In mate choice, individuals consider a wide pool of potential partners. It has been found that people have certain preferences, but intraindividual stability of mate choice over time remains little explored. We tested individual consistency of mate choice with respect to a number of demographic, physical, and personality characteristics. Only mothers were recruited for this study, because we wanted to find out not only whether women choose long-term partners with certain characteristics but also whether the father of their child(ren) differs from their other long-term (ex-)partners. Women (N = 537) of 19-45 years of age indicated the demographic, physical (by using image stimuli), and personality characteristics of all of their long-term partners (partners per respondent: mean = 2.98, SD = 1.32). Then we compared the average difference between an individual's long-term partners with the expected average difference using a permutation test. We also evaluated differences between partners who had children with the participants (fathers) and other long-term partners (non-fathers) using permutation tests and mixed-effect models. Our results revealed that women choose long-term partners consistently with respect to all types of characteristics. Although effect sizes for the individual characteristics were rather weak, maximal cumulative effect size for all characteristics together was high, which suggests that relatively low effect sizes were caused by high variability with low correlations between characteristics, and not by inconsistent mate choice. Furthermore, we found that despite some differences between partners, fathers of participants' child(ren) do fit their 'type'. These results suggest that mate choice may be guided by relatively stable but to some degree flexible preferences, which makes mate choice cognitively less demanding and less time-consuming. Further longitudinal studies are needed to confirm this conclusion.

Department of Philosophy and History of Science Faculty of Science Charles University Prague Czechia

Department of Zoology Faculty of Science Charles University Prague Czechia

National Institute of Mental Health Klecany Czechia

Zobrazit více v PubMed

Allen B., Curless B., Popović Z. (2003). The space of human body shapes: reconstruction and parameterization from range scans. ACM Trans. Graph. 22 587–594. 10.1145/882262.882311 DOI

Anderson J. L., Crawford C. B., Nadeau J., Lindberg T. (1992). Was the duchess of windsor right? A cross-cultural review of the socioecology of ideals of female body shape. Ethol. Sociobiol. 13 197–227. 10.1016/0162-3095(92)90033-Z DOI

Bell A. M., Hankison S. J., Laskowski K. L. (2009). The repeatability of beahviour: a meta-analysis. Anim. Behav. 77 771–783. 10.1016/j.anbehav.2008.12.022 PubMed DOI PMC

Boothroyd L. G., Jones B. C., Burt D. M., DeBruine L. M., Perrett D. I. (2008). Facial correlates of sociosexuality. Evol. Hum. Behav. 29 211–218. 10.1016/j.evolhumbehav.2007.12.009 DOI

Boothroyd L. G., Vukovic J. (2018). “Mate preferences across the lifespan,” in The Oxford Handbook of Evolutionary Psychology and Behavioral Endocrinology, eds Welling L. W., Shackelford T. K. (Oxford: OUP; ).

Botwin M. D., Buss D. M., Shackelford T. K. (1997). Personality and mate preferences: five factors in mate selection and marital satisfaction. J. Pers. 65 107–136. 10.1111/j.1467-6494.1997.tb00531.x PubMed DOI

Brumbaugh C. C., Wood D. (2013). Mate preferences across life and across the world. Soc. Psychol. Pers. Sci. 4 100–107. 10.1177/1948550612442396 DOI

Buss D. M. (1989). Sex differences in human mate preferences: evolutionary hypotheses tested in 37 cultures. Behav. Brain Sci. 12 1–14. 10.1017/S0140525X00023992 DOI

Buss D. M., Barnes M. (1986). Preferences in human mate selection. J. Pers. Soc. Psychol. 50 559–570. 10.1037/0022-3514.50.3.559 DOI

Buss D. M. (1991). Evolutionary personality psychology. Annu. Rev. Psychol. 42 459–491. 10.1146/annurev.psych.42.1.459 PubMed DOI

Christensen T. L., Djurhuus C. B., Clayton P., Christiansen J. S. (2007). An evaluation of the relationship between adult height and health-related quality of life in the general UK population. Clin. Endocrinol. 67 407–412. 10.1111/j.1365-2265.2007.02901.x PubMed DOI

Conroy-Beam D., Buss D. M., Pham M. N., Shackelford T. K. (2015). How sexually dimorphic are human mate preferences? Pers. Soc. Psychol. Bull. 41 1082–1093. 10.1177/0146167215590987 PubMed DOI

Cotton S., Small J., Pomiankowski A. (2006). Sexual selection and condition-dependent mate preferences. Curr. Biol. 16 755–765. 10.1016/j.cub.2006.08.022 PubMed DOI

Cunningham M. R., Barbee A. P., Pike C. L. (1990). What do women want? Facialmetric assessment of multiple motives in the perception of male facial physical attractiveness. J. Pers. Soc. Psychol. 59 61–72. 10.1037/0022-3514.59.1.61 PubMed DOI

