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Flirting with Meaning: An Examination of Miscommunication in Flirting Interactions
Sex Roles
Abstract
Men tend to view women's behaviors as more sexual than do women in cross-sex interactions (e.g., Abbey, 1982). This difference may result because men view specific behaviors as sexually motivated, whereas women attribute a different motivation to the behaviors. It is proposed that people flirt for a variety of different reasons including the desire to increase sexual interaction. Six flirting motivations derived from the literature are considered in this study: sex, fun, exploring, relational, esteem, and instrumental. The motivations attributed to flirting behaviors by men and women in typical flirting interactions are explored. Gender differences emerge for several flirting motivations (i.e., sex, relational, and fun). Men tend to view flirting as more sexual than women do, and women attribute more relational and fun motivations to flirting interactions than do men. No gender differences emerge for esteem, exploring, or instrumental motivations. The discussion focuses on how miscommunication may occur during flirting interactions.
... Investigating why individuals flirt, Henningsen [3] identified six flirting motivations: three courtship (i.e., sex, relational, and exploring) and three quasi-courtship (i.e., fun, esteem, and instrumental) (see also Frisby [4]). When individuals engage in flirting interactions with the goal of persuading another to assist them in accomplishing some non-courtship goal, it is referred to as instrumental flirting. ...
... Instrumental flirting is a persuasive technique that employs quasi-courtship behaviors to influence a target to provide assistance or rewards [3]. The use of flirting to achieve ...
... Related research indicates that charm is likely used by men and women. For example, both men and women report using instrumental flirting [3]. Men and women both reported instrumental flirting occurred in their work settings [1]. ...
The scholarship on flirting as a persuasive tactic in the workplace indicates that flirting can have negative consequences for task groups. The goal of this study was to extend the investigation of instrumental flirting by operationalizing this form of flirting as charm and by examining the consequences of charm in decision-making groups for the individual group members. In the current study, participants (60 women, 60 men) made decisions in four-person, mixed sex groups. The results of the study demonstrate that the use of charm was negatively associated with perceptions of group member task competence. Differences in perceptions of charm were also examined.
... Hospitality employees are likely to engage in flirting to generate romantic or personal interest (i.e., relational motivation, or for financial gain (i.e., instrumental motivation; Henningsen, 2004). Whereas relational flirting may be perceived by customers as sincere , instrumental flirting may be perceived as job flirting; in other words, simply as part of the hospitality employee's efforts to provide good service, which by definition is not sincere. ...
... Flirting can be verbal and nonverbal, planned or spontaneous. Customers may find it hard to determine why a hospitality employee is flirting since flattery can derive from authentic intent or can be misleading especially for customers who would be tempted to reciprocate (Henningsen, 2004(Henningsen, ,2008. This ambiguity appears to be the main source of potential miscommunication with customers who may perceive flirting as inappropriate because it takes advantage of a commercial friendship (Henningsen et al., 2008;Seger-Guttmann and Medler-Liraz, 2018). ...
... This ambiguity appears to be the main source of potential miscommunication with customers who may perceive flirting as inappropriate because it takes advantage of a commercial friendship (Henningsen et al., 2008;Seger-Guttmann and Medler-Liraz, 2018). Because flirting can be motivated by differing goals ranging from an explicit sexual invitation, to playfulness, to wanting to start a relationship, it can undermine the flirter-customer relationship if perceived negatively (Henningsen, 2004;Henningsen et al., 2008). Thus, the emotional labor strategies tapped during flirting are likely to affect customer-related outcomes such as rapport and tip size. ...
... Much of this research is based on the traditional sexual script, a cognitive conceptualization of the gendered roles of courtship (Gagnon, 1990) which posits that males are more interested in and likely to pursue sex than are females, who act as sexual gate-keepers (Eaton & Rose, 2011;Impett & Peplau, 2003;La France, 2010). Results from this paradigm suggest that flirting behaviors are often ambiguous, difficult to detect, evaluated differently by individuals of differing genders-typically as more sexual by males than by females-and differ in effectiveness based on the target of the flirtation (Hall et al., 2015;Henningsen, 2004;Moore, 2002;Wade & Slemp, 2015). This literature reinforces the conceptualization of flirting as a primarily gendered behavior, also suggesting that it is often misconstrued or unnoticed-perhaps due in part to gendered differences (e.g., Henningsen, 2004)-with women tending to underperceive flirting and men tending to overperceive flirtatious intent (e.g., Haselton & Buss, 2000;Perilloux et al., 2012). ...
... Results from this paradigm suggest that flirting behaviors are often ambiguous, difficult to detect, evaluated differently by individuals of differing genders-typically as more sexual by males than by females-and differ in effectiveness based on the target of the flirtation (Hall et al., 2015;Henningsen, 2004;Moore, 2002;Wade & Slemp, 2015). This literature reinforces the conceptualization of flirting as a primarily gendered behavior, also suggesting that it is often misconstrued or unnoticed-perhaps due in part to gendered differences (e.g., Henningsen, 2004)-with women tending to underperceive flirting and men tending to overperceive flirtatious intent (e.g., Haselton & Buss, 2000;Perilloux et al., 2012). Further, researchers themselves cannot agree on certain facets of gendered flirtation; for example, some studies indicate that men are the aggressors in flirtation (e.g., Buss, 1988Buss, , 1994 while others posit that women are the initiators as they must signal their interest in order for men to approach (e.g., Moore, 1985). ...
