Purpose: The primary evolutionary purpose of mate love has been to attract and keep mates ‘together’ to support child rearing. This ‘attachment’ to a mate evolved based on a mutual exchange of exclusive sexual/mating functions.

Mate love inspires a high degree of apparently altruistic and unselfish behaviour. Each mate accommodates the needs and desires of the other, even to the point of delaying or ignoring their own. This strategy creates a very appealing environment for each other. Actually, however, mate love is not truly unselfish. Each mate engages in this behaviour in order to nurture mate love in the other and to gain exclusive mating rights with the object of desire. This discussion will show why mate love necessarily depends on ‘mutual possession’ and is quite self-serving.

Love Exists Only Because It Is Useful
Because of the fact that for most of evolutionary history offspring often did not survive to reproduce, genetic continuation has always been a problem. This meant that a mating love bond was necessary to keep the parents together, thereby creating a safer environment for offspring. Human babies are so helpless and so dependent, for so long, that for most of human evolution the physical presence of both parents was critical, even just for protection.

So the same hostile physical environment that raised the need for a ‘protective and nurturing’ parent to child love bond also raised the need for parents to stay together. At least the environment favoured those that did stay together. All animals (including humans) have evolved different strategies for maximizing their own particular genetic success. For most of human evolution two devoted parents was a huge protective advantage. This protection would have significantly increased the likelihood of the offspring surviving to reproduce. Therefore, mate love, which kept parents together, was a strategic asset. It became stronger over time, and was reproduced in subsequent successfully surviving generations.

The success of the human species has resulted, not primarily from physical advantages, but rather from behavioural adaptations. Humans display a remarkable variety of behaviours as well as a remarkable flexibility and ability for new behavioural adaptations. Humans thrived by being smart and by adapting their behaviours in spite of physically superior competitors and predators. The primary reason why humans have large brains and well developed cognitive abilities is because it is the mechanism for learning new behaviours which is our primary evolutionary asset.

However, unlike physical advantages, new behavioural adaptations are not genetically inherited; they have to be taught from one generation to the next. Yet teaching requires the presence of parents. And the relatively high degree of behavioural differentiation between men and women (in the human species) meant that there was a significant component of learned human behaviours that was gender-specific. For example, if only the mother was ‘around’ learning of male offspring would be seriously handicapped. This meant that there would be an advantage for the offspring of couples who were able to remain together.

Emotionally attached parents allowed division of labour efficiencies and created a team-based nurturing environment that significantly enhanced the survivability of ones children from sexual reproduction. The mating love bond evolved because such a bond conveyed competitive advantage on the offspring of those who had it. In other words we love not because it is beautiful, not because humans are ‘special’, and not even because “God is Love”, but because it was useful for our evolutionary survival.

Mate love clearly characterizes many other living organisms (particularly animals), and certainly evolved first long before humans existed. Although it is possible that is unusually strong in humans this is only because of the relatively high dependency of human offspring compared to other species, and the relatively high marginal value of two-parent rearing.

Love Is Different For Men and Women
Remember that a prevalent male reproductive strategy (in humans) was to mate with as many females as possible creating many offspring and maximizing the chances that at least some of the children would survive. This strategy (if successful) would create a high number of offspring to offset the relatively low chance of survival of each. Due to biology this strategy was only available to males, and due to its prevalence in the male population, one can presume that it has been a relatively successful male reproductive strategy.

For females, a better reproductive strategy has been to mate with relatively few males, and to select them partly on the likelihood that they would support her and the mutual offspring.

Logic suggests that a woman that did not have exclusive sexual access to her mate would experience more competitive offspring (fathered by the man that she chose as a desirable genetic mate). Worse than that, she might have had to share his ‘fathering’ resources and attention or even lose them altogether to the other woman. Either one of these possibilities would have been a disaster for the reproductive success of the female in an already difficult and competitive environment. Logic suggests that females would carefully select males to ensure they were sufficiently ‘bonded’ for ‘exclusive’ mating.

Observation of typical female behaviour confirms this logic. Human females often delay sex with a male till some degree of ‘bonding’ occurs, and then carefully guards sexual exclusivity. Although his sexual infidelity may result in her not loving him, his lack of ‘post-sex commitment’ will almost certainly cause her to do so.

For males, lack of sexual exclusivity would be even worse. It could mean that the subsequent offspring is not even his. In this case he would have lost his chance of producing children with that (presumably genetically desirable) female for 1-3 years. Worse still, he might never know the offspring was not genetically his and would invest his fathering resources raising the offspring of another male.

From the point of view of a man, if mating and reproductive rights are not exclusive he could be creating a nurturing family environment that then protects another man’s genetic offspring. A biological disaster for him in evolutionary terms; Therefore, the definition in this model implies that men in particular will go to great lengths to avoid non-exclusive sexual possession.

Because a man’s primary reproductive vulnerability came from his mate’s sexual non-exclusivity, his ‘mate love’ came to depend on her sexual fidelity (more than any other thing). And because a woman’s primary reproductive vulnerability came from the man’s lack of continued or non-exclusive physical presence, her ‘mate love’ came to depend on this dependability or ‘stickiness’, (more than any other thing).