Dixson A. F., Halliwell G., East R., Wignarajah P., Anderson M. J., Alan F., et al. (2003). Masculine somatotype and hirsuteness as determinants of sexual attractiveness to women. Arch. Sex. Behav. 32 29–39. 10.1023/A:1021889228469 PubMed DOI

Dixson B. J., Brooks R. C. (2013). The role of facial hair in women’s perceptions of men’s attractiveness, health, masculinity and parenting abilities. Evol. Hum. Behav. 34 236–241. 10.1016/j.evolhumbehav.2013.02.003 DOI

Dixson B. J., Dixson A. F., Bishop P. J., Parish A. (2010). Human physique and sexual attractiveness in men and women: a New Zealand-U.S. comparative study. Arch. Sex. Behav. 39 798–806. 10.1007/s10508-008-9441-y PubMed DOI

Dixson B. J. W., Rantala M. J. (2015). The role of facial and body hair distribution in women’s judgments of men’s sexual attractiveness. Arch. Sex. Behav. 45 877–889. 10.1007/s10508-015-0588-z PubMed DOI

Eastwick P. W., Harden K. P., Shukusky J. A., Morgan T. A., Joel S. (2017). Consistency and inconsistency among romantic partners over time. J. Pers. Soc. Psychol. 112 838–859. 10.1037/pspi0000087 PubMed DOI PMC

Feingold A. (1992). Good-looking people are not what we think. Psychol. Bull. 111 304–341. 10.1037/0033-2909.111.2.304 DOI

Figueredo A. J., Sefcek J. A., Jones D. N. (2006). The ideal romantic partner personality. Pers. Individ. Differ. 41 431–441. 10.1016/j.paid.2006.02.004 DOI

Frederick D. A., Haselton M. G. (2007). Why is muscularity sexy? Tests of the fitness indicator hypothesis. Pers. Social Psychol. Bull. 33 1167–1183. 10.1177/0146167207303022 PubMed DOI

Frost P. (2006). European hair and eye color: a case of frequency-dependent sexual selection? Evol. Hum. Behav. 27 85–103. 10.1016/j.evolhumbehav.2005.07.002 DOI

Frost P., Kleisner K., Flegr J. (2017). Health status by gender, hair color, and eye color: red-haired women are the most divergent. PLoS One, 12:e0190238. 10.1371/journal.pone.0190238 PubMed DOI PMC

Geary D. C., Vigil J., Byrd-Craven J. (2004). Evolution of human mate choice. J. Sex Res. 41 27–42. 10.1080/00224490409552211 PubMed DOI

Germine L., Russell R., Bronstad P. M., Blokland G. A. M., Smoller J. W., Kwok H., et al. (2015). Individual aesthetic preferences for faces are shaped mostly by environments. Not Genes. Curr. Biol. 25 2684–2689. 10.1016/j.cub.2015.08.048 PubMed DOI PMC

Gosling S. D., Rentfrow P. J., Swann W. B. (2003). A very brief measure of the big-five personality domains. J. Res. Pers. 37 504–528. 10.1016/S0092-6566(03)00046-1 PubMed DOI

Hensley W. E. (1994). Height as a basis for interpersonal attraction. Adolescence 29 469–474. PubMed

Hönekopp J. (2006). Once more: is beauty in the eye of the beholder? Relative contributions of private and shared taste to judgments of facial attractiveness. J. Exp. Psychol. Hum. Percept. Perform. 32 199–209. 10.1037/0096-1523.32.2.199 PubMed DOI

Jennions M. D., Petrie M. (2007). Variation in mate choice and mating preferences: a review of causes and consequences. Biol. Rev. 72 283–327. 10.1111/j.1469-185X.1997.tb00015.x PubMed DOI

Jensen-Campbell L. A., Graziano W. G. (2001). Agreeableness as a moderator of interpersonal conflict. J. Pers. 69 323–361. 10.1111/1467-6494.00148 PubMed DOI

Johnston V. S. (2006). Mate choice decisions: the role of facial beauty. Trends Cogn. Sci. 10 9–13. 10.1016/j.tics.2005.11.003 PubMed DOI

Judge T. A., Cable D. M. (2004). The effect of physical height on workplace success and income: preliminary test of a theoretical model. J. Appl. Psychol. 89 428–441. 10.1037/0021-9010.89.3.428 PubMed DOI

Kaplan H. S., Gangestad S. W. (2005). “Life history theory and evolutionary psychology,” in The Handbook of Evolutionary Psychology, ed. Buss D. M. (Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley, and Sons Inc; ), 68–95.

Kenny D. A., Kashy D. A., Cook W. L. (2006). Dyadic Data Analysis. New York, NY: Guilford Press.

