Pheromones – (unconscious smells) reveal someone’s genes, people are attracted to those that have an immune system opposite to their own so that their children are stronger.
Hypothalamus – releases chemicals which trigger physiological arousal
Buss (1994) – Evolution In order to carry on survival of the species and one’s genes, males have to attract females and people are attracted to a mate who is likely to give them the strongest and healthiest offspring.
This means that women need to be pickier when choosing a mate as women can only have one baby a year and around 400 eggs over their entire life. Men have unlimited amounts of sperm and no given responsibility of being a parents.
Immune system Linked to evolution, the chances of offspring and therefore genes continuing are improved if a child has parents with different immune systems and therefore receive a diverse and strong immune system to fight disease and illness. Pheromones reveal one’s immune system through unconscious signals in one’s scent.
SOCIAL COMPARISON: Cognitive processes have an effect on attraction, such as social comparison. Suggests that attraction doesn’t happen in isolation and thought processes lead to comparing one person to other available options, so, if in group of unattractive people, a potential mate will appear more attractive.
People carry out cost-benefit analysis when deciding if they find someone attractive. This is a cognitive process that can change due to further contact and experiences with the person, which explains why some attractions build over time.
Can be detected frequently when you ask people why they are together. A question we often answer in terms of how others make us feel. We are more inclined to spend more time with someone who make us feel good or offer some kind of social status or benefits.
Operant conditioning: if spending time with a person directly or indirectly offers us rewards, this is reinforcing and will increase the desired frequency of such interactions
Classical conditioning: people we associate with positive emotions become a source of such emotions
Culture: What we see as attractive has changed over time and location, e.g. figure size in affluent and poor societies
Familiarity According to this concept, it is sufficient for us to simply see a person several times for us to start to find them attractive and is called the mere exposure effect. However, it is also suggested that overexposure is possible and can often lead to disgust.
Attraction originates from seeing an image repetitively and knowing it well. Knowing something well eliminates risk as we can predict its behaviour and know how it will react and feel towards us. This familiarity leads to attraction as it minuses risks and provides more guaranteed rewards