So for normal mate love to prosper a man promises to be exclusive, but above all things, to ‘stick around’ after sex and the woman promises to ‘stick around’, but above all things to be exclusive. The final result is similar but not symmetric for males and females; mate love is intrinsically associated with mutually exclusive mating, i.e. ‘possession’. In the long run, significant deviations from this implicit exchange will counter or dissipate mate love.

The importance of love between mates is that it had to create a complete mutual commitment to a single shared objective in spite of the fact that male and female reproductive strategies were not aligned. Almost all gender (mating) issues are a natural but inevitable result of this asymmetric biology.

How Does Love Function?
According to biologists, the primary way in which this particular bond functions is that the brain releasing chemicals during activities associated with the presence of this individual. Since sexual activity is the primary mechanism for accomplishing genetic reproduction, particularly powerful neurotransmitters are released prior to and during sex. According to biologists, the schedule of release of these neurotransmitters appears to last from 18 months to five years, depending on who you ask.

Whatever the period is exactly, it coincides (logically enough) with most vulnerable period of life for human offspring. If we need empirical support for the notion that the purpose of mate love is to keep parents around to rear the offspring, here it is; it appears to last as long as human children are vulnerable, and then declines.

Mate love functions in that we are highly motivated to hold onto the source that evokes these powerful and pleasurable chemical neurotransmitters; the source in this case being the person who triggers, in us, the release of these neurotransmitters. The chemical neurotransmitters are, like many other drugs, extremely pleasurable and highly addictive. The desire for sexual and other mating activities is based on the drive to reproduce the pleasurable feelings from the powerful neurotransmitters.

Love and Desire
Mate love is a desire for, and attachment to, another person based on a perception of their desirability and availability as a ‘mate’.

If the simple definition above is reasonably good, you would expect the mating bond to be most affected by the perceived desirability and availability of the person, as a mating partner. In other words, this definition says, that feeling this type of ‘love’ is directly related to your perception of another’s sexual attractiveness and their availability to you for mating. If the simple definition above is reasonably accurate, you would also expect the strength of a mating bond to weaken if:
1) Perception of ‘mating desirability’ decreases significantly, or 2) if the other person is not available, or becomes, unavailable (other things being equal).

Furthermore, since, (according to this definition) the evolutionary purpose of the mating bond is to keep parents together to protect their offspring, if:
1) Significant mating (sexual) activity occurs, or
2) Children result,
This model predicts that a subsequent decrease in sexual desirability (other things being equal) does not necessarily have to cause a significant weakening of the bond. The presence of children, for example, can produce strong bonds with even incompatible couples, keeping them together (happily or otherwise), for years.

In other words, this definition suggests that if you have a lot of sex and/or children early on, your ‘love’ will be more robust to decreases in sexual attractiveness. Women who fight hard to stay thin and then put on 70lbs six months after getting married, and women who get pregnant to ‘save the relationship’, are recognizing these realities even though they will swear they are romantic and believe that “true love lasts forever”.

What Is The Connection Between Jealousy And Love?
Since mate love is based on genetic desirability, other things being equal, the greater the perceived genetic desirability of the mate, the greater will be the likelihood of ‘mate love’. Also however, other things being equal, the greater the love bond, the more is lost from lack of exclusivity. The departure of a desirable genetic father, or having your female mate impregnated by another male are biological catastrophes for the individual. Based on this logic, we would expect mate love would be characterized not just by a strong desire for mating activities, but also extreme intolerance of non-exclusive mating. Mate love is a powerful behaviour-changing condition that exposes the individual to considerable risk by mitigating its ‘normal’ tendency to behave in its own self-interest. This is the flip side of the precarious balance of ‘love’. A genetically desirable mate that is sexually unfaithful could then suddenly change from ‘desirable mating partner’ (requiring unselfish behaviour to attract them) to ‘strong genetic competitor’ (requiring aggressive behaviour to compete with them). Jealousy is the mechanism that counteracts mate love to allow return to ‘normal’ selfish behaviour. It counters the tendency to behave unselfishly towards a mate at a time when it appears no longer in their interest to do so. To deal with the radical change in status of a mate departing from exclusivity, humans (and other animals too judging by behaviour) must have evolved neurotransmitter reactions sufficiently powerful to ‘overcome’ those associated with mating love. A sort of ‘love cure’; as strong as the chemistry is to inspire mate love, jealousy neurotransmitters would have to be, and are (if you ask me), equally, or more ‘overpowering’ in order to allow the individual to revert to behaving selfishly in it’s own interest once again. The key to note here is that the model predicts that far from being totally altruistic, mate love elicits ‘nice’ behaviour only as long as exclusive mating is maintained. Functionally, the desire alone to avoid the loss of these intensely powerful pleasurable chemical neurotransmitters could motivate strong reactions. But mate love neurotransmitters are so powerful, that they require equally powerful antidotes. The resulting combination of powerful chemicals in the body is unavoidably ‘overpowering’ or destabilizing. Thus jealousy can evoke uncharacteristically harsh, even violent, behavioural reactions. Also, judging by the way sexual jealousy feels subjectively, I would assume that these are a quite different set of neurotransmitters. Judging only by our own subjective feelings, we might conclude that, not only does perceived infidelity by a mate counter the neurotransmitter effect of love, but that ‘jealousy’ itself is the result of a different set of neurotransmitters. And they are not as pleasant. Threats to any organism’s important life resources must be vigorously contested. They typically evoke its most harsh behavioural reactions. Functionally, protection of reproductive assets is similar in many ways to protection of food (in an environment where such resources are very scarce). It is likely, therefore, that the chemistry is similar. There is ample evidence that in environments where food is scarce, humans, much like other animals, react forcefully and even violently to compete for food resources. Therefore, from a behavioural point of view jealousy is equivalent to the feeling of someone stealing your food when you are starving. In animals, the reactions also look similar.

