Coping with Infidelity

Everyone hears about infidelity, more commonly called “cheating,” at some point in their life. The media loves to make use of it in the news or in movies, and it is actually a more common occurrence in real life then we would maybe like to believe. Even though research shows that up to 80% of people in monogamous cultures disapprove of extradyadic (with a person other than your partner) sexual involvement, it also indicates that 30-60% of men and 20-50% of women engage in at least one of these encounters. (1) Self reports also suggest that 75% of men and 68% of women who have been in at least one serious dating relationship also report engaging in some sort of extradyadic activities such as dating or kissing. (1) What exactly defines cheating, though? Though most people would generally agree on what constitutes sexual infidelity, the line drawn is not as solid for nonsexual behaviors. This is especially true for emotional cheating. Try asking the people you know if they consider emotional infidelity (becoming deeply emotionally involved with another person besides for your partner) cheating. Since the few lectures I’ve had discussing the subject, I have talked to quite a few of the people that I know. I’ve personally discovered that my friends are relatively split down the middle. Some people believe that it is certainly a form of cheating and condone it, while others don’t and think it is no big deal. It is probably safe to assume that many conflicts between partners arise if they do not have the same views on infidelity.

Take for example the trailer above for the movie Along Came Polly (2004). Reuben (played by Ben Stiller) thinks that he has finally found the love of his life. However, during their honeymoon he finds her cheating on him with the scuba instructor. Reuben freaks out, naturally, and does various things throughout the movie to help him cope with the infidelity like stabbing all of her pillows, focusing on another woman and going home to his friends and family. His wife returns later in the movie wanting to start over. She believed that they could continue their relationship despite the act of infidelity she went through. Reuben finds that he is unable to give her forgiveness. He cannot get over the fact that she had sex with someone else…on their honeymoon, no less. It isn’t impossible for a relationship to continue after infidelity occurs, however. But what exactly determines whether a partner will break it off afterwards?


Many studies have looked at sex differences between men and women and what their views are on the types of infidelity. Within those differences, they analyze what each gender is generally more able to forgive. One study by Shackelford (2002) looked at just that. They hypothesized that sex differences would follow an evolutionary perspective. For men, a single act of infidelity by his partner would cause the chance of the offspring not being his own. Therefore, there is the threat that he would be putting time and effort into a child that was not his own. For women, however, a single act of sexual infidelity by her partner would not be as devastating since her child is always her child. If he were to be emotionally involved with another woman, it would be a different story. He would then have to divide resources, time and effort between her and the other woman. As a result, men should be more distressed by sexual infidelity, while women are more distressed by emotional infidelity. (2) The study had a pool of 256 college undergraduate participants. They first took a survey that asked them demographics, followed by instructions to think of a person they are currently seriously involved with, or were seriously involved with. They were then given a set of scenarios to which they had to pick which one would upset/distress them more. Two example scenarios are: “imagining your partner enjoying passionate sexual intercourse with that other person” versus “imagining your partner forming a deep emotional attachment to that other person” and “imagining your partner trying different sexual positions with that other person” versus “imagining your partner falling in love with that other person.” Following that task, they were then asked about whether it would be more difficult for them to forgive sexual versus emotional infidelity, and which action would lead to them most likely breaking up with their partner.

Maybe not very surprising, the results showed support for the evolutionary perspective. 61.9% of men versus 22% of women said that it would be more difficult to forgive a sexual infidelity. 58.4% of men compared to 41.6% of women said that they would be more likely to break up with their partner after a an act of sexual infidelity. Interestingly, when participants were told to imagine their partner committing BOTH types of infidelity at the same time, 57.9% of men and 41.3% of women said that it would be more difficult for them to forgive the sexual act than the emotional. All of the effects found remained even after controlling for those attributed to age and ethnicity. Therefore, in general, it is supported that men will have a harder time forgiving sexual infidelity and that emotional infidelity is the same for women. The study specifically clarifies that no matter what type of infidelity happens, both men and women get very upset. The purpose of the study was to look at the potential sex differences and how they would affect relationship outcome. It is important to note that most men will not be willing to overlook emotional infidelity, nor will most women overlook sexual infidelity.


In a study done by Gunderson & Ferrari (2008), 196 participants read about an imaginary romantic partner cheating on them by having sex with someone else (3). They found similar results to the Shackelford study -- there are differences in the way that men and women react to sexual infidelity. Though most of the participants had never experienced such a scenario themselves, they found it quite believable and were able to imagine it well. Women also found it harder to forgive their imaginary partner and worried more about future behavior more than the men in the study did. However, those who found that their partner only cheated on them once were much more likely to forgive, than those who cheated multiple times or were still cheating. Apology also appeared to play a role in forgiveness. Those who read their imaginary partner apologizing to them were more likely to forgive them than those who did not. Apology with an attempt at making amends to continue the relationship seemed to be the best starting point for reconciling the relationship.


