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Attractive Women Make Men Temporarily Stupid
Ponca City, We love you writes "The Telegraph reports that men who spend even a few minutes in the company of an attractive woman perform less well in tests designed to measure brain function than those who chat to someone they do not find attractive. This leads to speculation that men use up so much of their brain function or 'cognitive resources' trying to impress beautiful women, they have little left for other tasks. Psychologists at Radboud University in The Netherlands carried out the study after one of them was so struck on impressing an attractive woman he had never met before, that he could not remember his address when she asked him where he lived. Researchers recruited 40 male heterosexual students and had each one perform a standard memory test. The volunteers then spent seven minutes chatting to male or female members of the research team before repeating the test. The results showed that men were slower and less accurate after trying to impress the women. The more they fancied them, the worse their score."
From TFSummary:
How about the even more simple explanation of just being distracted by the beautiful woman and imagining her naked with her legs wrapped around you is taking up all of your resources? "Trying to impress" doesn't need to come into it at all (and likely doesn't because usually having your mind so completely occupied that you become a dumbass doesn't really impress people), and seems like a stretch of a conclusion to come up with. Far more likely that thought of sex have simply completely taken over the brain and body, as they so often do..
Like the old joke says, men have a brain and a penis, and only enough blood to operate one at a time. ;)
"Empathise with stupidity, and you're halfway to thinking like an idiot." - Iain M. Banks
Now there is a concrete argument for gender segregation of boys and girls in school.... I wonder how women react around rich men?
I could have told you that.
It's embarrassing is what it is, to be turned into a drooling moron and then realise later just how stupid you sounded.
Anecdote is not, nor ever will be, the singular of "data". Sure, everyone may know this. Sure, the outcome may seem obvious to everyone. However, it is not empirical fact until it is studied and established as such. How many common sense "truths" have turned out to be not so true when properly analyzed over the history of human scientific endeavor? In the case of this study, anecdote and assumption about human behavior has now become data, and can be used as such in psychology and sociology to continue to study and describe how and why we are the way we are.
Now that we have established the phenomenon (doot dooo do-do-doot) as data, perhaps we can look into the actual physiological mechanisms which control it.
I would think that above all else, the type of people who read a "news for nerds" site would appreciate research for research sake. :-/
"Empathise with stupidity, and you're halfway to thinking like an idiot." - Iain M. Banks
It's perfectly valid if they don't claim it generalizes past the confines of the experiment. Of course the /. headline is then inaccurate, but it's not like that doesn't happen anyway. The problem is that there are thousands of variables that can affect an experiment, and you can't test them all in one go. What about testosterone level? Time since last having sex? Relationship status? Heterosexuals account for roughly 90% of the population, which makes them a reasonable group of test subjects for an experiment.
That said, I'd be extremely interested to see a similar study that takes sexual preference into account. Even more interesting would be to study transsexuals whose mind and body disagree on sex; as you might find that straight FTMs exhibit the same behavior as the heterosexual males, despite having female bodies themselves.
Playing devils advocate (here agreeing with you I guess), don't forget that not everyone can be cleanly lumped into those four bins of preference, you insensitive clod!;)
93rd rule of Slashdot: No matter how obvious my sarcasm is, my comment will be taken seriously by someone.
I used to get tongue-tied thinking I was unworthy of this gorgeous woman & becoming nervous & basically being an idiot. But now with advancing age I realize Beauty is only transitory. Today's "hottie" will probably be a "fatty" by the time she's 30 or 40 (see Pierce Brosnan's wife as an excellent example).*
In other words, they all get ugly eventually, just like me. So that gives me confidence.
*
* http://www.beforeandaftermarriage.com/celebrity/fat-keely-shaye-smith
"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - historian Evelyn Beatrice Hall
CORRECTION: This story is worthless.
Another story: Men were given a huge meal of food they love. After eating, they did less well on tests.
Even more: Men were subjected to adversarial behavior from women who were being seductive, but had no interest in the men. The men responded with confusion, and later did less well on tests.
This explains why the average Slashdotter is so smart. They found the best solution to this problem: stay away from women, however beautiful they may be, altogether!
The next time someone gives you crap for living in voluntary solitary confinement in your mom's basement, at least you'll know you're making the smart choice.
I'd rather you rationally disagree than irrationally agree.
Maybe beautiful women just make the stupid psychological tests seem less important by comparison.
--Mizerai
I go to lots of conferences where supposedly there are lots of brilliant men. But, when I meet them, they are just as stupid as the rest of the guys.
If you must moderate, please moderate as irrelevent, not something bad, because I'm sure someone will find this interest
This study seems like a barely concealed reason to bring attractive women into the lab
Taking them along to meet with the grant committee would probably explain the funding.
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
Durrr... sorry to double comment on the same post, but I wanted to address this.
Some things count as so obvious as to not require scientific inquiry. Hot women give get males wood. You don't need
to publish this to claim it, end of story.
Yes, and for centuries it was so obvious that no scientific scrutiny was required that the sun went around the earth, not the other way around. It was also completely obvious that a heavier object would fall faster than a lighter object. It was also obvious that things would get cold because the cold of the surroundings would flow into them. It was also so obvious that time passes at a constant rate, regardless of our perceptions and reference frames. It was also so obvious that humans are the only organisms to experience emotion and pain.
Obviously there are a great many things that are so obvious as to not require scientific inquiry.
Point being, a great many things are so obvious. A great many of those obvious things also turn out to be correct in light of empirical data. However, we are not allowed to treat those scientifically and draw scientific conclusions from them until they are established as empirical data. This is one of the fundamental requirements for science, and I would think people on a "news for nerds" site would get that. Taking the obvious for granted as true is exactly the kind of mentality that brings about pseudoscience. Science requires empiricism, even for the bleedingly obvious.
"Empathise with stupidity, and you're halfway to thinking like an idiot." - Iain M. Banks