Women Ornament Themselves for Intrasexual Competition near Ovulation, but for Intersexual Attraction in Luteal Phase

The present study examined women's attentional bias toward ornamental objects in relation to their menstrual phase as well as to motivations of intersexual courtship or intrasexual competition. In Experiment 1, 33 healthy heterosexual women were tested in a bias-assessment visual cuing task twice: once on a high-fertility day (during the ovulatory phase) and once on a low-fertility day (during the luteal phase). They paid greater attention to pictures of ornamental objects than to pictures of non-ornamental objects near ovulation, but not during the luteal phase, suggesting an ornamental bias during the high-fertility phase. In Experiment 2, before the visual cuing task, 40 participants viewed 10 same-sex or opposite-sex facial photographs with either high or low attractiveness as priming tasks to activate the intrasexual competition or intersexual courtship motives. Results showed that women's ornamental bias was dependent on the interaction of menstrual phase and mating motive. Specifically, the ornamental bias was observed on the high-fertility day when the subjects were primed with high-attractive same-sex images (intrasexual competition) and was observed on the low-fertility day when they were primed with high-attractive opposite-sex photographs (intersexual courtship). In conclusion, the present findings confirm the hypothesis that, during the high-fertility phase, women have an attentional bias toward ornamental objects and further support the hypothesis that the ornamental bias is driven by intrasexual competition motivation near ovulation, but driven by intersexual courtship motivation during the luteal phase.