Love Is Necessarily Selfish
This model of different types of love bond, does not suggest (as the Dictionary does) that what we call ‘love’ is selfless or altruistic, except to the degree that being unselfish brings personal benefits. Mate love is at its core a desire for mating ‘possession’ and is therefore essentially self-serving. We know this to be true from both logic and observation. The purpose of the mating bond is not to benefit the ‘loved’ person per say, but rather to inspire love for oneself and to create a nurturing family environment for ones own offspring; this is logical, because after all, unless socially altruistic behaviour conveys some definite personal advantage it would not be ‘selected’ for, or survive the natural selection process.

Mate love is clearly characterized by unselfish (‘other-serving’) behaviour. Yet although we think of mate love as altruistic, the love bond clearly only lasts as long as it is perceived to be mutual. This behaviour is therefore unselfish, but self-serving. Perceived lack of ‘mutuality’ will usually squash mate love and associated unselfish behaviour before it ever develops. Also, if, and only if, love is self-serving, would perceived lack of mutuality logically cause a need for self-correction to mate love?

Sure enough real life behaviours are consistent with this notion. We only love our mate as long as they love us back, and we are only unselfish as long as it is in our interest to be so. Mate love is still self-serving in that sense, and would not exist, in fact, if it did not effectively perform this self-serving function. Mate love exists because it maximizes ones own genetic success. It is part of the reproductive strategy of the human species.

True Love?
The ultimate test of such a model of course, is does it explain and predict real-world behaviours? Ask yourself; are these assertions consistent with your observations of actual human psychology and behaviour? Do they allow you to consistently describe and/or predict actual human behaviour, regardless of how ‘shallow’ the behaviour may seem?

To test this model, try to remember how you usually feel when your ‘love interest’ wavers, does not love you back, or departs from the exclusive mating arrangement. If you cannot ‘possess’ her/him does it quickly turn to something far less ‘romantic’? After all, if there were such a thing as ‘true love’ then wouldn’t you presumably love them forever regardless of whether they loved you back?

How many times have you seen that?

Posted by Scott as Psychology, Sociology at 11:32 PM GMT

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The four types of distinct (love) bond that I see are:

1. Mating love; a tendency to bond to a desirable mate(s) or sexual partner(s).
2. Offspring love; a tendency to bond to ones own genetic offspring.
3. Genetic love; a tendency to bond to ones own close genetic relatives (even if they are not ones own offspring).
4. Friendship love; a tendency to bond to other individuals in ones community or environment.

Consider the purpose, function, and characteristics of each of these types of love bond:

Mating Love
Purpose: The primary evolutionary purpose of mating love is to attract and keep mates together to support child rearing. Based on this definition alone, this model predicts that the strength and duration of mating love would be related (in general) to:

• Perceived genetic qualities of mate.
• Frequency and quality of sex.
• Exclusivity of sexual access.
• Reciprocity of love bond.
• Age and presence of children.
• Other factors unique to the individual.

Based on this definition, this model also predicts that mating love (in general):

• Is unselfish but self-serving.
• Evokes mutual supportiveness in exchange for sexual possession.
• Quickly reverts to selfishness after mate sexual infidelity.
• Tends to diminish as children grow beyond vulnerable stages.
• Tends to evolve towards ‘friendship love’.
• Will tend to last longer for females than for males.
• In males, will primarily be affected by sexual infidelity.
• In females, will primarily be affected by emotional infidelity.
• Can be a high or low intensity bond, but will not last for life.

---

Offspring Love
Purpose: The primary evolutionary purpose of offspring love is to motivate parents to protect their genetic offspring and invest in them. Based on the definition, this model predicts that the strength and duration of offspring love could be affected (in general) by:

• The number of other offspring.
• The hostility of the environment, or vulnerability of offspring.
• Other factors unique to the individual.

Based on the definition, this model also predicts that offspring love (in general):

• Is unselfish but self-serving.
• Primarily evokes protectiveness and nurturing.
• Will tend to diminish or revert to selfishness after adulthood.
• Will tend to be stronger and more enduring in females.
• Will be a high intensity bond that lasts (albeit in a diminished capacity) for life.

---

Genetic Love
Purpose: The primary evolutionary purpose of genetic love is to motivate individuals to protect their genetic ‘relations’. Based on the definition, this model predicts that the strength and duration of genetic love would be related (in general) to:

• The genetic ‘closeness’.
• Other factors unique to the individual.