Another study done by Kluwer & Karremans (2009) looked at unforgiving motivations following acts of infidelity. They found that people who are currently in a committed relationship when finding out about their partner cheating are more hurt and less likely to forgive than those who were in a relationship and are no longer in the relationship when they find out. (4) It also appears that people are generally more unforgiving when the infidelity was currently ongoing or if it lasted longer than six months. This shouldn’t be surprising, though, as it is much harder to apologize or use the excuse that “it was only one mistake” if the infidelity lasted an extended period of time. Time does seem to have some effect on forgiveness as well. The study found that there were more positive and less negative effects as time passed, from the act of infidelity. This could imply that if couples remain together and try to work things out, time may help the person left hurt and angry, forgive their partner.


Unfortunately, because people will more often than not feel emotions such as resentment, retaliation and separation from the partner who committed the infidelity, relationship problems will naturally ensue. Research shows that people generally feel like avoiding their partner because of hurt feelings as well as wanting to get some sort of revenge. (4) There is some evidence that there are also sex differences in coping with the betrayal that comes along with infidelity. In a study investigated by Miller & Maner (2008), 69 undergraduate students underwent activities that were previously proven to invoke jealousy as well as concerns of infidelity. (5) They were given scenarios of different levels of “cheating,” such as flirting, holding hands with another person and actually engaging in sexual contact. After each scenario, the participants were instructed to write about how they would feel and what they would do. Raters then coded all of the responses looking for four things: 1) phrases indicating anger such as “I would be pissed!” 2) phrases indicating sadness or hurt such as “I would shut down and start crying” 3) phrases referencing a violent act such as “I would slap him across the face” and lastly, 4) references to affiliating behavior like “I would go to my friend’s house to talk.” The raters also paid attention to whether or not the violence was directed at the partner, or the person committing the act with their partner.

Graph showing gender differences
in behavioral response (5)

Results showed that men were more inclined than women to imagine themselves engaging in some sort of violence, while women were more likely to imagine affiliating behavior. Though men tended to be much more violent than women, it is interesting to compare where the violent ones directed their thoughts. Women directed their violence at their partners, while men had the tendency to direct it at the person their partner was with. The study also found that men experience greater feelings of anger than sadness, but the reverse was true for women. Miller & Maner hypothesized that the evolutionary perspective may also have something to do with justifying these findings. They believe that men are more likely to impose dominance strategies (such as violence) in order to reinstate the value they lost as a result of their partner committing the infidelity. Jealousy in men has been shown to precede violent behavior, not to mention facial expressions of anger can act as signals of dominance in men as well. (5) In terms of the evolutionary theory, losing a mate for a woman means losing out on resources and protection. Therefore, it would be natural for them to look to groups in order to balance out the negative costs of their partner cheating. Instead of taking out their feelings violently, women would therefore focus their energies on forming and maintaining alliances with friends and family. (5)

The top lines show data from those couples who
had experienced infidelity in some fashion, while the
bottom lines are couples in therapy not for infidelity.  (6)

In a study conducted by Atkins and colleagues (2010), they compared couples with infidelity issues to couples without them in therapy. (6) There were a total of 540 couples, and out of those, 145 couples reported infidelity as a problem in their relationship. After the partners consented to the study, they completed self-report questionnaires prior to treatment, post-treatment 6 months later and again in a follow up study 12 months following. As can be seen in figure one (to the right), couples who expressed infidelity as a concern started off with a remarkably higher mean of relationship distress (The Global Distress Scale pictured on the left chart) and depressive symptoms (The Care for Epidemiological Studies Depression scale pictured on the right side). Those who had infidelity as a problem in their relationship showed slow and gradual improvement during therapy, but by the follow-up study, they were no longer statistically different from the non-infidelity couples in the story. This indicates that infidelity couples who seek therapy have hope for a good outcome in their relationship, as they are approximately similar to couples in therapy without infidelity problems by the end.


As much as we do not want to admit it, infidelity does happen. In evolutionary terms, monogamy is not really in our nature.  The idea of monogomy started when hunting and gathering became the norm for humans.  Hunting and gathering meant settling in one place was now easier, and this led to the social norm of a man and woman living together in a fixed place (7).  This may be why some find it so difficult to stay loyal to one. However, in our society now, it is not moral to cheat, but people make mistakes. If you have cheated, and you feel hopeless; do not fret. There are many ways to repair your relationship. Sometimes, after cheating, your bond can even become stronger than it was. It just takes a lot of work. There are many things out there to help you. First off, marriage counseling is a very important step to take.  There are different circumstances as too whether working out the relationship after infidelity is worth it. Usually, couples who have put a lot into their relationship, such as time and money tend to seek repair. Also, usually couples who have children tend to want to stay together for the family.  However, no matter what the reason is for you wanting to repair your relationship, there are multiple places to seek help.

