Online Dating Blog

If you’re a man and you’ve ever been frustrated by the fact that you fall apart socially around beautiful women, it’s not just you. According to a study discussed in the Telegraph, studies have shown that men actually do lose much of their ability to think and reason when around pretty women:

The research shows men who spend even a few minutes in the company of an attractive woman perform less well in tests designed to measure brain function than those who chat to someone they do not find attractive.

Researchers who carried out the study, published in the Journal of Experimental and Social Psychology, think the reason may be that men use up so much of their brain function or ‘cognitive resources’ trying to impress beautiful women, they have little left for other tasks.

As the article later points out, women weren’t affected at all talking to attractive men as they are looking for other attributes such as youth, wealth and kindness. I guess the real question for men would be, what can help a man turn off this ‘reproductivity focus’ that turns his brain to mush? I have a few thoughts on this:

• When one of my friends would date a beautiful woman, I never felt those flustered feelings this article describes because I knew I wouldn’t date her (even were she to pursue me). If you could artificially convince yourself that you shouldn’t date a woman (even though you could), it might help.
• When I had many first dates scheduled while dating online, I think my ‘reproductivity focus’ was less severe or even absent because I had so many other possibilities on the horizon. With this in mind, it would seem reasonable to suggest that the dating opportunities you have the more ‘stupid’ you’ll be around
  these pretty women. I know this was true for me.

I can’t offer much advice for accomplishing the first bullet but I cover the second in great detail in my online dating guide. While us guys are more controlled by our instincts than we would care to admit, I believe there are some things you can do to improve your chances even with these forces working against us.