Scientific Tips For Post-Covid Flirting

"Now that many of us are emerging from our Covid shells, blinking at the spring sun, it's time to refresh some prepandemic pastimes. Like flirting, for example. A dating app can call up several romantic prospects within a five-mile radius of where you stand, but can it hold your gaze, or lightly brush your bare arm while passing by?

No, for subtle -- and not so subtle -- sexual signals, nothing beats the frisson one gets when flirting in person. If, after over two years, you can't remember how it's done, a new research paper offers helpful guidance as to what types of signals work best, with whom, and under what conditions.

 

To take some familiar examples: When a woman shows a bit of skin, moves close to a man, brushes by him or otherwise makes body contact, men are moved to pursue the relationship, at least in the short term. A woman is likely to show interest in a man who makes her laugh, is generous, looks her in the eye and is a good listener, among other signs that show that he has resources to spare and is ready to commit.

 

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Humans have been using these strategies to attract mates for millions of years, according to evolutionary psychologists. Those that worked were passed along to the next generations and still provide a distant thrum underlying our efforts to attract and keep a partner.

But after decades of flux in sexual and gender power dynamics, have the old ways of wooing lost some of their hold? Women have equaled or overtaken men in some occupations and even out-earned them in a few others. Does a man's ability to flaunt his wealth still work as a flirting strategy? Is a woman's appearance and willingness to make body contact still as important in attracting a man's interest?

The study, "Perceived Effectiveness of Flirtation Tactics," compared the flirting preferences of more than 1,000 heterosexual college students between 18 and 30 years old who completed a 40-item questionnaire about flirting and sexual attraction. Half were in the U.S., half in Norway.

The research team, led by Leif Edward Otteson Kennair of the Norwegian University of Science and Technology and T. Joel Wade of Bucknell University, set out to bolster the evolutionary arguments about flirting described in a 1993 paper by David Buss and David Schmitt. The two University of Michigan psychology professors found that men and women evolved flirting strategies unique to each sex and specific to a short-or long-term goal.

 

For a fling, a man would seek signals that a woman is sexually available and looking for minimal commitment; for the long term, he would favor someone young and attractive -- stand-ins for fertility -- who would be faithful and a good parent.

 

Women seeking short-term partners look for signals of physical strength and generosity.

 

For the long term, women also look for observable cues of ambition, industry, income and status.

 

Primal signals are at work when it comes to flirting; triggers have persisted over time, across continents and cultural divides. The question now is whether in-person flirting is the same as before the pandemic, the same as before women's educational and occupational gains and nearly the same as eons ago. And the answer seems to be yes, yes and yes.

There is one difference. In the past, being funny was a pivotal trait for a man, but a woman's jokes often didn't register. Now, the paper shows, humor is a gender-equal form of flirting.

All of this suggests that you can rely on your muscle memory of flirting, as not much has changed. Just don't take yourself too seriously." [1]

1. REVIEW --- Mind & Matter: Scientific Tips For Post-Covid Flirting
Pinker, Susan. 
Wall Street Journal, Eastern edition; New York, N.Y. [New York, N.Y]. 18 June 2022: C.4.