Based on the definition, this model also predicts that genetic love (in general):

• Is unselfish but self-serving.
• Will tend to revert to selfishness under competitive conditions.
• Will tend to be characterized by protectiveness.
• Will be a low intensity bond that lasts for life.

---

Friendship Love
Purpose: The primary evolutionary purpose of friendship love is to bond in order capture the strategic evolutionary benefits of living in communal environments. Based on the definition, this model predicts that the strength and duration of friendship love would be related (in general) to:

• The reciprocity of the bond.
• Proximity and frequency of community interactions.
• Mutual relevance in the community environment.
• Other factors unique to the individual.

Based on the definition, this model also predicts that friendship love (in general):

• Is unselfish but self-serving
• Will tend to revert to selfishness under non-reciprocal conditions.
• Tends to be characterized by mutual supportiveness.
• Can be a high or low intensity bond, and will tend fade only with distance, lack of frequency, and/or reduced environmental relevance.

Posted by Scott as Biology, Sociology at 4:19 PM GMT

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First, understand that the best biological strategy for men has historically been ‘relatively promiscuous’ sexual behaviour, and for women ‘relatively selective’ sexual behaviour. Furthermore, for men sex is frequently an end in and of itself; more so than for women. I once heard it put quite well as:

Men use intimacy to achieve sex, and Women use sex to achieve intimacy.

This is not universally, true, of course, but there is enough truth to provide insight and be useful.

If you accept these notions as being relatively useful descriptions of real life, you might also predict, other things being equal, that men would have a lower ‘threshold’ for sexual interactions than women (and by the way, a higher threshold for interactions involving significant intimacy). Ask yourself; are these assertions not both true?

In other words, in most relatively symmetric situations, there are more women that the average man ‘would have sex with’ than there are men that the average woman ‘would have sex with’. Therefore, other things being equal, the typical male/female sexually-related interaction is that of him making a pass at her, and her declining. Based on the most logical and most prevalent male/female strategies for maximizing their own genetic success into subsequent generations, a typical male/female sexual interaction, is that of a man attempting to initiate sex and a woman rejecting it.

This type of interaction is not an isolated incident, an emotional trauma, or an excuse for being shy. It is the most natural, and by the way, the most frequent, type of interaction. Probably 90-95% of all sexually-related (heterosexual) interactions look pretty much like this.

Much words to assert what is for most of us an obvious reality. The question is, so what?

The insight for men is; understanding that long run equilibrium is defined by an equation that looks something like this:

10 passes = 9 rejections + 1 acceptance

The insight is that in order to get the 1 acceptance a man should expect to have to go through 9 rejections. The number may actually be 1, 2, 9, 90, or any other number, but the point is the same. Men should expect a certain amount of ‘rejection’ as a natural part of their long-term seduction strategy, and should learn to deal with it, with understanding and confidence. After all dealing with acceptance is easy. It’s dealing with the rejections that are ‘in-between’ now and the next acceptance that is difficult.

Posted by Scott as Philosophy, Psychology at 9:13 PM GMT

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I have heard it said that most men know within about seven seconds whether they are attracted to a woman or not. In any case, it is well-accepted that men (in general) are more visually oriented then women in the mate selection process.

To say that this just shows that men are shallower is just useless gender stereotyping. The question is: if they are more visual, why? Or equally relevant why are women less visual? And if the female selection criteria does not appear to weight physical/visual appeal so heavily, then what other criteria are they using?

First the obvious merit of using visual criteria is that physical attributes have been quite important for most of human evolution. Strength, agility, foot speed, youth, and energy are all obviously valuable attributes that have made both males and females genetically desirable and clearly made sense as mate selection criteria. For the most part these attributes were discerned using visual evaluation. Even the typical male infatuation with large breasts is obviously based on the fact that they promise excellent nutrition for her offspring.

Men are more visually oriented because given the males best ‘impregnate and leave’ reproductive strategy, the best criteria for selecting genetically desirable females were primarily visually observable physical attributes. For a male who engaged in a typical ‘impregnate and move on‘ strategy only young, strong, fast, and healthy, females had a chance of surviving pregnancy and protecting the offspring without him.

The male impregnate and leave strategy, however, leaves relatively little time and energy for complex evaluation of potential mates. A quick visual evaluation is sometimes all that is possible, and usually, all that is necessary. The consequences of looser evaluation are not serious. When in doubt, impregnate and move on.

Actually, one might initially think that easily observed physical attributes would have been more important in a male. The specialized male tasks such as protection and hunting are readily visible and therefore ought to be important for women as a mate selection criterion. To some extent this is true in the sense that many women are strongly attracted to such visible physical attributes. However, because so many males developed a reproduction strategy based on impregnating as many females as possible and moving on, the visible male attributes were not the most important criteria for a woman. It would not matter much that the baby had great physical genes, because if the father did not stick around for long the child would probably not live long enough to benefit from them. This may be the reason why male persistence works as a seduction strategy. It demonstrates ‘the tendency to stick around‘ which is not readily visible but is a male trait that is very important to female reproductive success, and only becomes apparent over time. Hence these visible attributes became less critical.

