Mortality salience induces men's mating strategy toward body attractiveness in long-term mating context

Abstract

Sexual attitudes are influenced by social norms, with an open sexual attitude in loose cultures (e.g., United States), and a conservative sexual attitude in tight cultures (e.g., China). Previous studies have found that men prefer women's face in long-term mating context and prefer women's body in short-term mating context in loose culture. However, whether men in tight culture prefer women's body in one-night stand mating context is unknown. Moreover, previous studies have shown that mortality salience has an influence on human's reproductive behaviors, however, it is unclear how mortality salience affects men's mating preferences. Experiment 1 replicated the previous findings showing that men prefer women's face in long-term mating context (girlfriend), and prefer women's body in short-term mating context (one-night stand) in tight culture. Moreover, experiment 2 found that after priming with death, men in the long-term context prefer women's body more than that in control priming group, and they also rated higher importance of body in mating selection than that in control group. Our results suggested that mortality salience induces men's mating strategy toward body attractiveness in long-term mating context.