Py2 study: Buss :)

Some notes for each question that may be asked  :)

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Aims and context

- Define the evolutionary theory:

Parental investment: women put a lot more investment into offspring then men so this may be a consideration of why womenare more choosy then males e.g picking mates with more resources:)

Fertility: Men suggests that males more than females will value youth and physical attractiveness in mates as these are indicators of fertility and reproductive value :)

Paternity probability: Males would like to have chaste in there female mat as they can ensure that there offspring is there's, women have little need of this as there paternity is certain.

Keyword definition: Sexual selection

Buss aimed to test the evolutionary theory in different cultures to find the behaviours and characteristics that make up sexual selection :)

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Procedures

- 37 samples from 33 countries

- Atotal of 10,047 participants ( that's a LOT! of people )

- they used a questionnaire with two parts

- the first part was to collect biographical data e.g age and sex

- the second part was to rank a total of 13 characteristics, rank 1 was given to the most desirable characteristic and rank 13 the least

- translations and slight changes had to be taken out with the questionnaire to be suitablefor all cultures e.g in Sweden few people get married they just live together

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Findings and conclusions

- women ranked "good finacial prospects" higher then men

supporting the hypothesis of women seek cues related to resourses

- women ranked "ambition and industriounes" higher the men

supporting the hypothesis of women seek cues related to resourses

- men preferred women to be younger than them with the preferresd age to marry for females to be at 24.83 years

supporting the fertility hypothesis

Men ranked "chasity" to be more important then women

supporting the paternity probablity hypothesis 

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Methodology

- they used a quesionnaire:

+ It was quicker and easier

- people lie on questionnaires to make themselves seem better

- Reliablility was good

- validity can be critisised

- sample was good because of the size

- ethical issues

cofidentiality

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Alternative evidence

- Little et al

conducted a study where they found a relationship between the symmetry of a face and the rated attriveness of a person

-Singh

found a relationship between a womens waist to hip ratio and there fertility and reproducrtive value, this is a physical sign that men may un-conciously look for :)

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