So an even more critical determinant of a female’s genetic reproductive success was whether males would remain present long enough to protect children instead of going off in search of another receptive female. Thus a genetically mediocre male who stuck around would enhance the female’s reproductive success rate substantially. It therefore became critical that the female could assess the degree of likelihood that a male will not disappear after impregnating her. In other words, how devoted and faithful would this one be? This type of criteria could not be determined visually and would take time to assess. In fact, it is easy to see why some women assess ‘devotedness’ partially by abstaining from sexual activity until significant assessment and bonding occurs. “No sex before love” epitomizes what is a sound female reproductive strategy. It is evident in many other mammals besides humans and has probably been common for a million years.

Although in recent human history the physical presence of the father has significantly diminished as a critical factor for survival of offspring, ‘devotedness’ survives in the minds of women as an important criteria in mate selection. It has always been more important than the mere physical attributes for her genetic success rate. Women are less visually oriented and more personality oriented in using mate selection criteria because, given male reproductive strategies, male personality traits such as ‘devotedness’ (how much do you love me?) were more critical factors in determining female reproductive success. No wonder women ask; “Do you ‘really’ love me”. And no wonder men always say yes.

Once again, men are the way they are and women are the way they are, because it has been in their (respective) interests to be that way.

Posted by Scott as Sociobiology, Sociology at 1:58 AM GMT

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Most women, have well-developed automatic defensive postures for use when men ‘come on’ to them. Many women assume an automatic defensive posture (ADP) around specific men or even certain types of men. Others go into ADP around men in general under a blanket ‘presumption of guilt’. ADP will in any case frequently be triggered if you show indications of sexual interest or attention that a woman does not specifically ask for.

Triggering the automatic defensive posture (ADP) much of the time eliminates your chances of positive interactions at all, never mind getting laid! These defensive postures involve a great deal of resistance to any interactions with you, and even hostility towards you, based on the assumption (which may or may not, be true) that you ‘just want to get into her pants’. The trouble is that everything you do from this point on is viewed in a certain light. Even if your attention was actually just curiosity, being sociable, or desire to ‘get to know her’, you looked like an invader so she has pulled up the drawbridge and the castle is in defensive posture. You can try to storm the castle, but that can be painful; far better to come back when the queen does not feel threatened and has lowered the drawbridge. On a different day she may even invite you in for tea.

Recognizing ADP:
Train yourself to sense when a woman has gone into ADP mode. If your instincts are really that bad, and sensitivity and intuition are not your strong points, if you cannot tell by the inflection in her voice, then at least associate it specifically with some of these signs.

• Arms crossed.
• Legs crossed.
• Fingers crossed.
• Face looks cross!
• Evasive eye contact.

Eye contact, above all things, eye contact. A woman may cross her arms or legs to hold off your sexual overtures, but if she still looks in your eyes she is still interested in you. Early detection of ADP can also help you avoid much suffering. Avoid pushing social interactions with these women unless you have a high tolerance for pain, or the technical skills for disarming ADP.

Avoiding ADP:
To avoid triggering a woman’s ADP come in from a different perspective. The key is to give women the perception that you are not ‘hitting on them’. This means literally changing the reason why you are talking to her. If you are a good actor you may be able to fake it for a while, but the best way I know to do that is at first, simply not to hit on her sexually, at all.

In terms of introduction:

• Get someone else to introduce you.
• Find a good excuse to talk to another member of her group.
• Get introduced to her in a social context.
• Avoid approaching her one-on-one.
• Get introduced to her by mutual friends or at least a third party.
• Accidentally knock her drink over and offer to replace it.

In terms of initial psychology:

• Avoid appearing too interested sexually.
• Make early interactions group-oriented.
• Talk to others in the group equally.
• Listen more than you talk.
• Find some real reason why you would be interacting together.
• Become knowledgeable in something she finds interesting.
• Remember that you are evaluating her as well as the other way around.
• Allow your interest in her to ‘evolve’ slowly; it’s far less likely to trigger ADP.
• Stop imagining her naked.
• Stop looking at her breasts.
• Think about something else.

Luckily for you, most women have a well-developed sense of ‘social and community bonding’. Approaching women from this standpoint or in this context will significantly enhance your interactions. In this circumstance, women very easily cycle into an automatic ‘social’ posture that is quite the opposite of ADP. In this posture, not only are women more open to interactions with men (i.e. you), but this role even causes them to be pro-actively social. In this posture you can interact without having to be perceived as chasing them or pushing for sex. In fact, if you are skilful enough, it will even allow you to reverse the normal psychology and have her ‘chase’ you for more interaction. The key is to avoid interactions that allow her to cycle back into the ‘classical’ psychological posture that men immediately want sex and women have to play ‘hard to get’ for long enough to ensure that they have earned it. This is ADP.

In fact, as part of the propensity for ‘social bonding’ the typical female psyche involves a desire to be seen as ‘nice’ or ‘good’. This is a typical female ‘blind spot’, although it has been getting less common over time (Who knew that emancipation also meant: ‘the right to be bitchy’). In fact, if you find the right woman you can actually use a seduction technique referred to as the “nice trap”.

