In every crummy romcom there’s the beautiful woman who fawns over the devilishly handsome bad boy, but he screws her over. After eating three cartons of Haagen-Dazs, she comes to the realization that the quirky guy who she’s been working with for the last 6-years at her magazine job in the city is actually her soulmate. Even though the dude at her job isn’t as good-looking as the dude that rejected her, she adores him because just like her he enjoys eating cold spaghetti for breakfast and he’s willing to take her to the big NSYNC reunion concert. However science says that Hollywood fairytale, is just that, a fairytale.
According to a new study in Social Psychological and Personality Science, when women were rejected by an attractive man, they became cruel towards less attractive dudes, even when the less desirable men expressed interest.
Over two studies which involved nearly 300 single women, researchers created dating profiles for the ladies. The women were told that these profiles would be viewed and evaluated by two men, one attractive and one not as much, who they could potentially meet at the end of the experiment.
The women were informed of the responses from the two men. They were rejected or accepted. The women were asked to accept or reject the men, as well as to rate each man’s attractiveness, romantic appeal and level of responsiveness.
Researchers discovered that when the attractive male profile expressed interest in the women, more than two-thirds of the females were interested in going on a date with them. The women were almost as eager to go on a date with the ugly dude when both types of men expressed interest. But once the attractive men rejected the women, these ladies quickly lost interest in meeting the unattractive man, even if the less attractive men were interested. Less than a quarter of women were keen to meet the homely men after being spurned by the attractive man.
The study revealed that these cold-heated vixens were also more likely to insult the unattractive men’s romantic and physical qualities after they were rejected by the hot dude. Shallow and scorned is no way to go through life ladies.
The authors of the study discovered that people often become antisocial once they are personally rejected. Scientists reason that the women who have been rejected will distance themselves from an unattractive man to help her retain her idea that she is high status, cushioning the blow of the rejection. Here, I got you a step stool, so it’s easier for you to get off your high horse.
“Being affiliated with an unattractive man would make those women feel like that’s the kind of man they ‘deserve,’ which puts their larger social goals at risk,” said lead author Dr. Greg MacDonald from the University of Toronto.
Really? Because you got shot down by a hot guy, you’re going to suddenly not give a chance to some dude with a bad haircut, a ketchup stain on his Crocs and a weak chin? Don’t be so catty ladies. Give the ugly guys a chance, a lot of times they’ll work harder to capture your heart. And I thank my lucky stars that I don’t have to worry about being the ugly guy in this fucked up scenario.