Judith Barnett, a clinical psychologist, and marriage counselor who specializes in infidelity, with 20 years of experience may be a good place to start. According to Barnett, seeing just any marriage counselor may be a bit too general. You should see one who specifies in infidelity such as her. (8) This is important because you should focus mainly on this topic, not general marriage issues. She claims on her site that "for an overwhelming majority of cases of infidelity, not only can the relationship be saved but it can evolve into a stronger and more resilient and even more intimate relationship than before. However, this often requires some skillful facilitation from a therapist specifically trained in dealing with issues after infidelity occurs." On this website you can search through a variety of places for help. She has some basic facts about infidelity, and even mentions Internet infidelity. Most importantly, she has a "recovery" section. Here, she can help you decide if it is better to separate or not. She also has information on healing as a couple and as an individual. There are many resources to use on this site. To check it out go to : http://www.afterinfidelity.com/

If you are one who trusts in things you see on television, then you may want to to to check this out. Featured on The Today Show, Dr. Laura Berman, (the director of the Berman Center in Chicago and an assistant clinical professor of psychiatry and obstetrics/gynecology at the Feinberg School of Medicine at Northwestern University) has a few general steps to repair your relationship after infidelity. She first says to "Commit to a solution". This should involve seeking counseling once a week for a while. Another thing to do is make an adultery contract, where you promise to never cheat again, or speak to the one you cheated with. Also, don’t let long periods of time go unaccounted for, because it does not help the process of trust being built. Next, she says to "Check your Anger". The one who was cheated on must get rid of their anger. Since they will have anger, and feel worthless, depressed, and other emotions, they should try to vent in a non harmful way. She suggests letting the hurt one go on for about 10 minutes where they can yell or scream, but then they should just calm down and talk to their partner. During this talk, any questions should be answered by the one who cheated, in order to move on. The last thing to do is "address the root of the problem". Most infidelity does not come from just seeking external sex partners. It usually comes from another personal matter. Something is missing from the relationship- maybe emotionally, or maybe infidelity is common in one's family, and could have been learned. You should attempt to find the root of your problems without pointing blame at anyone in particular. Once you realize what went wrong in the relationship, it may even become a stronger bond in the end. (9) Check it out here : http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/21433484/ns/today-relationships/

If you would like to talk with somebody directly there are websites to do so. There is a group of psychotherapists than run a website. This site has many counselors and therapists, and you can even check them all out directly on the site to find the right one for you. Most importantly, there is a phone number which you can call and pay directly with your credit card for counseling. You can also go to the "counseling corner" on this website, for some help. On the topic of infidelity, Psychiatrist M.Goulston, explains how you will respond to infidelity with the "four H's". You will feel hurt, hate, hesitation to trust, and holding onto resentment (10). However, with the four H's, comes the four R's- remorse, restitution, rehabilitation, and request for forgiveness:

Remorse: if you cheated, you must show that you are truly and sincerely sorry. This will be reflected through the things you do and say. This may involve apologizing repeatedly. Show that you realize how hard it was for your partner when you were unfaithful.

Restitution: Then, to help them feel better you may have to just let them vent all their anger and hurt, maybe towards you. This may be a way of revenge so you feel bad like them.

Rehab: You must show that you are making an effort to make things better, and deal with the relationship issues better, to meet their needs.

Request for forgiveness: After you do the above three things, for at least six months, you should request for forgiveness. Forgiving will not be an easy thing, so you must wait for your partner to truly forgive you before things start to get better.

If this seems helpful, go to: http://www.beachpsych.com/pages/cc123.html

If you are one who likes to deal with things your own way, then you should probably invest in purchasing a self-help book on infidelity. I suggest just going on either barnesandnoble.com or amazon.com and search for a good book. Barnes and Noble alone displays over 300 books on infidelity. Here are a couple with high ratings:

Surviving Infidelity: Making Decisions, Recovering from the Pain by Rona B. Subotnik, a family therapist and clinical psychologist Gloria G. Harris.
This book deals with understanding the different types of affairs, coping with your emotions, and repairing your marriage. (11)
First Aid for the Betrayed: Recovering from the Devastation of an Affair: A Personal Guide to Healing by Richard Alan. This book was written over a two year span, and includes the author's personal experiences and 100 others than have dealt with infidelity. The author shares ways to help those who have dealt with this issue to recover and survive after the matter. (12)

Cheating seems unforgivable, and trust seems irreparable, but this is truly not the case. Just look at a famous example of Bill and Hillary Clinton. That was an extreme case of cheating. Everyone in the United States knew about Bill’s infidelity to Hillary. She had to have been hurt and mortified, but look at them now; 10 years later, and they are still married. This is a perfect example of forgiveness and moving on.

In this video of Hillary Clinton on The Tyra Banks Show (from 2:48-4:40), Hillary speaks to Tyra about how she dealt with this infidelity. She talks about how hard it was, but how she learned to recover from it. This shows that you just truly have to have the strength to repair your relationship, and it is possible.