Posted by Scott as Psychology, Sociology at 9:36 PM GMT

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Many of us, men and women, have a highly ‘romanticized’ view of adult sexual love. This view includes such beliefs as:

• Love cannot be defined or explained ‘rationally’.
• Love is ’spiritual’ and differentiates us from animals.
• Love will make you happy.
• ‘True love’ is forever.
• If a woman really loves you she would give up her job for you.
• If you really love her you would not think about other women.
• If you really love her you would ‘make a commitment’.
• If you really love each other you would not ‘cheat’ on each other.
• The purpose of love is marriage.
• Marriage is a ‘sacred institution’.
• Marriage is the primary goal of adult sexual relationships.
• Once you are married you should be ‘partners’.
• Men and women have the same goals in a relationship.
• Somewhere ‘out there’, you have a ‘soul-mate’.
• You and your soul-mate are destined to meet.
• Blah, blah, blah, and other equally silly stuff…

All of these notions promote an idealized romanticized version of love and sexually-related behaviour that is very ‘nice’, and may even help to sell Hollywood ‘feel good’ movies, but they don’t help to understand and explain adult behaviour in a way that makes sense or helps you function in the real world.

In fact, these are ‘dinosaur’ notions, handed down culturally from one generation to the next. The strange thing is how tenaciously some of us cling to such notions in complete contradiction with known science, logic, and observable reality. Mostly such notions are so distanced from reality that they get in the way of clear thinking. It’s not at all surprising that we don’t understand women. Our common observations of real-life behaviours are not consistent with such logically flawed preconceptions.

In stark contrast to the romanticized view, read the following and decide if it seems to make more sense…

The Definition of Romantic Love:

Romantic (or sexual) love is an attachment between sexually mature adults that results from a symphony of chemical neurotransmitters emitted by the bodies, which have evolved specifically to help two adults stay attached long enough to support each other and rear the offspring resulting from sex!

There may be many kinds of ‘love’, but romantic love is a bond between sexually mature; and mating adults. This ‘love’ bond has a specific purpose; to create enough ‘togetherness‘ between the mating adults so that they will remain together to successfully rear their children. Throughout most of human evolution, such a bond between the parents long enough to maximize the survivability of the offspring, was a strong advantage. Without such a bond to keep both parents together, the children would not have good chances for survival, so parents without such bonding did not pass on their genes. In most animal species, sexually mature adults develop similar bonds (if they need them to support child rearing) for exactly the same reasons.

The particular character of ‘romantic‘ love, it’s ‘quality’, is most affected, (logically enough given its primary purpose) by the presence, absence (or perceived quality) of a) Sex, and b) Children. Check this against your own experience. Without good sex, or children, romantic love loses its strength and can quickly dissipate. Unrequited love can rapidly become hostility.
Actually ‘romantic‘ love is not selfless and can make you miserable! It is really a desire for exclusive mating and/or childrearing partnership and is basically selfish, and self-serving. If you doubt this try to remember how you feel when your ‘love interest’ wavers or even looks like wavering from the exclusive arrangement. If you cannot ‘possess’ her/him it quickly turns to something far less romantic. The presence of children, however, can produce strong bonds with even incompatible couples, keeping them together, happily or otherwise, for years.

The love ‘bond’ is created by chemicals in the body and the perception of, or mental reaction to, those chemicals by the individuals mating. The ‘romantic model‘ of love provides no mechanism for explaining the observed fact that love obviously fluctuates and changes over time. The fact that we know body chemistry fluctuates so much over time, makes this model particularly consistent with observed reality.

Actually according to biologists the releases of these neurotransmitters of love typically have a limited duration up to 3-7 years at best (check this against your experience). Not coincidentally, this range is consistent with the amount of time it might have taken (for most of human history); to have and rear one to three children to an age of ‘decreased vulnerability’.

Coincidence? No, logic!

Posted by Scott as Psychology, Sociobiology at 8:00 PM GMT

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Cockblocking is a male-to-male behaviour. The term ‘cockblocking‘ is used to describe behaviour by men who physically intrude themselves between another man and a woman he is ‘bonding‘ with. Almost always, the woman is also of interest to the blocker, but she either is not interested in him, or at least less so. Cockblocking is most often used in places like bars, where the forum is very ‘open‘ and neither of the men in question are on ‘home turf‘. But it can also occur in more subtle forms in almost all social interactions.

Imagine a get together after work for happy hour at a local bar. Some of your group know each other from work. Others are friends of theirs, or friends of friends. A small group of five or six of you are standing around talking and drinking, and one of them is a very sexy girl who appears to frequently direct her conversation at you. She is standing across from you in the group, so it is easy for you to direct your conversation at each other without being obvious or excluding others. Although there is another guy on your left who is clearly also interested in her, you feel like you are establishing a good connection.

