and you're also... You know, th- this is kind of your role, is that you're bringing on experts and then asking the questions that you already want.
- CWChris Williamson
Make a career out of being the most stupid-
- MMMacken Murphy
Yeah, that's-
- CWChris Williamson
... person in the room. Yeah.
- MMMacken Murphy
That's one of... I- I wouldn't say that at all.
- CWChris Williamson
Y- The- the... Whatever. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- MMMacken Murphy
You're being humble.
- CWChris Williamson
Yeah.
- MMMacken Murphy
But that's- that's why you're popular, is that you have a knack for, as a smart guy, obtaining enough information to ask the questions that everyone's wondering, right? But there's a- but there's... So I'm not talking about you at all, but there's a real tendency of people who are on the internet to just, you know, pick out one finding here, one finding there, and then just speak at length as if they've got all the answers to the world's problems. And the truth is that, like, in academia, if you haven't spent a year reading about something, your knowledge is basically zero. Like, you're- you're... That's- that's like entry level, is once you've been thinking, mulling over, and reading the literature. Um, (sighs) the- the ide- the idea of getting straight up to speed on a subject, that- that's very... They're very unlikely to have the right context to decipher it. And so with a question like this, it's like, I'm not an expert in domestic violence. I'm not an expert in, uh, you know, hypergamous versus hypogamous dating outcomes. And although I... So- so- so, uh, uh, even though I'm, from a broad theoretical standpoint, as someone who looks at things from a behavioral ecology point of view, I'm very optimistic that our nature, our cultural norms will naturally change to accommodate shifts in gender equality.
- CWChris Williamson
Just to interject, uh, do you think that women's preference for socioeconomically competent men is sufficiently malleable for that? To me, and I think to a lot of the guys, and to give the- the- the- the guys on the internet that are talking about this their due, if it was being spoken about in a less sort of cantankerous, adversarial way, I think what they would try to say is something like, "Women's preference for socioeconomically successful men is so ingrained, it is such a, uh, fundamental part of their source code of attraction, I don't believe that it is something that they are going to be able to reprogram." And I would say that largely, like, I'm in that camp too-
- MMMacken Murphy
Mm.
- CWChris Williamson
...to a degree. Um, I would say that it is akin and equivalent to men's preference, in terms of strength, men's preference for youth and fertility.
- MMMacken Murphy
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
I think that that is the equivalent. And fundamentally online, just again to get meta for a second, this is the debate. The debate online typically is, "You have a preference. That preference is wrong." "I have a preference. My preference is right."
- MMMacken Murphy
Mm.
- CWChris Williamson
"Your preference can be changed. My preference should not."
- MMMacken Murphy
Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
That's the way that the discussion online-
- MMMacken Murphy
Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
...gets presented. But I think... I- I think I'm right.
- MMMacken Murphy
Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
I think that I speak... You know my favorite place? And it's a shame that you're leaving this week, 'cause we could have done it on Saturday. Favorite place for dating and mating research, Soho House Pool in Austin.
- MMMacken Murphy
Okay.
- 1:12:14 – 1:16:00
Worst Mating & Dating Myths
- CWChris Williamson
um, what myths, if you could clean house, what myths would you like to get rid of from the mating and dating world? What's been bastardized the most-
- MMMacken Murphy
Okay.
- CWChris Williamson
... in your opinion?
- MMMacken Murphy
All right, well, the most meme one is definitely body count. This idea that, the idea that, you know, historical promiscuity is a predictor of bad outcomes in long-term relationships. That's pretty well validated by a bunch of studies. It's just that it shows the s- same-
Episode duration: 2:02:41
Install uListen for AI-powered chat & search across the full episode — Get Full Transcript
Transcript of episode xq1NPza03uM
Get more out of YouTube videos.
High quality summaries for YouTube videos. Accurate transcripts to search & find moments. Powered by ChatGPT & Claude AI.
Add to Chrome