Kleisner K., Kočnar T., Rubešová A., Flegr J. (2010). Eye color predicts but does not directly influence perceived dominance in men. Pers. Individ. Differ. 49 59–64. 10.1016/j.paid.2010.03.011 DOI

Kleisner K., Priplatova L., Frost P., Flegr J. (2013). Trustworthy-looking face meets brown eyes. PLoS One 8:e53285. 10.1371/journal.pone.0053285 PubMed DOI PMC

Kokko H., Brooks R., Jennions M. D., Morley J. (2003). The evolution of mate choice and mating biases. Proc. Biol. Sci. 270 653–664. 10.1098/rspb.2002.2235 PubMed DOI PMC

Kościński K. (2010). Do they know what they like? Intra-individual variation of female facial preferences. J. Evol. Psychol. 8 23–55. 10.1556/JEP.8.2010.1.4 DOI

Kościński K. (2011). Life history of female preferences for male faces. Hum. Nat. 22 416–438. 10.1007/s12110-011-9123-7 PubMed DOI PMC

Laeng B., Mathisen R., Johnsen J.-A. A. (2006). Why do blue-eyed men prefer women with the same eye color? Behav. Ecol. Sociobiol. 61 371–384. 10.1007/s00265-006-0266-1 DOI

Langlois J. H., Kalakanis L., Rubenstein A. J., Larson A., Hallam M., Smoot M. (2000). Maxims or myths of beauty? A meta-analytic and theoretical review. Psychol. Bull. 126 390–423. 10.1037//0033-2909.126.3.390 PubMed DOI

Little A. C. (2015). Attraction and human mating. in Evolutionary Perspectives on Social Psychology, eds V., Zeigler-Hill, L. L. M. Welling, and T. K. Shackelford (Cham: Springer), 319–332 10.1007/978-3-319-12697-5_25 DOI

Newman A. V., Pollet T., McCarty K., Neave N., Saxton T. (2018). Isn’t it eyeronic? Little evidence for consistent eye colour choices across relationships. PsyArXiv [Preprint]. 10.31234/osf.io/dv93s DOI

Pawlowski B. (2003). Variable preferences for sexual dimorphism in height as a strategy for increasing the pool of potential partners in humans. Proc. R. Soc. B Biol. Sci. 270 709–712. 10.1098/rspb.2002.2294 PubMed DOI PMC

Perrett D. I., Lee K. J., Penton-Voak I., Rowland D., Yoshikawa S., Burt D. M., et al. (1998). Effects of sexual dimorphism on facial attractiveness. Nature 394 884–887. 10.1038/29772 PubMed DOI

Pierce C. A. (1996). Body height and romantic attraction: a meta-analytic test of the male-taller norm. Soc. Behav. Pers. Int. J. 24 143–149. 10.2224/sbp.1996.24.2.143 DOI

Puts D. A. (2010). Beauty and the beast: mechanisms of sexual selection in humans. Evol. Hum. Behav. 31 157–175. 10.1016/j.evolhumbehav.2010.02.005 DOI

Regan P. C., Levin L., Sprecher S., Christopher F. S., Gate R. (2000). Partner preferences. J. Psychol. Hum. Sex. 12 1–21. 10.1300/J056v12n03_01 DOI

Rodríguez R. L., Boughman J. W., Gray D. A., Hebets E. A., Höbel G., Symes L. B. (2013). Diversification under sexual selection: the relative roles of mate preference strength and the degree of divergence in mate preferences. Ecol. Lett. 16 964–974. 10.1111/ele.12142 PubMed DOI PMC

Rosenthal G. G. (2017). Mate Choice. The Evolution of Sexual Decision Making from Microbes to Humans. New Jersey: Princeton University Press.

Sarlio-Lahteenkorva S., Lahelma E. (1999). The association of body mass index with social and economic disadvantage in women and men. Int. J. Epidemiol. 28 445–449. 10.1093/ije/28.3.445 PubMed DOI

Saxton T. K. (2016). Experiences during specific developmental stages influence face preferences. Evol. Hum. Behav. 37 21–28. 10.1016/j.evolhumbehav.2015.06.001 DOI

Štěrbová Z., Tureček P., Kleisner K. (2018). Consistency of mate choice in eye and hair colour: testing possible mechanisms. Evol. Hum. Behav. 1 74–81. 10.1016/j.evolhumbehav.2018.08.003 DOI

Štěrbová Z., Valentová J. (2012). Influence of homogamy, complementarity, and sexual imprinting on mate choice. Anthropologie 50 47–59.

Swami V., Einon D., Furnham A. (2006). The leg-to-body ratio as a human aesthetic criterion. Body Image 3 317–323. 10.1016/j.bodyim.2006.08.003 PubMed DOI

Tovée M., Maisey D., Vale E., Cornelissen P. (1999). Characteristics of male attractiveness for women. The Lancet 353:1500 10.1016/S0140-6736(99)00438-9 PubMed DOI

White D., Rabago-Smith M. (2011). Genotype–phenotype associations and human eye color. J. Hum. Genet. 56 5–7. 10.1038/jhg.2010.126 PubMed DOI

Parental Interference in Offspring's Mate Choice: Sets of Actions and Counteractions Based on Both Perspectives