You begin to notice that the guy on your left has slowly shifted his body posture by turning his right shoulder towards the centre of the group, and towards the woman. His body now physically obscures your view of each other and makes conversations between the two of you more strained and unnatural. In spite of your desire to interact, the only way for you to re-engage involves physical actions that are a) very obvious, and b) probably require some form of confrontation with the blocker. Either one of these actions would ruin the ambiance and contaminate further ‘bonding‘. Furthermore, the only interactions that are interfered with are those between you and the sexy girl. All others in the group are unaffected by this manoeuvre, and it is unlikely any of them are even aware of it.

Gradually, the woman’s attention has become ‘involved‘ in other conversation in a perfectly normal way. On the few occasions when you catch her eye you are unable to discern the previous ‘connection‘. After even a few short minutes of interference, the connection has weakened and quickly withers without further nurturing. You have just been subtly, and quite successfully, cockblocked!

In this particular scenario, the interactions described, the physical movements by the blocker and his final ‘block‘ position are all quite subtle. Nothing overt has occurred that even looks deliberate, never mind cause for objecting. The blocker nevertheless knows quite well what he is doing. Actually the girl may or may not, become more responsive to him. But even if he elicits annoyance, that just ruins her mood and thereby her inclination and ability to further bond with anyone. In other scenarios, cockblocking is quite overt. At that point it changes functionally to become male ‘Rutting‘ behaviour.

In my observation, cockblocking behaviour does not typically enhance the blockers chances for ‘bonding‘ (although it might be possible). Thus the tactic is not as effective in getting the prize for the ‘blocker‘ as it is in wrecking chances for others. It is typically a disruptive, destructive tactic engaged in by macho men with few other tools, and a chip on their shoulder. The annoying thing is that it can be effective! So you had better learn to identify it.

Posted by Scott as Psychology, Sociology at 12:40 AM GMT

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I recently read in the paper about a man in Pakistan who gouged out the eyes of his wife and cut off her nose on suspicion of her being unfaithful. The most shocking part of this story is that in Pakistan such behaviour is not uncommon. Indeed, crimes such as killing ones wife for being unfaithful (or on suspicion of being unfaithful) are called ‘honour crimes‘ and are rarely prosecuted. In many parts of the world, female infidelity or promiscuity still ranks as a heinous crime. In many cases draconian punishments are meted out by the woman’s own family.

When we are quite finished being self-righteous about the more ‘civilized‘ morals of the western world, it is good to remember that there have been times when western cultures entertained similar attitudes particularly with respect to female infidelity, sometimes even with similar brutal consequences. Aside from the issue of the asymmetrical nature of such attitudes, an interesting question is how do we reconcile such behaviours with what we think of as ‘Love‘?

From Webster’s dictionary I take the following definition of love which describes our normal use of the word and is consistent with a very altruistic and generous state of mind:

Love; a deep and tender feeling of affection for or attachment or devotion to a person or persons…

This does not exactly explain an ‘OJ’ who is supposed to have cut the throat of the woman who had been his wife, and was the mother of his children. The woman he loved so much he could not let her go. OJ is quoted as having said;

If I was guilty of this crime, it could only have been because I ‘loved her’ too much.

How do we explain the Pakistani man who cut his wife’s eyes out? Was that ‘for love‘?

What about the millions of people who get insanely jealous to the point of being destructive to the person they ‘love‘, rather than let another have them? In fact, what about people who deliberately provoke their partners because they view the subsequent jealousy as ‘a sign of love‘? And what about stalkers, is that ‘love‘? What about unrequited or jilted love? How does that ‘turn’ into hate, in the bat of an eye? How does a ‘lover‘ suddenly become a ‘hater‘ immediately after being dumped?

In case I left the impression that I think horrible behaviours towards the object of ones love is primarily a male phenomenon, I don’t. Women may tend to be less physically violent, but divorce courts, abuse shelters, every day relationships, and graveyards are full of men and women who treat each other in ways that are in no way reconcilable with the way we commonly think of ‘love‘. It is so common that we are not surprised when we see these behaviours in associated with people who love, or have loved, each other.

If we believe that love is so altruistic, generous, and beautiful, how should we explain how it also often inspires our most ‘horrific‘ behaviour? Are the behaviours we observe in the real world consistent with our understanding of love as a ‘deep and tender feeling of affection‘, or an ‘attachment or devotion‘? Or, is our understanding of love conceptually flawed, sentimental Bullshit!?

Yes, I believe it is.

Posted by Scott as Philosophy, Psychology at 11:14 PM GMT

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You meet a woman you are interested in; so you try to interact. You go to the same places, make excuses to talk to her, hang out with her friends, and maybe even try to invite her places. She accepts the attention but only barely; avoids acknowledgements unless you do first, and seems so independent of whether you are there, or not, that it’s unnerving. Her conversations with you may be thin and brief, like she has somewhere else to go. Sometimes, just having a conversation, she makes you feel like she is doing you a favour. Maybe she invites you somewhere one time, and then shows up with another ‘friend’. In spite of the ego bruising you take it further. She says she likes you, but all the while the process of getting to know each other is a one-sided effort. It feels like you are swimming upstream pulling her on a raft behind you. Also, you are not happy about it, but you want her badly and feel lucky to get what you have.

