The Science of hookups

3 January 2022
Man and Woman Kissing Together on Body of Water

Picture by Edward Eyer / Pexels

It’s the new year. I see a lot of y’all pouring your hearts out on various platforms about your desire to extricate yourself from Covid-induced self-gratification. Not to worry; I have the two-step solution right here:

  • If you’re a woman, you need to signal availability
  • If you’re a man, you need to signal commitment

That's it.

Now you would have to be freakin' insane to believe some random twaddle from a sexagenarian scribe on the Internet, but you can trust me because this is science.[1] It comes from a paper published April 2021 titled " Want to Hookup?: Sex Differences in Short-term Mate Attraction Tactics".

The executive summary: 

While a great deal of psychological research has been conducted on sex-specific mate choice preferences, relatively little attention has been directed toward how heterosexual men and women solicit short-term sexual partners, and which acts are perceived to be the most effective. 

The present research relied on an act nomination methodology with the goal of determining which actions are used by men and women to solicit a short-term “hook-up” partner and then determine which of these actions are perceived as most effective by men and women.

These findings are discussed in the context of both short- and long-term mating strategies and mate solicitation. The relationship between motivation, sexual strategies, and sexual behavior are examined…

I like to break things down into listicles. So here, in descending order, are the top five successful hookup strategies for men and women.

Women

Men

She goes home with him

He asks her out to dinner or a movie

She kisses him

He converses with her

She flirts with him

He flirts with her

She dances with him

He asks her to dance or kiss

She gets a drink with him

He asks to walk her home

(My South African and Los Angeles readers are asking: "Walk her home? What's that?")

The top unsuccessful strategies in order.

Women

Men

She dances near him

He gets drunk

She gets drunk

He tries to impress her

She smiles at him

He buys her a drink

She has a friend introduce her to him

He makes body contact with her

She makes eye contact with him

He texts her

She drunk texts him

He dances with her

She laughs at his jokes

 

She dresses revealingly

 

She chats with him

 

She texts him

 

She exchanges numbers with him

 

She touches him in general

 

She teases and jokes around with him

 

 

("But wait!" you say. "I’m gay" or "I’m lesbian" or "I'm asexual". Sorry guys, I'm cis-hetero and speak from that perspective. But the authors do talk about "the need for research on the hookup tactics and motivations of self-identifying gay, lesbian, and bisexual individuals". Maybe send them some money to do the research?)

 

[1]  Wade, T Joel & Fisher, Maryanne & Salmon, Catherine & Downs, Carly. (2021). Want to Hookup?: Sex Differences in Short-term Mate Attraction Tactics. Evolutionary Psychological Science. 7. 10.1007/s40806-021-00282-0.

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