REFERENCES:
1) Mattingly, B. A., Wilson, K., Clark, E. M., Bequette, A. W., & Weidler, D. J. (2010). Foggy faithfulness: Relationship quality, religiosity, and the Perceptions of Dating Infidelity Scale in an adult sample. Journal of Family Issues, 31(11), 1465-1480. doi:10.1177/0192513X10362348

2) Shackelford, T. K., Buss, D. M., & Bennett, K. (2002). Forgiveness or breakup: Sex differences in responses to a partner's infidelity. Cognition and Emotion, 16(2), 299-307. doi:10.1080/02699930143000202

3) Gunderson, P. R., & Ferrari, J. R. (2008). Forgiveness of sexual cheating in romantic relationships: Effects of discovery method, frequency of offense, and presence of apology. North American Journal of Psychology, 10(1), 1-14. Retrieved from EBSCOhost.

4) Kluwer, E. S., & Karremans, J. (2009). Unforgiving motivations following infidelity: Should we make peace with our past. Journal of Social and Clinical Psychology, 28(10), 1298-1325. doi:10.1521/jscp.2009.28.10.1298

5) Miller, S. L., & Maner, J. K. (2008). Coping with romantic betrayal: Sex differences in responses to partner infidelity. Evolutionary Psychology, 6(3), 413-426. Retrieved from EBSCOhost.

6) Atkins, D. C., Marín, R. A., Lo, T. Y., Klann, N., & Hahlweg, K. (2010). Outcomes of couples with infidelity in a community-based sample of couple therapy. Journal of Family Psychology, 24(2), 212-216. doi:10.1037/a00187897)Anitei, Stefan. (2008, May 15). The biology and psychology of cheating. Retrieved from http://news.softpedia.com/news/The-Biology-and-Psychology-of-Cheating-85610.shtml

8) Barnett, Judith. After infidelity or an affair. Retrieved from http://afterinfidelity.com/

9)Berman, Laura Dr., . (2007, October 23). Is infidelity a forgivable sin?. Retrieved from http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/21433484/ns/today-relationships

10) Goulston, M. Reparing your marriage after an affair. Retrieved from http://www.beachpsych.com/pages/cc123.html

11) Subotnik, Rona. (1999). Surviving infidelity: making decisions, recovering from the pain . Retrieved from http://www.amazon.com/Surviving-Infidelity-Making-Decisions-Recovering/dp/1580621376

12) Richard, Alan. (2006). First aid for the betrayed . Retrieved from http://search.barnesandnoble.com/First-Aid-for-the-Betrayed/Richard-Alan/e/9781425103569/?itm=1&USRI=first+aid+for+the+betrayed#TABS

How to Detect a Liar

Dr. Greggory House
(House MD) (2)

Deception is deliberately saying something that you know is untrue to someone with the intention of deceiving them. In other words, deception is another way of saying you lied to them. Everyone lies. In fact, people tell about ten lies per week on average (1).  Despite knowing this, no one wants to be lied to. In fact, we would like to think that we are accurate in detecting when someone is lying to us. Unfortunately, the people who often utilize lying the most are also those who are very concerned about creating positive self-presentations and therefore are more sociable and manipulative (1). On top of that, an average person’s ability to detect lying is no greater than chance. Yes, that’s right. You are only 50% likely to catch if someone is lying to your face.This statistic causes society many problems. Obviously we want our ability to be greater than chance when it comes to detecting a liar not only for personal reasons, but certainly for catching criminals that could get away with murder. Luckily, research is making progress on more effective methods for detecting lies. Many studies have looked at various nonverbal communication cues and even brain imaging in order to further this field.

     An interesting study conducted at the University of Pennsylvania investigated the possibility of using fMRIs in order to detect deception. (3) The study was only conducted with one participant, JG (a male newspaper reporter), who was told to pretend he was applying for a job as a science writer. After the main experimenter told him the job requirements, JG had his resume returned to him for revising. He was told to “employ whatever means necessary to be hired” and to return the resume. It is important to note that all the other research members were unaware of this exchange. JG was not specifically told to lie about any part of his resume at any point. Later, JG was instructed that he was going to be tested using the fMRI and to answer all questions about his resume as truthfully as possible. He was asked three known truths (to the experimenter) and three unknown statements fifteen times in a pseudorandom order. After being debriefed, JG reported that he had told the truth on the three truth statements but lied on the unknown ones. Looking at the results, lies in two of the three “unknown” items were associated with an increase in prefronto-parietal activation, and could therefore be categorized as a lie. This supported the thought that the inferior parietal/frontal regions are highly associated with deception. The third unknown, which happened to be “did you serve in the military” did not activate these regions at all. Interestingly, the hippocampus and amygdala were activated instead. The researches hypothesized that this change may be a result of the question itself (in which JG had particular feelings about the military that evoked this change), or because of the question’s social inappropriateness and moral dilemma. This finding, however, could be used for further study of lying about personally or socially significant questions.


