The Real Laws of Attraction and its 3 Explanations
Does that big handsome man to the right look familiar to you? I hope so because that is your brotha from anotha motha. That right there is a human being. A culture-bearing primate classified in the genus Homo, and the species H. sapiens. So next time you’re perusing through your local mall, I implore you to greet your fellow primates with a “Hey Homos!”. I assure you, you will be met with open arms. If a mob overhears your unique greeting, then I would prepare myself. Because a BIG group hug is coming your way.
This collective embracement would happen because we Homo Sapiens are social animals that contain a yearning desire to belong, and an everlasting inclination to connect with others on an intimate level. These endogenous/exogenous feelings worked together to help us evolve.
We don’t have time to enumerate the plethora of theories on how we evolved as a species, but there is one constant variable that permeates through all the theories I have seen so far.
What I have identified is that mutual attachment was an indispensable facet of our evolution. Whether you believe the contrivance of fire supplementing the missing nutrients for our cognitive development, a collective of bowlegged apes throwing spears like Nolan Ryan at lions, or that we followed cows to consume psilocybin from their droppings. None of this could have been done alone.
Life is hard, but it’s a lot easier to go through it with someone else.
Regardless if you are aware, much of your time upstairs is spent thinking about some kind of someone else. It doesn’t matter if the relationship is: veritable, anticipated, imaginary, or one you wish you could forget. It was rather alarming to sit and think about how much this consumes my life. The veracity of this personal realization seems to be truer by the day; I find myself constantly thinking about a relationship in some fashion at all times.
But to take a step back, I had to ask myself, how do relationships begin? Well, that’s an easy one, especially since I asked it myself. The answer is attraction.
But you might say “Shane why would I even want to be attractive? I prefer sitting in my parent’s basement with my grandmother's drawers on?”
Well, Walker, I’m glad you asked.
Being attractive has endless positives. What I found in my lecture this week is according to the Meta-analysis of (Langlois et al., 2000). Their results show that people considered attractive are
judged, treated, and behave differently from those considered unattractive. Attractive children received higher grades, showed higher intellectual competence, and were more popular/better-adjusted. This was followed by job success and generally being liked more by others. As well as being physically healthy, sexually experienced, having increased self-confidence, and self-esteem. Seems like a pretty good gig to me.
And I'd love nothing more than all who read to reap those benefits listed above. But to do so, one must understand the basics. The 3 explanations for attraction.
Biological Explanations
Social Contextual Explanations
Love <3
Biological Explanations
The biological approach believes behavior to be a consequence of our genetics and physiology. This manifests itself in a way likes the good gene hypothesis. The good genes hypothesis is an explanation that suggests that the traits females choose when selecting a mate are honest indicators of the male's ability to pass on genes that will increase the survival or reproductive success of her offspring. This differs from men, who are more likely than women to rank attractiveness as important in a mate. Again, whereas women assigned importance to honesty, humor, kindness, and dependability. These umbrella traits explain things we think are unique to us as individuals. Such as our innate attraction to symmetrical faces, men's attraction to the color red, men's attraction to the hourglass figure (associated with more regular menstrual
cycles and higher fertility), or women's attraction to the inverted triangle build of a man.
It is also a biological trait for humans to goal set. There is nothing wrong with aiming high and aspiring to redeemable ideals. In attraction, we have biological ideals as well. In relationships, there are three ‘ideal partner’ dimensions that appear to guide preferences of both men and women that alter depending on the
long-term or short-term context: Warmth-trustworthiness, Vitality-attractiveness
Status-resources.
So the next time you feel the desire to scream "society made me this way man!" Think to yourself, maybe I'm just a hairless monkey, and all my decisions are made in my cells.
Social Contextual Explanations
The next time you feel the need to scream "maybe I'm just a hairless monkey, and all my decisions are made in my cells" Think to yourself "society made me this way man!" Attraction is a social construct!
The most prevalent social explanation for attraction is equity. Do you hold up your end of the bargain? People are happiest in relationships when they believe that the give and take aspect is approximately equal. When the relationship is equitable, the participant's outcomes (reward minus cost), are proportional to their inputs or contributions to the relationship –distributive justice. You don't need to be an economics major to be well versed in social exchange. In relationships, people often weigh up costs and rewards before deciding what to do. It may seem off-putting, but you operate your relationship more like a business transaction than you think. Because our resources are traded with that of a partner, we try to use the minimax strategy (minimize cost, maximize reward).
– Costs: time, effort, money, etc.
– Rewards: money, love, sex, services, status, etc.
A relationship can become unsatisfactory when the costs exceed the rewards. This becomes especially true when we look to our peers. A product of past experiences with other parties in similar situations is used to judge whether we think exchanges are positive or negative, which then can alter perceptions of attraction.
Love
What is love?
Love is a combination of emotions, thoughts, and actions, which are often powerful, and usually associated with intimate relationships. But there are several kinds of love: Passionate, Companionate love, Fatuous love.
What makes you attractive in love is commitment, Trust, and Forgiveness
Commitment increases the chances that partners will stay together. It only takes one partner to show low commitment for the relationship to go downhill. Trust can also preserve a relationship even in the face of adversity. Trusting someone brings out the best version of yourself. Forgiveness also plays a large role. This can consist of:
- Both parties apologizing
– A process, solution, and a positive alternative to the breakdown of the relationship
– Prosocial acts later down the track
Break up thoughts
These are my 3 explanations for attraction. You can be attracted to someone because you are in fact a hairless monkey, society can make you this way, and love is a multifactorial power we still don't fully understand. But this is all I can tell you, it's over, it's not you it's me. I hope you understand.
