Alpha Dominance

If you have ever been in a long-term relationship with a woman, you know the drill.  After the limerence, the initial thrill of the relationship, has worn off, you find your girlfriend stops trying to put her best foot forward, and takes to lounging about the house in shapeless sweats and dowdy flannel pajamas.  Gone are the days of lingerie for bed and putting forth the effort to look her best for you.  Grannie panties replace the thong when the two of you are together, which mystifies you because up until now you thought she didn’t wear the wretched things.  By this time you have grown to care for her enough that this doesn’t change your feelings for her, but it can sting a little because it seems to imply that you aren’t important enough for her to put her best foot forward.  As time passes you notice that when you go out together the effort she puts into appearance diminishes as well, but you innocently suspect she has simply grown comfortable with you; or perhaps you read it as a temporary change due to depression.  You decide that you like this girl enough that you are willing to overlook the change and consign it to insignificance.  You go on like this for some time thinking this is just the new norm, but unsettling discrepancies nag at you until you notice a pattern.  Despite her seeming disinterest in her appearance while with you, it seems that ever time she goes out without you, she’s again expending a great deal of effort primping and preening.  Her make-up is perfect.  She’s wearing skirts again and showing more skin than you’ve seen in months.  Maybe she’s wearing the red fuck-me pumps you bought for her and have been hoping to take for a test run in bed.  It all begs the question of why all this effort when appearance has seemed to be the furthest thing from her mind lately?  What’s going on here?

This question has personally plagued me in a number of relationships in the past, and in order to understand what is going on, I’ve made the mistake of asking them why they must get dressed to the nines to go out without me, but dress like a burlap potato sack when I’m around?  Whose attention are they trying to attract?  If they are with me, why should anyone else’s attention matter unless they are on the prowl for an affair?  Jealous and mate-protecting behaviors are a typical male response to this sort of threat, but unfortunately this tends to drive her away from you at this critical time.

Well, I’ve posed this question of why dress up for anyone else when you are in a committed relationship to many women.  Many of them had no reason to mislead me, being family members or other friends with whom a potential relationship would not affect their answer.  Before I go on, I challenge you to test this for yourself.  Ask five or ten women this very question.  Best of all; ask your mother, sisters and others who have your interests at heart and see if any woman answers this question truthfully.  Invariably the reasons they give fall into one of two answers:

• “I dress this way for ME to feel good about myself”
• “I dress this way for the girls, so other women think I look good”

It never fails.  Now either of these answers seems innocent enough on the surface, but always failed to satisfy me.  Something smelled fishy and I wasn’t buying it.

Well, the truth is now out and the biology confirms that our jealousy and suspicion were well founded.  A recent study “Ovulatory shifts in human female ornamentation: near ovulation women dress to impress” found the following:

One of the most noteworthy differences between humans and

other closely related primates is the absence of clear advertisements

of fertility within the ovulatory cycle (Dixson, 1998).

Recent evidence has suggested, however, that there are subtle

ovulatory cues in humans. Roberts et al. (2004) showed facial

photographs of women taken during the follicular and luteal

phases to male and female judges. On average, follicular phase

images were judged more attractive approximately 54% of the

time. Similarly, relative to those from other cycle phases,

women’s body scents near ovulation are judged as more

attractive by men (Doty et al., 1975; Singh and Bronstad,

2001; Thornhill et al., 2003) and women’s sexual desires vary

across the cycle (Bullivant et al., 2004; Gangestad et al., 2002;

Haselton and Gangestad, 2006). Thus, human ovulation may not

be completely concealed.

In the last decade, the literature on cyclic shifts in women’s

social motivations has grown rapidly. For ancestral women, the

time required to collect food could have been considerable; thus,

Fessler (2003) reasoned that there likely were tradeoffs across the

cycle between feeding and other activities such as mating. Fessler

(2003) compiled and reviewed evidence that women’s appetites

decrease near ovulation, and he hypothesized that this decrease in

appetite at high fertility reflects an adaptation in women designed

to decrease the motivational salience of goals that compete with

efforts devoted to mating. As additional evidence supporting the

hypothesis, Fessler reviewed studies showing that women’s

ranging activities, such as locomotion and volunteering for social

activities, tend to increase near ovulation.