     Naturally, this study cannot be generalized by any means. There was only one participant and they were simply clinical trials to see what work could be done using fMRIs for the field of deception. Though there were no definite findings, I found it very interesting to consider the possibility of using brain imaging technology to measure truthful statements. As most people know, the technology we currently use for lie detection is the polygraph. Unfortunately, it is not a very reliable source of information because it measures ANS arousal rather than something like cognition. If researchers could really utilize brain imaging in a way to measure activity when lying, it would completely revolutionize the field. If nothing else, a decent brain imaging technology could at least serve as a way to verify decisions made based on nonverbal communication. The machinery required would be insanely expensive, immobile and raises questions of ethics, however. There is still much needed research for technique of lie detection before any changes are to come.


     Using expensive machines however, is not the only way to detect lies.  There are many clues we can look for to help reveal deception.  Nonverbal cues are very helpful in detecting a liar, because we are not aware of the nonverbal things that we do.  Such as the pitch of our voice can get higher when we lie (4).



With as much overlap and
variability as these kind of
statistics give rise to, its no
wonder we do not completely
rely on such cues (5).

      Although nonverbal cues are one of the best ways to identify a lie, even they have many weaknesses. Nonverbal cues are not giveaway clues into the truth.  For example, the saying “the eyes are a gateway into the soul” might imply that we can always tell a lie when we look into somebody's eyes.  This is not true, however.  Since this is a very known belief, in this circumstance, if somebody is lying, they may make sure they keep direct eye contact.  Therefore, this would not be an accurate way to figure out a liar.  Nonverbal cues merely represent what is more likely to happen when someone is telling the truth vs. telling a lie. Many nonverbal cues have been found are based on small statistical patterns and cannot guarantee a persons deception (5). For instance, the nonverbal cue of greater number of blinks during a lie is a statistically significant finding that should not go unaccounted for. However, one cannot simply identify a lie every time someone blinks more than usual.

     One of the greatest strengths of nonverbal cues of lying is that they are mostly based off uncontrollable expressions fueled by uncontrollable expressions fueled by emotions. This makes them very difficult to suppress, which is why we are very tempted to rely and trust these cues. Unfortunately for people who are exceptionally great at reading these cues, “human lie detectors,” even emotions can be misleading, making no cue a clue to a lie. Have you ever been scared when telling the truth? Being questioned, especially during high stakes situations, can be very stressful (5). Despite our best effort, our faces leak out microexpressions: facial expressions that last for less than ¼ of a second that portray that persons true emotion. It’s said that liars often display microexpressions of fear during the act, but what about an extremely nervous truth teller? In the question lies the answer. Even mircoexpressions can be misleading.

       So, if the physiological responses, and the nonverbal cues are never perfectly accurate, then can we ever tell if somebody is lying?  Really, we can't.  But, there are definitely circumstances where we have a pretty good idea that somebody is lying.  For example, it can be much easier to tell if somebody is lying if they are close to you.  When somebody you love is deceiving you, there may be ways to figure it out easier than if a stranger were lying to you.  This can be for multiple reasons:  If you are very close to someone, you may be able to tell when they are acting differently.  Or more specifically, if somebody you know very well is trying to lie to you, you may realize the lie, because you know details about them and the story may not go along with what you know about them (4). For example, just the other day one of my friends called me to complain about one of his friends.  He invited her to come to a wedding reception with him, and she agreed.  Then the day of, she told him she was asked to work two extra hours at work.  Since my friend knows her very well, he knew this story seemed extremely inconsistent with her behavior, and with her job.  He knew that she would not usually work extra hours to when asked, especially if she had other plans.  Therefore, this made him to believe she was lying about the whole thing, and secretly had other plans, and this made him extremely angry. 

     Another example would be a scene from the movie Just Married. Though we could not embed the video into this blog entry, if you go to http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xhqz73_a-pig-with-hair_shortfilms, you will see a clip from the movie that displays how there are many ways to tell if a loved one is lying. In the clip, Ashton Kutcher's character, Tom is trying to lie to Brittany Murphy's character, Sarah.  But, she can tell he is lying because of the way his face involuntarily moves.  She also realizes that his story is not consistent with the usual behavior of her dog.  Once again, as with all other ways of detecting a lie, this method does not always work either.  This is because we do not want to believe that somebody we love may be lying to us, so we remain blind to the clues and just decide to buy their lies in order to protect ourselves.


     Deception is just something we unfortunately, have to learn to live with.  No machines, nonverbal cues, or closeness to a person can clearly or accurately point out a lie.  Humans have just really seemed to perfect the art of deception.

