Contrary to popular perception, researchers have found that after being rejected by an attractive man, a woman does not jump into accepting a proposal offered by an unattractive man.
Rejection by an attractive man actually led women to socially distance themselves from an unattractive man, even when he offered acceptance, the findings showed.
"We had not expected to see derogation of the unattractive male when women had been rejected by the attractive male," said lead study author Geoff MacDonald from University of Toronto in Canada.
"But when we replicated the study, the effect was still there," MacDonald noted.
The new study turns the popular idea that acceptance is the goal after rejection on its head, highlighting that "what people want is not immediate acceptance per se but a sense of assurance that the person is acceptable to the sorts of people they want to be connected to", MacDonald said.
The researchers chose to use attractiveness as a measure of social value, based on a large volume of literature backing the idea that in a relationship formation context, attractiveness is a highly valued attribute.
The new study sought to replicate more real-world dating scenarios in the lab.
"A possible reason for this effect is that 'being affiliated with an unattractive man would make those women feel like that's the kind of man they 'deserve' which puts their larger social goals at risk," MacDonald said.
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