Other lines of evidence also indicate cyclic shifts in women’s

mating motivations. In a daily report study, Haselton and

Gangestad (2006) found that on high fertility days of the cycle

women report a greater desire to go to clubs and parties where

they might meet men. Macrae et al. (2002) found that women’s

ability to categorize male faces and male stereotypic words is

faster near ovulation, suggesting increased attentiveness to

“maleness” at high fertility. Other research shows that women’s

preferences for masculine features (e.g., masculine facial

structure) increase near ovulation (reviewed in Gangestad et

al., 2005a). Several rigorous within-subjects studies have found

that women’s attraction to and flirtation with men other than

their primary partner is higher near ovulation than in other

phases of the cycle (Gangestad et al., 2002; Haselton and

Gangestad, 2006; also see Bullivant et al., 2004). Finally, Fisher

(2004) found that women tested near midcycle, compared with

those tested in other cycle phases, tend to give lower

attractiveness ratings to photographs of female faces—an effect

Fisher interpreted as evidence that women are more intrasexually

competitive near ovulation. In sum, a variety of data

sources indicate that women’s social motivations – in particular,

their sexual motivations – increase near ovulation.

Further:

In humans too, ornamentation may serve the purpose of

attracting mates, at least in part. In a recent study, Grammer et

al. (2005) interviewed women at a discotheque; those who rated

their clothing as “sexy” and “bold” also reported that their

intention for the evening was to flirt or find a sex partner.

Although the direction of causality is unclear, these findings

suggest that women’s clothing choices are linked with their

motivations.

Finally:

Thus, women may engage in ornamentation to attract

mates. It is possible, in particular, that women may be aiming to

attract mates other than their primary partners in order to gain

access to good genes. Several rigorous within-subjects studies

have found increases in women’s desires for men other than

their primary partner at high fertility (Gangestad et al., 2002,

2005b; Haselton and Gangestad, 2006; Pillsworth and Haselton,

2006), but no changes in desires for the primary partner

(Gangestad et al., 2002, 2005b; Pillsworth and Haselton, 2006).

Three studies show that increases in extra-pair attractions at

high fertility are greatest for women who could, in theory, gain

the most from extra-pair mating for genetic benefits, specifically

women whose primary mates are relatively asymmetrical

(Gangestad et al., 2005b) or lacking sexual attractiveness

(Haselton and Gangestad, 2006; Pillsworth and Haselton,

2006). Preliminary evidence also suggests that women are

intrasexually competitive near ovulation (Fisher, 2004), possibly

because this is the time at which the costs and benefits of

mating decisions are greatest (Fessler, 2003). Thus, near

ovulation, women may also be competing with other women

for the best mating opportunities.

This is an excellent resource as it broaches a number of topics that I will elaborate on in the future, however for the purposes of this topic we can refute the idea that dressing up is done exclusively for self esteem or the esteem of other women.  Both of these are by-products of the real goal, to attract the attention of men and compete sexually with the other women.  This deep seated need of women remains strong even when in a relationship or otherwise satisfied because it is hormonally driven.  Biological imperatives are powerful, and though they hate to admit it, women know deep down that men are visual creatures and that enhancing their attractiveness will draw the attention of men and the jealousy of women.  This propensity is the reason for the coining of the term “attention-whore” which alludes to the fact that women are often satisfied with having the option of a sexual encounter, particularly when they have a primary partner at home.  From the male perspective having the primary partner should be enough for her.  We take cold comfort from the fact that while we “have” this woman, she is getting a rise out of being propositioned by other men, and is in fact soliciting it.  The fact that such behavior is directly associated with ovulation, the main time each month that a woman’s hormones drive her to seek sexual encounters, should raise serious doubts in the minds of their partners.

Alpha’s don’t tolerate such behavior.  Make a pact that Guys and Girls Nights Out will not be a part of your relationship, if you insist on having one.