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

latitude

This tendency has always baffled me-- or at least, it is a tendency I have observed-- that men are very interested in looking at pictures of women or videos of women and most women have little to no interest in pictures or videos of men. Is this something others have also observed, or has my small sampling size skewed the results to this end?

QuarkCharmer

I tend to think that women are just less open about the topic.

turbo

Have you ever opened the pages of a womens' magazine on style, health, fashion? Their ads are wall-to-wall women! I think your conclusion falls apart due to a pretty big selection effect. Media aimed at women is heavily woman-oriented, with female models.

Greg Bernhardt

I don't think women "like" looking at women models. I believe they look for comparison and suggestions. They look at them much differently than men. Mens health mags are full of half naked guys and I don't really like looking at them.

Men have very basic needs for sex. A man can be washing the dishes and if an ad on the tv comes on with a lady in a swim suit, a man can easily get excited and take care of business right then and there. Women don't have that kind of response to images. I find they are much more complex and require much more involvement with emotions and setting. In the end a man just wants to have sex with as many women as possible as often as possible. A women is much more selective as she traditionally has the investment of raising the baby.

DanP

If you where an average women would you like to look at picture of other women with perfect bodies, displaying excellent genetics and the will to stay fit ? Dont think so. Most likely you would start a "fat acceptance movement" and cry "sexual objectification":P

That's because you are not gay. We the straight men enjoy looking at naked women anywhere at anytime.

Oh, Greg going down to the road of behavioral evolution. This is something new. Welcome to the dark side :P Remember Zahavi.

FrancisZ

Save perhaps for the asexual amongst us: isn't everyone attracted to something? I just don't find women as overt about it as men, usually. Certainly, there's always an exception.

For many people, preferences are a private matter.

QuarkCharmer

I would probably rush out and buy the advertised products in hopes that they can transform me into the models on the pages. That's the idea right?

mege

I think it's a little bit of everything mentioned so far, but I think much of it comes down to something common: there is a cultural norm that women are pure, special, and meant to be revered (which the feminist movement calls 'objectification' in it's attempt to turn it into a perjorative). So, men are more willing to see that 'pureness' (or lack there of in a sense of oddity) whereas there is nothing special about a man to a woman since they're taught subconciously about this specialness in themselves. Even in areas where men are put on pedistals, it's not because 'they're a man' (think pro sports stars) but because they represent a celeb status. Women are put on pedistals just for the fact that they're a woman far more often. Unfortunately, because of this - women's achievements are often diminished because we (as a culture) are used to the ad hoc specialness of women. In a sense it's expected that a woman gets the spotlight. (I understand that this view is a bit nieve - but I feel that it's only perverted by extreme greed of certain cultures and the basic goodness of this ideal is still there in many different applied forms.)

The absolute basis for this is likely the miracle of birth - male god figures weren't found until the dawn of historical civilization when power systems started becoming the norm. Nearly all pre-historical civilization 'cultures' worshiped descriptly asexual or female gods.

FrancisZ

This is actually very interesting. I remember Joseph Campbell (in "The Power of Myth" series) mentioning something about how, even still that inkling survives: that the innate desire to essentially enthrone a woman, has pervaded history; and even despite of any intentional female iconoclasm.

Mary is a good example of this...





Not to make excuses, of course, for any bizarre subconscious perversion I might have; but as a Catholic, I have to admit, it does still give me warm fuzzy feelings to worship a sort of meta-woman.

If you look at it: there's also nothing really overtly sexual about that statue either (she's completely covered up); and yet, I confess that I do very much like looking at it somehow.

Perhaps the feeling it evokes, somehow touches the very base-essence of human desire: the need to be nurtured. And maybe for guys: sexuality (via ogling women) is a sort of short-cut to that inner peace.

Probably, it would be better though, to be ogling your significant other; and not simply a woman you'll never know personally.

DanP

Interesting theory but which kinda defies the facts we know about how women where actually treated for thousands of years by society. Rather than being enthroned, they where robbed by civil rights, forced into marriages, bound to some idiot for life thanks to the Christian dogma and so on, banned from sciences, and generally treated like crap by society. Weird ways to treat a princess :P

Francis man, are you into nuns ?

We are not wired evolutionarily to seek inner peace in sex. We are wired to seeks sex. And this behavior is responsible for throwing away a lot of good things sometimes. This is why sometimes humans prefer a wild and playful partner for sex, and not a a very reliable partner, but plain and tern. Our sexual behavior is not always the the best thing for us. It sometimes works against us and destroy the inner peace we may have had. But is hard to fight against those powerful modulations on behavior.

Ill ruin the rainbow once again. Seeing a women (man) you know by a short time romantically, or a hot one you had not had sex yet , but there is potential for that causes powerful activations in dopamine system;while seeing your SO of many years usually results in activation of portions of brains linked to empathy. There is some interesting research on this. Dopaminergic reward system vs empathy systems, and interesting tug-o-war.

How sad is that ? Nature play pranks on us :P

nucleargirl

I actually find images of beautiful women more eye-catching than images of men... like most beautiful women look beautiful to me, but supposedly good looking male models... well, a lot of them just dont do it for me. hot women look hot... but hot men... well, I would need to get to know them first!

brocks

Not a *real* man.

FrancisZ

Accentuate the positive Dan. If you watch the documentary, what Campbell was saying is that our earliest religions were of female divinity, rather than male; and only later on (as you mention also) was that overturned. Yet, even still, was his point: that we (in western religions at least) have essentially transposed that notion of "Mother Goddess" unto Mary, "The Mother of GOD." Which, if you are Catholic, has a lot of personal significance.



Actually yes, I do find nuns very beautiful; and for the same reason I do Amish women, and Muslim ladies that wear a Hijab. Honestly, I don't think it has anything to do with being forbidden and covered; save for the fact, in each case, their garments naturally draw attention to the face.

Really, I guess it's just because they don't were make-up. I don't begrudge anyone wanting to wear make-up, of course; but it doesn't really "do" anything for me personally (nor does fingernail or toenail painting).

Oddly enough perhaps: I find that make-up only "covers up" God's perfection, even in a manner that clothes cannot.



I disagree. Maybe not for the purposes of basic physical evolution--as in being able to swim and climb out of primordial ooze; and then to be able to pass that ability on to subsequent generations--but perhaps still, in some type of psychological evolutionary sense.



Too true.

turbo

This *real* man actually washes dishes, does laundry, sweeps the floor, tends the garden, and does all of the canning and preserving of the vegetables, in addition to splitting and stacking wood, yard-work, etc. Edit: I should mention that I do a LOT of the cooking around here.

Evo

I would agree.

DanP

You forgot: plan an invasion, change a diaper, conn a ship, comfort the dieing .... Heinlein was up to something . Yet in the end we are beings with limited intellectual capacity and at the top of a field you become pretty much unidirectional.

Still cooking , changing diapers , handiwork and master of several important tools, home repairs, basic gun use are in the reach of all of us.

And I promise to anyone , cooking or washing dishes wont lower your freaking testosterone levels.

DanP

Ok, I understand , but what is the fact ? We did put 1 women to status of divinity while we
robed all the others from most of their civil rights. What is this supposed to mean ? Is this supposed to be some kind of math I dont understand ? 1 Women raised in myth, billions oppressed for millenniums. It doesn't add up to me to anything even remotely close to a "innate need" for enthroning women. Myabe Im just blind, but I can not see how can we have this desire innate, and at the same time do what we did as a society.

Care to develop a bit on this Francis please ? Im not sure I get what you want to say.