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Stereotypical and Actual Associations of Breast Size with Mating-Relevant Traits
Breast size varies substantially among women and influences perception of the woman by other people with regard to her attractiveness and other characteristics that are important in social contexts, including mating. The theory of sexual selection predicts that physical criteria of partner selection...
Autores principales: | , , |
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Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
Publicado: |
Springer US
2019
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Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7058577/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/31562583 http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10508-019-1464-z |
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author | Kościński, Krzysztof Makarewicz, Rafał Bartoszewicz, Zbigniew |
author_facet | Kościński, Krzysztof Makarewicz, Rafał Bartoszewicz, Zbigniew |
author_sort | Kościński, Krzysztof |
collection | PubMed |
description | Breast size varies substantially among women and influences perception of the woman by other people with regard to her attractiveness and other characteristics that are important in social contexts, including mating. The theory of sexual selection predicts that physical criteria of partner selection should be markers of the candidate’s desirable properties, mainly biological quality. Few studies, however, have examined whether breast size really signals biological quality or its components and whether observers accurately interpret these signals. Our first study encompassed 163 young women and aimed to establish actual correlates of breast size. The aim of the second study was to determine preferences and stereotypes related to breast size: 252–265 women and men evaluated female digital figures varying in, among other characteristics, breast size. Breast size (breast circumference minus chest circumference) was negatively associated with body asymmetry and positively associated with infections of the respiratory system, but did not correlate with infections of the digestive system, openness to casual sex, and testosterone and estradiol level. Women and men perceived breasts in a similar way to each other: the bigger the breasts the higher the reproductive efficiency, lactational efficiency, sexual desire, and promiscuity attributed to the woman. Nevertheless, large breasts were not regarded more attractive than average ones, though small breasts were the least attractive. In addition, big-breasted women were perceived as less faithful and less intelligent than women with average or small breasts. We discuss our results from the perspectives of evolutionary psychology, perceptual biases, and social stereotypes. ELECTRONIC SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL: The online version of this article (10.1007/s10508-019-1464-z) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-7058577 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2019 |
publisher | Springer US |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-70585772020-03-16 Stereotypical and Actual Associations of Breast Size with Mating-Relevant Traits Kościński, Krzysztof Makarewicz, Rafał Bartoszewicz, Zbigniew Arch Sex Behav Original Paper Breast size varies substantially among women and influences perception of the woman by other people with regard to her attractiveness and other characteristics that are important in social contexts, including mating. The theory of sexual selection predicts that physical criteria of partner selection should be markers of the candidate’s desirable properties, mainly biological quality. Few studies, however, have examined whether breast size really signals biological quality or its components and whether observers accurately interpret these signals. Our first study encompassed 163 young women and aimed to establish actual correlates of breast size. The aim of the second study was to determine preferences and stereotypes related to breast size: 252–265 women and men evaluated female digital figures varying in, among other characteristics, breast size. Breast size (breast circumference minus chest circumference) was negatively associated with body asymmetry and positively associated with infections of the respiratory system, but did not correlate with infections of the digestive system, openness to casual sex, and testosterone and estradiol level. Women and men perceived breasts in a similar way to each other: the bigger the breasts the higher the reproductive efficiency, lactational efficiency, sexual desire, and promiscuity attributed to the woman. Nevertheless, large breasts were not regarded more attractive than average ones, though small breasts were the least attractive. In addition, big-breasted women were perceived as less faithful and less intelligent than women with average or small breasts. We discuss our results from the perspectives of evolutionary psychology, perceptual biases, and social stereotypes. ELECTRONIC SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL: The online version of this article (10.1007/s10508-019-1464-z) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users. Springer US 2019-09-27 2020 /pmc/articles/PMC7058577/ /pubmed/31562583 http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10508-019-1464-z Text en © The Author(s) 2019 Open AccessThis article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. |
spellingShingle | Original Paper Kościński, Krzysztof Makarewicz, Rafał Bartoszewicz, Zbigniew Stereotypical and Actual Associations of Breast Size with Mating-Relevant Traits |
title | Stereotypical and Actual Associations of Breast Size with Mating-Relevant Traits |
title_full | Stereotypical and Actual Associations of Breast Size with Mating-Relevant Traits |
title_fullStr | Stereotypical and Actual Associations of Breast Size with Mating-Relevant Traits |
title_full_unstemmed | Stereotypical and Actual Associations of Breast Size with Mating-Relevant Traits |
title_short | Stereotypical and Actual Associations of Breast Size with Mating-Relevant Traits |
title_sort | stereotypical and actual associations of breast size with mating-relevant traits |
topic | Original Paper |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7058577/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/31562583 http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10508-019-1464-z |
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