    

REFERENCES: 

1. Franzoi, Stephen L. (2009). Social Psychology. New York: McGraw-Hill. 122-123.

2. Dr. Greggory House photo from http://foxshop.seenon.com/detail.php?p=70778

3. Hakun, J.G., Ruparel, K.K., Seelig, D.D., Busch, E. E., Loughead, J. W., Gur, R. C., & Langleben, D. D. (2009). Towards clinical trials of lie detection with fMRI. Social Neuroscience, 4(6), 518-527. doi:10.1080/17470910802188370

4. Svetieva, E.  (2011).  Deception [Power point presentation]. Retreived from https://ublearns.buffalo.edu/webapps/portal/frameset.jsp?tab_group=courses&url=%2Fwebapps%2Fblackboard%2Fexecute%2Fcontent%2Ffile%3Fcmd%3Dview%26content_id%3D_1812400_1%26course_id%3D_89404_1%26framesetWrapped%3Dtrue

5. (2001). Nonverbal signs of lying.  Truth about deception. Reference from http://www.truthaboutdeception.com/lying-and-deception/detecting-deception/nonverbal-cues.html

Physical Attraction

     Physical attraction is obviously an important phenomenon that occurs almost every day, multiple times each day. It is not something that we are able to control because it is practically automatic when we interact with people. We’ve all experienced a time where we’ve had an extreme desire to talk to, or even maybe pursue a relationship with someone solely based on their physical appearance. We also are all aware of the fact that the people who were popular in our school years, the people who become actors and actresses, models, and even those who appear in commercials are all generally what people find physically attractive. Unfortunately, physical appearance has gained great importance in society; especially in the United States.  If you simply look at the lengths actors and actresses go to in order to keep their bodies physically attractive (plastic surgery, breast implants, excessive diets, etc.), you are able to see evidence of the importance we place on our appearance.

     This great importance on physical appearance often leads to superficial attitudes. Recently, my friend went on a date with a guy. When I asked her how it was, she said that he told her that he “broke up with his ex because she was not pretty enough.” I know quite a few males that will make comments to me about certain women that they know and obviously don’t like, but will want to pursue them anyway because they are a “10.” Many people are also aware of the game that people (mostly men from my experience) play by saying numbers from 0-10 as people from the opposite gender walk by without any consideration of their personality.  I can’t even imagine thinking this way myself, but there are many people who base everything solely on physical appearance. As can be seen in this video of Barney from the popular TV show “How I Met Your Mother,” (below) there are people who are more interested in their partner being attractive than other personality traits. He claims that he doesn’t mind if the woman he is dating is crazy as long as she is “equally as hot.” In other words, physical appearance can balance or even override negative personality traits.

     Physical attractiveness has been shown to be the most important thing for initial impressions. And in contrary to popular belief, beauty is not in the eye of the beholder. There are actual ways that we all measure beauty. For example, we like faces that are symmetrical and don’t have any unique features more. Body proportionality also matters. It has been scientifically proven that a “golden ratio” exists; the distance from the navel to the bottom of the feet is 1.618 times the distance from the navel to the top of the head, the width of the lips is 1.618 times the width of the nose, etc. There is even a preferred waist-to-hip ratio of .70 for women and 1.00 for men.

     According to a study done at Yale University by Alan Feingold, there were some interesting findings relating to gender differences and physical attraction (1). The first was the idea that more men than women value attractiveness gained some support from this study.  Secondly, it was shown that the correlation for female physical attractiveness and romantic popularity was stronger for women than men. On the other hand, the correlation for platonic popularity (friends) with the opposite sex was stronger for men than women. This would make sense according to an evolutionary standpoint because according to that theory, men look for young, attractive women in order to pass their genes on. In our society, we generally associate a romantic relationship with a possible future family and therefore physical appearance of women would become more important in a romantic sense. Females, according to the theory, are looking for a male that will provide support for her and her offspring, so it would seem natural for women to look for relationships out of friendship first.

     Since physical attraction seems to be so important, how does this affect the workplace? In one study that was conducted at the Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, they decided to investigate just that (2). People are permitted to include a personal photo on a resume in Israel, so this was an ideal opportunity to see if people are more attractive for a job if they are considered more physically attractive. 5,312 resumes were sent out to 2,656 jobs. Each resume either had no picture, a picture of an average looking person, or a picture of an attractive person. The response rate for attractive males was found to be 19.9%, for average males was 13.7% and for no picture males was 9.2%. Interestingly, women were found to be significantly less likely to be hired if they were attractive. The response rate for women was highest when there was no picture at all (16.6%), while the response rate was lowest if they were considered to be physically attractive (12.8%). However, it was later found in a post-study survey that the women with photos were subject to discrimination because of the high number of women who were reviewing the applicants. They experienced feelings of jealousy when they saw young, attractive women applying to work at their company and therefore decided not to contact them. By looking at the response rate for males, it does seem that physical attractiveness may have a chance of enhancing the possibility of being hired. However, as can be seen with what happened to the attractive females in this study, physical attractiveness may also harm you depending on who is doing the hiring.

