View source for Heterosexual men's ratings of sexual attractiveness of adolescent girls: a cross-cultural analysis

[Abstract:] Following an identical procedure to the one we previously reported (O'Donnell, Lowe, Brotherton, & Bennett, 2014), we examined ratings of sexual attraction to photographs of (the same) adolescent girls (Tanner stages 3-4) labelled as either 14-15 years or 16-17 years old, women, and men. Ratings were made by Bulgarian heterosexual men by pressing buttons on a response box which recorded the ratings made and the time in milliseconds taken to respond. Despite the age of sexual consent in Bulgaria being 14 years, the pattern of findings did not differ from those found in the UK, where the age of consent is 16 years. That is, mean ratings of the sexual attractiveness of the girls labelled as younger were lower than those of the (same) girls labelled as older, and those of the women. In addition, correlations revealed significantly longer responding times when younger girls (and men) were rated as more highly sexually attractive. These associations were reversed in response to the photographs of women. We take these findings to indicate an inhibitory effect arising from generalized sexual norms relating to the inappropriateness of sexual attraction to young girls; the greater the attraction, the higher the inhibition. This second replication of our initial findings suggests a robust effect that may be of benefit in exploration of pedophile or sex offender groups.<br>
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[The researchers conclude:] [T]he consistent finding that the same photographs of younger females, but with different age labels, were assigned significantly different levels of attractiveness suggests that cognitive factors beyond biologically driven sexual attraction were involved in making these ratings. In all the three samples, apparently younger girls were rated as less attractive than older girls despite being the same photographs. We hypothesize that this difference reflects some self-censoring mechanism involved in making such judgments. This may involve a form of comparison between participants' own sexual attraction to the individual girl and the likely social norms surrounding this judgment.<br>
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<i>source: Study 'Heterosexual Men's Ratings of Sexual Attractiveness of Adolescent Girls: A Cross-Cultural Analysis' by Paul Bennett, Rob Lowe & Hristina Petrova; link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10508-015-0504-6; www.annabelleigh.net/messages/733450.htm; Archives of Sexual Behavior, volume 44, pages 2201-2206; 2015; Published: 27 March 2015</i>

[[Category:Paul Bennett]]
[[Category:Rob Lowe]]
[[Category:Hristina Petrova]]
[[Category:Research]]
[[Category:Onderzoek]]
[[Category:Percentage with pedophile feelings‏‎]]
[[Category:Percentage met pedofiele gevoelens‏‎]]
[[Category:Muireann O'Donnell]]
[[Category:Hannah Brotherton]]