SEXUAL ATTRACTION: PHYSICAL CONSIDERATIONS
What happens normally is that boys and girls think about the things that interest or excite them while masturbating. The pleasant sensation of masturbation reinforces the enjoyment of the fantasised person, situation or object and the adolescent takes this image or fantasy ‘on board’ as part of their growing sexual personality. How and about what the adolescent fantasises depends to some extent on his or her personality and several studies have been done in this area. In one, ninety-five men were shown silhouettes of female figures which had various breast, buttock and leg sizes. The researchers found that different types of men emerged according to their
preferences for the silhouettes. The ‘breast men’ tended to be Playboy readers, extrovert and masculine in their interests, and those who liked small-breasted women tended to be inward-looking and submissive, drink little and hold fundamental Christian beliefs. Men who liked large buttocks were also keen on neatness and order and those who liked small ones were work-centred and uninterested in sport. The most remarkable characteristic of those who preferred large legs was that they drank little and were shy in social situations. Men who preferred small legs drank very little but they smoked, and read sports magazines rather than Playboy. In general, a preference for large women was linked to ambition and a high consumption of alcohol whereas men who preferred smaller women were persevering and of a higher social class.
Similar studies of women looking at male outlines show that they prefer ‘V’s rather than ‘pears’ in male body shape. Women who liked large men were more likely to be interested in competitive sports. Smaller women preferred large men and so did those raised in fatherless homes.
There are definite class differences in likes and dislikes. In one study which involved psychiatrists, psychologists, porters, maintenance men and soldiers being shown fifty colour photographs of women, some women were found to have almost universal appeal regardless of the age, social class or marital status of the men. There were some interesting differences too. The porters and soldiers preferred the photos of naked, large-breasted women who were being sexy, and the psychiatrists preferred young, clothed girls who were ‘unconventional’ or ‘provocative’. All the men tended to choose attractive and dressed women when asked to select a possible wife from the photos and they avoided those women shown in provocative or sexy poses. This and other work suggests that what a man finds attractive in a woman depends upon her age, social class, personality and to some extent on what he wants of her.
Research done with women looking at pictures of men shows that the professional and educated positively disliked the muscle-man type and preferred conventional, dressed men who were slim, dark and sensitive looking. Many men think that all women like muscular,
hairy-chested, broad-shouldered men with large penises, but studies have shown this not to be true. Women overall like men with small buttocks and a tall, slim physique and many in one survey said they were actually put off by the features men thought women liked.
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