     Of course, not everyone is completely superficial. People value personality, interpersonal skills, similarity, mere exposure, proximity, and a variety of other things. For example, Tobias Greitemeyer from the University of Innsbruck in Austria set out to see if the reciprocity effect (liking someone when you find out that they like you) had an impact on the attraction between people. (3) He thought that the more attractive a person was, the more someone would want them if they found out they were desired by them. He had 61 participants and did multiple studies where the participants were shown pictures of very attractive and not-so-attractive people. They were told that the people they were shown were attracted to them. Despite how attractive the people in the photos were, there was some level of reciprocated attraction when the participants found out they were liked by the people in the photos. However, this effect was shown to work more if the person in the photo was rated highly attractive. Because the participants never interacted with the people in the photos, physical attraction was shown to be an important (though not the only) factor in first impressions. The bottom line is, people will generally like you more when they first encounter you if they find you physically attractive.

     So, if physical attraction is so important, what do we subtly do in order to make ourselves more attractive? It seems that you can use cues involving eye contact, lips, crossing of the legs, touch and proximity to guide your perceptions (4). When people are attracted to someone, they want to look more and make eye contact with them. Eye contact will be naturally prolonged. If you catch someone looking at you for an extended period of time, especially with a smile thrown in there, chances are probably good that they are interested. Secondly, people may lick or bite their lips more often. The lips are very sensitive and have an important role when it comes to intimacy. For example, a woman may bring her necklace up to her mouth and playfully toy with it. Thirdly, women will often cross and uncross their legs to draw attention to her legs and groin area, while men will sometimes either sit or stand with their thumbs tucked into their belt loops, which also draws attention to the same area. When people feel more comfortable with the person they are attracted to, touch and proximity play a larger role. Touching someone’s hand, arm, hair, or even the bold move of touching someone’s leg are examples of how you may show you are attracted to someone. Being in someone’s close proximity such as leaning into them and whispering can also be used to convey feelings of attraction.

     Despite all of the research that shows physical attraction is a very key component of interpersonal relationships and that there is a scientific aspect of beauty, there is a cultural component of it as well. For example, compare the well known actor Brad Pitt from the US (left) (5) to Oguri Shun from Japan (right) (6). Both of these men are very popular and considered extremely attractive in their respective countries. Anyone can see the differences in what is considered attractive between them, though. In the United States, male actors and models more commonly have six packs (or at least pretty jacked), relatively shorter hair on their head, have facial hair, angular jaws, and just plain ooze “masculinity.” In contrast, the actors that are popular in Japan have longer hair, are very thin and lanky, don’t have facial hair, have a softer jaw-line, and would be considered more “feminine” by an American standpoint.

     In conclusion, it is almost impossible to deny the importance of physical attraction. It happens every day, whether we are consciously aware of it or not. Some people place more importance on how physically attractive someone is than others, and it often varies with context. And despite their being a quantitative way to measure beauty, culture plays some roles in shaping what exactly is considered attractive amongst a group of people.


REFERENCES: 
1. Feingold, A. (1990). Gender differences in effects of physical attractiveness on romantic attraction: A comparison across five research paradigms. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 59(5), 981-993. doi:10.1037/0022-3514.59.5.981


2.  Ruffle, Bradley J. and Shtudiner, Ze'ev, Are Good-Looking People More Employable? (November 8, 2010). Available at SSRN: http://ssrn.com/abstract=1705244 


3. Greitmeyer, Tobais. (2010). Effects of reciprocity on attraction: the role of a partner's physical attractiveness. Journal of the International Association of Relationship Research, 17.


4. Maughan, J. (n.d.). Five Signs of Physical Attraction. Retrieved 2011, from http://www.life123.com/relationships/communication/signs-attraction/signs-of-physical-attraction.shtml
 5.  Brad Pitt photograph from http://www.julielinker.com/2007/08/


6. Oguri Shun photograph from http://yeinjee.com/asianpop/tag/asian-celebrity/bio/ 

Self-Serving Bias

(Samantha) Just what is the self-serving bias? Have you ever noticed either yourself or people you know attribute success to themselves but any time something bad happens or they fail they always seem to have something else to blame? The self-serving bias is when people are more likely to take credit for good things but not do the same for bad outcomes.


A study done at the University of Georgia (1) examined the phenomena of the self-serving bias by having participants complete an facial recognition task that they were told would predict mental health and well-being. Regardless of what responses they gave, they were either given positive or negative feedback. After the feedback was received, the participants then were asked to answer with a button to a question that posed either an internal attribution or an external one (for example, "I am stupid" versus "The task was hard"). ERP activity was measured during these responses.


The results showed that the participants made more external attributions when provided with negative feedback, but made more internal ones when they were given positive feedback. These findings would be expected considering the self-serving bias. Interestingly, they also found that when a person made an attribution that didn't coincide with the self-serving bias, ERP activity was increased. This would suggest that it takes more cognitive control to make attributions that don't match this phenomena.


