Why do guys like to look at pictures more than women?

rootX

I go when I see girls with tattoos or nose/lips piercings.

So, I think it depends what kind of girl picture it is. Neither I would find skinny or fashion padded women attractive.

DanP

Good instincts. IMO soon, fit will be the new sexy :P (OK, research seem to say that fit was always sexy ). What do you think, can be such a preference evolved, or you consider it more as a part of social interaction ? I.E, since you exercise and make an effort to look good, be fit and healthy you just want someone with the same respect for himself ?


Interesting way to put it. Physical repulsion. I really like how you put this one, Lisa.

jannkahon

Maybe guys are more curious than women. We tend to clarify and understand the photo.

DanP

Tatoos, I don't mind, as long as they do satisfy my artistic taste. If they do not , it's kinda the same effect as when I see a women dressed in what i consider horrific clothes. Facial and chest ones are a turn off. Interestingly enough I do not mind piercings down there between her legs.

jannkahon

I agree with this, for me tattoos make a girls looks dirty. Being clean looks attractive.

lisab

Yes, respect and discipline. Ambition, even.

DaveC426913

: ruefully scratches lisab off his 'freebie five' list :

lisab

There's an actual reason: I have sensitive skin...rough hair is sooo painful!

Frankly

I dont think men look at images more than women. Women look at other women, and images of women more than men do. They also look at them differently than men do. While its true that theres a ridiculous amount of male targeted porn/semi-porn out there, your average male has no need to, and doesnt, spend alot of time looking at the images in order to uh, conclude his business. Women on the other hand will spend more time on each image of a woman(fashion, fitness related), and spend more time overall in their day looking at and evaluating other women.

I also think the male brain receives a female image as a collection of sexual objects (breasts, legs, butts, etc). I think the female brain processes the image more as a whole, and not so much as an assortment of body parts of varying degrees of interest.

DaveC426913

Ah, but soft luxurius facial hair means no stubble burns on your sensitive bits!

lisab

Hey who brought bits into this thread?!

jamesroy

The answer to this is biological. Among all forms of life, including humans, male is a poor performer, as far as sexual performance goes. A male of any species is generally never ill treated by females except for a short while after mating, which could be a reaction to the poor performance of the male, perhaps much below expectations. This 'ill treatment', shall be that after a sexual encounter, 'the female eats up the male partner' as in the case of certain spider, or some other posture, all violent.
When it comes to man, knowing well that a great agony is certain to befall on all men if sexual encounters are to proceed naturally, our forefathers devised various methods to reduce the possibilities of sexual encounter. Thus, we have sexual union prohibited on many grounds, of age, caste, relation etc. Looking at pictures and deriving pleasure thereby is one such way to escape from 'performance'.
As females are free from this performance anxiety, they have no such need.

SamirS

I think some kind of answer can be found in the following idea: rock stars or celebrities.

Think females: how many males do you see running after them, I mean really being groupie and stuff, raising their star to divine heights? Very few. If so, it's far and apart and most of those are called stalkers.

Then think of a male rock star and his female following and his groupies and everything. Or "Take That", where girls and women actually killed themselves or had emotional breakdowns.

Does it perhaps mean that women need something to emotionally attach to, and are willing to pay the price for that (a groupie having sex with her star), and men actually do objectify women in purely sexual matters, which can be expressed by the willingness of males to almost instantly have sex with an adequately attractive woman?

Or said differently, as satisfying as sex may be for both genders, that women view it more as a road to affection, attention and support (while enjoying it still!), while for men, it IS the actual target.

Said differently again, this could correspond to the evolutionary psychology idea that women need to bind a partner because pregnancy and raising children is a high investment while men need to spread their genes as much as possible with little regard for the target.

Conversely, there are much more physically rather unattractive guys (who are funny, witty, rich, or whatever) with quite attractive girls. The opposite rarely holds.

DanP

The actual prediction is that women will be much more discriminate than men in choosing a mate. Her investment is huge. Loose of fertility during pregnancy. The offspring will die if it's not taken care.

Men would be rather indiscriminate, their investment is minimal, they are better off with just being indiscriminate and impregnate as many females as possible.

SamirS

Well, then we agree? I meant to say that the emotional attaching of a women to a rockstar and the lack of the same for males (speaking in general) is a "misfiring" if you will. Men think of Megan Fox as a hot babe, while women seem to ascribe much more to their target of affection.

Phrak

Men appraise women for their physical fitness as much as women appraise men for the power in providing material. However, these should not be considered exclusive appraisals but dominant.

In this way, it is important for women to be atuned to the current perceptions of physical fitness often displayed as images of other women. And so women are as equally attracted to images of women as are me, but for different reasons. It is men who set these standards, and women who compare and take means to elevate themselves within these standards.

Equally, it is important for men to be atuned to the current perceptions of what constitues powerful men. These perceptions do not as often appear as images, but as oral and written messages.

I believe this is tracable to the sexual imbalance, DanP in #48 presented.

DanP

It is indeed almost unbelievable what range of options you have when you posses status and access to significant resources compared to others in your social group. It's pretty much happy hour.

It also has an interesting side effect. Power and good looks seem to make men less likely to commit to a women and stay in a relationship for a significant period of time. It's the little devil in your mind telling to you "Well, she is great, but look at me, how cool am I, I can do better". Ive also seen this happening with very beautiful women with a good developed mechanisms of self maintenance "Well, he is awesome, but I can get an even more awesome one".

This presents an interesting problem to be solved. Find the balance. Get someone "too good" for you, and chances are he will go. Go for someone "I can do better", and chances are you will go. I think it's such a beautiful problem which has to be solved by humans who enter a intimate relationship.

It's pretty much happy hour too for strong willed women or with very good genetics. At the rate obesity progresses in the western world, less and less women possess the fitness and health indicators valued by men. It simply means even more options for them to choose high standard males, since those who did not managed to preserve their fitness are pretty much deprecating themselves by their own actions. Let's be honest, why would you choose someone who got fat and can't maintain her body ? Life is too short for things like this. ( It's not that fat women cant get a mate. Sure they can. But for the vast majority of them, access to higher leagues is sealed)


I think yes, and this is pretty much dependent on reference hierarchy. We live in a very complex social world, with many different hierarchies. Status may mean different things in different hierarchies.