ROMANCE IS a puzzling thing, but scientists are doing their best to unravel the mysteries of human attachment. They have discovered that women wearing red appear more attractive to men. Men, however, are unaware that the colour red turns them on.
Researchers at the University of Rochester in New York conducted five psychological experiments to assess how colour can affect how men view a woman's attractiveness. In one study, the men were shown photographs of women framed by a border of either red or white. They tended to find the women more attractive when they appeared in the red frame.
In another study, men were shown pictures of women wearing red, followed by pictures of the same women wearing another colour. When wearing red, the women were more likely to score, receive an invitation and to be treated to a more expensive date.
Red did not change the attractiveness ratings for women rating other women, the authors said in their study, published on Tuesday in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, nor did it change how men rated the women in the photos in terms of likeability, intelligence or kindness.
The colour red is linked to romance throughout nature, says the study's lead author, Andrew Elliot, a professor of psychology.
Research has shown that male primates are more attracted to females displaying red. Female baboons and chimpanzees redden when nearing ovulation to send out sexual signals.
"Our findings confirm what many women have long suspected and claimed - that men act like animals in the sexual realm," the authors said. "As much as men might like to think that they respond to women in a thoughtful, sophisticated manner, it appears that at least to some degree, their preferences and predilections are, in a word, primitive."
- (Los Angeles Times-Washington Post service)