Once you sleep with her, suddenly, everything changes. Pretty soon, you can do no wrong. She practically ‘gushes’ over you and wants to be with you all the time. You hear her repeating things you say, and she wants to hang out with all your friends. Soon, she becomes dependent on you, and has lost that ‘independence’ that attracted you so much in the first place.

What happened? How did she swing 180 degrees from the “I’m doing you a favour” posture, to the “you and I are one” posture? After all, you are the same guy now as you were in the first place. Perhaps even you are no longer so excited about her and may be losing interest. Before you were totally challenged but unhappy because of the uncertainty, and now you are totally unchallenged and unhappy because of the ‘opposite’. And by the way, why did all this happen right after you had sex together?

This phenomenon is what I call the ‘Ovary Response’; The suitor for this girl (the behaviour is more common to young girls) like a sperm seeking the ovary, must accomplish the metaphorical equivalent of swimming a marathon upstream, followed by a wrestling match to the death with a giant Michelin man… With his hands tied behind his back! He will struggle like the dickens to get in, but if he penetrates beyond a certain critical threshold, everything changes. From that point on the Ovary will completely absorb him, and invest all her efforts in him; also, from that point on she will be unreceptive to all others, just like the real ovary!

If the psychology and the behaviour seem to bear an uncanny resemblance to the biology, I believe it’s no accident.

Posted by Scott as Philosophy, Psychology at 4:55 AM GMT

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A woman must arouse men’s interest and attention in order to have choices available for mating. So, the female selection process relies heavily on having choices available prior to selecting a mate. This is quite logical because once she mates she may get pregnant, and then it is too late to change her mind. Natural selection has historically rewarded those women with good selection processes by allowing more of their offspring to survive to reproduce. The fact that it has been a successful behaviour for women has also ensured that a thorough selection process is quite common.

Therefore much of female sexual behaviour has always focussed on activities that make as many men as possible ‘available’. Dressing and acting in ways designed specifically to attract sexual interest from more than one male, is not just natural, it’s necessary to her selection process. It’s one of the reasons why women are (generally) better flirts than men. In general, the more male interest she gets, the more men are available to her, the better her selection process, the more successful her offspring will be, and the more likely the behaviour will be common to the next generation of females.

The problem is that male sexual interest is rather easily aroused and if women are very successful at attraction, they then have to develop sophisticated mechanisms for efficiently screening out obviously unwanted attention. Otherwise women would spend enormous time and energy trying to evaluate the large numbers of males ‘indiscriminately’ attracted to them. Although a man may know ‘in seven seconds’ if he is sexually interested in a woman, a woman’s evaluation is typically more complex and may take weeks or months. Bear in mind that these screens must not only efficiently weed out undesirable male interest (which may even be all of it) but the defences must be porous enough to allow in ‘viable male interest’.

So how does a woman decide what is viable, or desirable vs. non-viable or undesirable interest, particularly since the evaluation process is typically so time consuming and complex? The answer is that she establishes behaviour patterns and defensive postures that automatically block unwanted sexual interest but make exceptions to allow the other type through. In this sense a woman’s screening mechanisms will often serve two functions if they are well designed. The process should weed out the obviously undesirable to save time; and it should also serve as a qualification tool for mate selection.

In fact, most women do exactly that. Women have multiple levels of screening. You might make the first cut and be allowed to talk to her, but you get cut on the second round, before she wastes any serious flirting on you. At each level, only qualified suitors will be able to overcome the screens. Whatever men are able to overcome the obstacles and screens are, by definition, qualified, and therefore viable male interest. If the screens are also automatic, or ‘standard’ she now has a very efficient process. This is particularly necessary if she is a ‘hot chick‘ getting a large volume of indiscriminate male interest.

This is why so many men are confused by women who dress ‘sexy‘ and act ‘flirty‘ as if to attract them but coldly reject them when they in interactions. They have been caught up in the initial indiscriminate attraction and then rejected by one of the subsequent screening processes. Remember, this behaviour evolved naturally over tens or hundreds of thousands of years. It’s there because it works for her. The purpose is to attract, qualify, and screen out potential mates efficiently. The fact that the screening process may be uncomfortable for those rejected is not just incidental. It makes further pursuit emotionally uncomfortable to dissuade unwanted males. In any case, a good ‘hotty‘ simply does not have enough time to ‘sensitively’ evaluate the volume of male interest she probably gets. On some intuitive level most men recognize the ‘fairness’ of this process in the joke:

Q: What’s a Bitch?
A: A woman that won’t sleep with you!

Although this sounds sexist, it is really men recognizing their own psychologically frail perspective.

The point of all this, is that a woman may actively engage in attracting your sexual interest, even though she may not want it eventually. Because her selection process requires choices, she may want you to be available to her just to make her comfortable with her actual selection! And the behaviour is perfectly ‘natural’.

If you approach a woman and experience well developed automatic defences, take heart. Knowledge is power. Understanding what she is doing, why, when, and how, can give you the ability to get around her formidable behavioural screens and defensive postures.

Posted by Scott as Psychology, Sociobiology at 12:14 PM GMT

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