Why Are Human Mating Rituals The Opposite Way Round To The Rest Of The Animal Kingdom?

Factual Questions
1

In the rest of the animal kingdom, the females don’t attempt to ‘impress’ potential mates or partners. It’s the males who make the effort and who use displays and rituals to try to prove their ‘fitness’ to be a mate: elaborate and colourful plumage, peacock displays, crabs and spiders that do that weird ‘semaphore’ thing with their palps or front legs, building elaborate nests and other structures etc. Humans do it the other way round. Males almost always wear drab colours, usually just black, brown, dark blue and grey. They don’t wear make-up or try to be colourful or visually impressive. All this effort is left to females.

Is the ‘drab female/flashy male’ picture really as universal in the animal kingdom as I’ve said it is? Or are there lots of exceptions?

If it IS the case that humans seem to be the exception, why are we like this?

2

The key thing - maybe flaw, in your argument - is that women often aren’t doing it to impress men. They may be wearing makeup or attention-catching clothing for their own sake, or their friends’, or other women, but not necessarily for men.

And furthermore, it generally is still men who are doing the bulk of the pursuing work. Men are still expected to be initiators. Men are generally the ones to ask women out. And some men do try to get flashy sports cars, or status symbols, etc. to make themselves higher-value in the eyes of some women.

Finally, humans don’t mate quite like animals, in the sense that a spider may only need to beguile a female spider for a few seconds and then he mates with her for a few seconds and then leaves. Humans are often into far longer lasting things, like marriage. That raises the stakes greatly and it makes a lot non-visual stuff much more important - nontangibles like humor, personality, likability, etc.

3

Using my extremely limited knowledge of history, I think it was pretty common for men to have to pay a dowry in order to marry a woman. So, you can think of the dowry as the extra effort that the men have to put in in order to get to mate, just like peacocks have to grow a long tail.

Historically, men would also show their fighting and strength prowess, go off to war, all to show that they are worthy.

4

Eh, dowry is paid by women’s family. But some cultures like Hmong have a bride price for the man to pay.

5

Hey, I said that my knowledge of history was limited.

6

Okay. Points taken. But let’s just focus on visual displays of beauty or attractiveness. In the rest of the animal kingdom, it pretty much seems to be drab female, colourful flashy male. In the human world, it vice versa. Do we have any idea why?

7

My WAG is, women are less focused on men’s visuals but men do focus a lot on a woman’s appearance.

8

That is only true in some times and places; it is nowhere near being universally true. The modern Western style of men wearing suits and ties, which are kind of boring, and women wearing pretty things is true now where I live. Five hundred years ago in Europe men wore frilly stuff that was as bright and colorful as what women wore. In feudal Japan, the attire of a samurai could be every bit as spectacular as a woman’s garb, sometimes even more so. There is little to distinguish the ceremonial and fine dress of most North American aboriginal peoples in terms of adornment between men and women. I could cite dozens more examples. (On the flip side, the Plain People - Mennonites, for instance - usually deliberately wear dull clothing whether man or woman.)

In truth, men wearing these solid, plain, dull clothes is kind of a historical anomaly.

9

In the bird world, the females are drab because they sit on the nests and have to be camouflaged.

10

That drab coloration is camouflage against predators. And, if you’ll accept the theory “eggs are expensive, sperm is cheap,” both human and animals follow this although in different ways.

11

This is strictly culture, and there are, and have been, plenty of cultures where the males did all those things.

12

In many species, the female signals her receptiveness to mating / being in estrus through non-visual cues, particularly scent. So, they don’t need to advertise their receptivity through overt visual displays.

Human mating and courtship is considerably more complex, includes a strong psychological factor, and isn’t solely (or even primarily) driven by the female being in the fertile point of her cycle.

13

Thanks, everyone, for your replies and helpful information.

14

There are assorted mating rituals. I think a good book is “Why Is Sex Fun” by Jared Diamond.

The “Male display” mating strategy is for fire-and-forget male mating. The only thing the female has to go by, is whether the male has good genes, and a fantastical display in spite of its handicap (like the peacock tail) is th only way to judge quality.

Humans tend to fall more in the category of animals like wolves - not a lot of sexual differentiation, because they both hunt and both participate in feeding the young (the female, obviously, a more important role than the male.) Similarly, animals like eagles, where both parents feed the young, not a great deal of sexual differentiation. It’s the ongoing family cooperation that determines survival of the offspring.