Putting aside that the study confirmed the self-serving bias, I thought it was interesting that the findings suggest that it actually takes more self-control to inhibit our self-serving tendencies. Everyone wants to feel good about themselves, of course, so it seems logical to only accept responsibility for good things that happen in order to protect our self-concept. But what do these findings imply for people who tend to have a negative outlook on life or are depressed? I personally have a friend that always makes internal attributions when things go wrong (especially on exams) but uses the excuse that it was luck or someone else influenced anything good. My guess would be that since depression generally comes with negative views about the self, the person will accept negative internal attributions more than good ones. Therefore, I wonder if the study was repeated with clinically depressed participants, the opposite findings would be true? It would be interesting to see if it requires depressed people more self-control in order to not constantly blame internal factors every time something goes wrong, not only for diagnostic purposes, but also for treatment plans.

(Nanako) This comic strip illustrates the self-serving bias. Calvin shows the latter pattern by blaming his failure on an external source. When the boy throws the snowball toward Susie, he misses. He thinks the reason why he misses is "a cross breeze," not his poor ability of throwing.  He attributes failure to external factor. It would probably be logical to assume that if he had made impact, he would have accredited it to his good aim.

It is natural for people to think that way because we want to feel good about ourselves. Perhaps we try to protect ourselves on an unconscious level. Whatever the reason, we want to see ourselves as being good or having talent. Although this tendency makes us get more motived, it can also cause us problems when we have too much of a positive bias towards ourself. 


However, I feel that this tendency depends on culture. In my culture, we do not tend to say that any success attributes to the self because we feel that it is more important to cooperate with others. Even if we think that success could be the result of personal factors, we are more likely to give credit to the group. Therefore, I feel that it might depend on culture.


(John) Lets look at an example of what this could look like. Lets picture an extroverted high school student who someone who happens to have a lot of friends. If this person has a strong self-serving bias then they might have a distorted attitude and credit their own personality and behavior for why they have so many great friends. What if this individual wasn't so "great?" What if this person was actually quite annoying but just happened to have a compassionate group of friends who are dedicated to their annoying friend no matter what? This individual could have a really tough time going into college and making new friends if their self-serving bias keeps getting the best of them.


(Alexandria) The study from the University of Georgia proves that the self-serving bias is in fact, a real thing.   Through their direct feedback, (‘‘I am smart’’, ‘‘I tried hard’’, ‘‘It was hard’’, ‘‘It was bad luck’’, etc.) it is clear they want to attribute either their successes or failures to themselves or elsewhere.  This was extremely interesting how there is neural differences.  The fact that it take more self-control to attribute a success to external factor, shows that the self-serving bias is very natural and takes effort to steer away from.    There are many, many studies showing the self-serving bias to exist, but we can all pretty much admit that it does exist, without the aid of a study, if we really just reflect on ourselves for a moment.  We, as humans, like to live in an ideal world in our minds.  Most people do not like to admit their failures.  We follow the self-serving bias to protect our self-esteem.  We want to think that we failed a test because the teacher sucked, not because we are incapable of comprehending something.  It's easier to blame our issues on other causes than to admit that we are indeed, flawed.


Researching more on the self-serving bias, I came across a study by Anne Wilson.  In her study, she explored how we view our present selves compared to our former selves, in the light of the self-serving bias (2).  She found that when looking at our former selves, we tend to rate our present selves on a much higher level.  We sometimes even distance ourselves away from being that person at all.  We want to think that now we are the best we can be.  We do not want to imagine that a younger, or past version of our-self can outshine us. This really is very true.  I have a good friend who always looks at herself in grammar and high school as being such a terrible person.  At the time, she never would have admitted that, but now she believes that she is a better person, so it makes her feel better to reflect upon her past self negatively.  Knowing that the self-serving bias exists makes me want to go against it.  It is only natural to want to see yourself positively, but it just seems strange that the person we think we are, is really just an unrealistic version of us. 


(John) As good as the self-serving bias can be for our self esteem, it can give us an unrealistic comparison of our past vs. present selves. If we tend to see ourselves as better than we were before, then why change?  Often times we will tell ourselves things like "Oh, I'm not like that now. I'm better than I used to be. That's the old me," and many other things. In reality, maybe we haven't changed so much. Self progress can be delayed or halted if our self-serving bias gets the best of us.

In this video, a woman takes credit for the success of what appears to be a group project. She is demonstrating the self-serving bias by attributing all of the success to herself.  (Yaeji)

REFERENCES:

1. Krusemark, E. A., Campbell, W., & Clementz, B. A. (2008). Attributions, deception, and event related potentials: An investigation of the self-serving bias. Psychophysiology, 45(4), 511-515. doi:10.1111/j.1469-8986.2008.00659.x


2. Wilson, Anne Ellen (2000).  How do people's perceptions of their former selves affect their current self-appraisals? Ph.D. dissertation, University of Waterloo (Canada), Canada. Retrieved February 12, 2011, from Dissertations & Theses: Full Text.(Publication No. AAT NQ53525).


3. Watterson, Bill. "Calvin and Hobbes" (comic strip excerpt). The Authoritative Calvin and Hobbes: A Calvin and Hobbes Treasury. New York: Andrews and McMeel, 1990. Pg. 27