Men: Ideal Woman has this age - Aftenbladet.no

Even though we live in one of the most equal countries, there are still wild that determines who to be with. According to a new study from the Department of Psychology, writes Forskning.no.

Students in Trondheim participated in the study and were asked about age, gender and status.

In addition, the question of the age to what they saw as an ideal short-term partner as well as the age of the ideal long-term partner.

– We found that men choose and want younger partner than themselves, while women choose and want the older partner than themselves, says doctoral fellow Trond Viggo Grøntvedt.

study shows that men, regardless of age, seeking women with ideal age of 21.

– This is the year of life the woman is most fertile. Younger men searched up until the age of 21, but after that they sought down through the ages, says Grøntvedt.

Signals fertility

Grøntvedt, together with Professor Leif Edward Ottesen Kennair been behind the study. They think the explanation can be obtained from the theory of evolution.

Partner our preferences may be due to the different problems men and women have faced in evolutionary time.

– A man can potentially have more offspring than females over different time periods because the men do not go pregnant, give birth or give offspring food the first time of the child’s life. A solution to the problem of obtaining a fertile partner, having preferences for traits that signal fertility. One of these traits is age, says Grøntvedt.

– Since women have a higher degree of fertility around 20-22 years of age, it is expected from an evolutionary perspective that men will seek and have preferences for partners around this age, he adds.

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– Reality is more complex

- The first thing I think is that there is something the press, and possibly some research love, it’s evolution, says Bente Træen, professor of health psychology at the University of Oslo, as a commentary on the study.

– It might be something with the simplicity of explanations that really appeals, this back to the Stone Age man. But I think the reality is more complex, we are not on the cave level. We can control how we live, such as the time when it is convenient to have children. Although the woman is biologically most fertile at age 21, it is the first ten years later she has a child, she adds.

Træen think rather that evolutionary perspective will have a strong fucked in the years to come.

– That’s because today’s women do not need a parent as it was before. Besides, when I look around me, women who are academics, intellectuals and artists, these chooses love to younger men. When opportunities are open to both women and men prefer a young and virile partner if it is about it, she says .

– Not representative

Træen think the study needs to be understood for what it is, a study among students.

– This is not a representative group study, student population is indeed becoming more and more heterogeneous, but is also fairly homogeneous when compared with the general population. I also believe that people in this age largely carries with it much of the romantic and mythical adventure stories where the structure and role of the characters are so he must be older than her , says Træen.

Træen believe that as we live and experience to walk on the face, we will reconsider these hooks and code of conduct.

– What to look for in a partner is about more than sex and number of offspring, the head and the heart must follow. A relationship today, and glue in it, not as it could be before: A working partnership where the woman was responsible for the private and caring for children and the elderly, while the man was the boss in the public domain. now requires much more from both individuals, intimacy and recognition. It is too easy to think that just because someone is young and vital, so will the relationship be happy. Here comes the evolution of short, says Træen.

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Reference of study:

Grøntvedt & Kennair: Age preferences in a gender egalitarian society (pdf), Journal of Social, Evolutionary, and Cultural Psychology, 2013, 7 (3), 239-249.