Humans have a peculiar position - there’s some monkey and ape species where the rule is the female is obviously in heat, and all the males take a turn; thus ensuring the whole tribe is invested in the survival of the offspring. Some species (especially like deer or mountain goats) the males compete and the winner keeps a harem of females, to ensure his genes survive.

The hypothesis with humans - females have hidden ovulation, which keeps the male around if he wants to be sure it’s his genes that are carried on. Also encourages the protective behaviour of the male, encouraging a bit of physical differentiation. The physical appearance aspect of the female is to encourage a male to select her, since he is then expected (expecting?) to invest time and hunting skills in keeping her fed. So basically, the male is also bringing something to the table (food) so the female is being selective, looking for good genes; but the male is also expecting something - he is looking for good healthy breeding stock (trying not to be too crude here).

The things that appeal to a male generally are indicators of health and reproductive capability. Repeated psychology experiments have demonstrated the appeal of these characteristics. The 36-24-36 measurements are more than a crude joke - men are attracted to women that have wider hips (necessary for child-bearing) and the ability to feed those children. Smooth skin tends to indicates lack of disease or genetic flaws; and men are attracted to younger women (physically) because they are looking for women who have more years of childbearing ahead of them. Good hair, symmetrical features, and physical characteristics within the norm are also indicators that are attractive.

There’s plenty of debate why humans unlike other primates, the breasts are not deflated when not breastfeeding. That’s an interesting discussion, but as Diamond points out - making sex enjoyable is another biological strategy for keeping human couples together, as a child is basically helpless and needs constant attention for several years after birth; thus handicapping the woman’s ability to do tasks like hunting. It also explains the emotional attachment between couples as another impetus to keep the male around

So short answer - both sexes are looking for certain characteristics in the other, in order to commit to a long term relationship. Just, the male is more looking to judge on appearance. The female is judging on his hunting (providing) ability.

then to top it all off, we have conscious thought, which can conflict with everything instinctive and really mess things up.

15

What I seem to recall reading is that in the animal world, the females of many species are only receptive to mating for a short, specific time. So the female is in the position of choosing which male(s) to mate with during that time, so the males have to distinguish themselves somehow.

Humans don’t really have a season, and it’s not obvious which women are fertile at any given time, so it’s not as male-centric as with many animal species.

However, you must be kidding if you say that the women do all the preening and primping; there’s nothing so precious as some teenage through late twenties men, as far as appearances/displays of attractiveness go. Sure, many are misguided (tricked out subcompact cars), some aren’t as attractive to women as THEY think they are (massive muscles, goofy hairstyles), but they sure as hell try really, really hard. Harder than the women do, IMO.

The main difference is that there’s a culture among women of looking a certain way/doing certain things as part of your status within that culture of women. You see a woman dressed up to go to the grocery store with her toddler, and you have a woman trying to display something to other women, not to attract men, for example.

16

Yes, forgot to mention as pack animals, humans do have a hierarchy of status (separate male and female hierarchies). Part of behaviour is to maximize status, and a partner’s status is part of the selection criteria of either sex. There are a lot of aspects to status, but appearance is certainly one means.

17

In general, females have an incentive to be selective about mating partners and males do not. Females can only be impregnated by one male at a time, while males can impregnate multiple females. Therefore, in the case of a female, any given mating is replacing another potential mating opportunity, while in the case of a male, any given mating is in addition to other potential mating opportunities.

In that context, it’s possible that the current situation that you note is a cultural one resulting from monogamy.

18

Well, I wouldn’t take monogamy for granted either. It’s certainly a cultural norm but not necessarily a built-in characteristic of the species. We don’t do it very well, on the one hand, and alongside of that, we have adequate reason to see it as an artificially imposed cultural behavior — the whole “property inheritance” thing, which can only be as recent as inheritable property. See Christopher Ryan’s Sex at Dawn for elaboration.

19

The evolutionary biology answer to OP’s question lies in Parental Investment Theory. The “choosy” sex is generally the one that commits most resources to procreation - most often the female. In many species, the male contributes little more than sperm. And since the male does not commit much time or resources, there is little reason for females to compete with one another for the best males - a “good” male can easily mate with multiple females.

But the situation with humans is more nuanced. Women are still certainly “choosy” about the characteristics of their partner. But humans have unusually high Male Parental Investment - we are an extreme outlier in this respect. Humans are generally monogamous, and human males commit immense resources over a very long period to raising the offspring of a specific female to the exclusion of other females. Thus, unlike species with minimal Male Parental Investment, there is good reason for human females to compete with one another to attract the dedicated resources of the best males, those males who have the resources and temperament to be committed fathers.

20

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