... Flirting with Gender: The Complexity of Gender in Flirting… 2018; Henningsen, 2004;Moore, 2002;Wade & Slemp, 2015), it may be that this dearth has emerged as a result of the invisibility of non-heterosexual flirting. In this vein, Kiesling (2013) calls into question the relationship between normative sexuality and flirtation, demonstrating that flirting is defined by the assumed genders and sexual orientations of the interactors; the default assumption being binary heterosexuality. ...
Previous research on non-verbal courtship behavior (flirting) has been conducted almost exclusively with heterosexual participants and has relied upon an evolutionary-based, reproduction driven framework. This study extended beyond a reductionist perspective to examine the differential contributions of gender identity, traditional masculinity-femininity, gender role ideology, and sexual orientation in predicting flirting behavior. Results from 626 participants revealed that, across all participants, gender, masculinity-femininity, and gender role ideology were predictive of flirting techniques, while sexual orientation was not. Among self-identified men only, sexual orientation was predictive, until the introduction of masculinity-femininity into the model nullified the effect. Among self-identified women, only masculinity-femininity and gender role ideology predicted flirting behavior. The negligible predictive role of sexual orientation suggests that existing paradigms of flirting research may be adequate to capture experiences of flirtatious behavior among sexual minority individuals.
... Flirting with attractive others elicits excitement (i.e., positive arousal; Garcia & Reiber, 2008;Henningsen, 2004). Flirting with brands may also elicit excitement, as using or admiring a brand other than a preferred one may be a novel and pleasantly arousing experience. ...
... for coders' ratings for each of the motivations (except for two, described below). Analysis of coders' ratings revealed that, as in interpersonal relationships, a variety of intrinsic and extrinsic motivations prompt brand flirting (Henningsen, 2004). The most common motivation was attraction to a brand's alluring characteristics (61.6%), mirroring interpersonal relationships in which the most common impetus of flirting is also a target's attractive characteristics (Coombs & Kenkel, 1966). ...
... Impulse buying 1.8 Sudden impulse (Rook, 1987) "Saw the brand in a military supply store and thought, 'cool', and bought the product." Givens, 1978;Henningsen, 2004), brand flirting occurs in the process of engaging with and/or indulging in the attractiveness of a brand (e.g., "I would look at this skirt several times a day. . . It was extremely cute;" "I tried [the boots] on and it felt great to wear them") in a brief and uncommitted experience. ...
We document the existence and consequences of brand flirting: a short-lived experience in which a consumer engages with and/or indulges in the alluring qualities of a brand without committing to it. We propose that brand flirting is exciting, and that when consumers flirt with a brand other than their typically preferred brand in the same product category, they can transfer this excitement to their preferred brand—resulting in even greater love and desire for it. Consistent with this conceptual account, we demonstrate that this brand flirting effect is mediated by excitement. Moreover, the brand flirting effect is most likely to emerge under conditions that facilitate arousal transfer: when consumers are highly committed to their preferred brand, and when the brand with which consumers flirt is similar to their preferred brand.
... David Dryden Henningsen [7] has distinguished six motives for flirting: sex, fun, exploring, relational, esteem and instrumental. This is based on the long-established distinction that flirting is not always used to initiate a romantic or sexual relationship. ...
... "The distinction between courtship initiation and quasi-courtship appears to lie not in flirting behaviors per se but rather in the motivations that generate those behaviors. Sexually motivated flirting behaviors are courtship initiating; behaviors with no sexual intent are quasi-courtship" [7]. (p. ...
Ulrika Carlsson has argued that it its justified to harbor non-moral resentment towards a person with whom one is unrequitedly in love. Anca Gheaus has rejected this with convincing arguments. This text explores the question of whether Gheaus’ verdict changes if the person being loved has previously flirted with the loving person. For this, it is first relevant what flirting actually is and how it relates to falling in love and love. On this basis, it is argued here that in the case of flirting, the non-moral resentment of the loved person defended by Carlsson is appropriate. By flirting, he or she has contributed to the unrequited love, even if he or she cannot be held responsible for it in a moral sense.
... Nonverbal flirtation elements include proximity, posture, gesture, and facial expression, especially, gazing and smiling. Flirtation is thrilling due to its ambiguity and uncertain outcome (Henningsen, 2004;Speer, 2017). Ambiguity prevents the flirter from disappointment if attraction is not reciprocal but is also a source of misunderstanding. ...
... Heterosexual and lesbian women reacted less favorably to other-gender advances than heterosexual and gay men, respectively. We interpret this finding as reflecting the risk of sexual objectification and harassment that women associate with heteronormative male advances (Calogero et al., 2021;Henningsen, 2004), especially in barroom settings (Quigg et al., 2020). Consistent with this, there were no gender differences in LG participants' response to same-gender flirtation. ...
Using a vignette methodology, this study examined reactions to same-gender versus other-gender flirtation in a sample of 445 German young adults: 320 participants with a heterosexual orientation and 125 participants with a lesbian or gay (LG) orientation. Even in LG-friendly societies as Germany, receiving advances from someone of the same gender might still evoke heterosexuals’ homonegativity. Another factor that might influence heterosexuals’ reactions to same-gender flirtation is the fear of being misidentified as LG (social contagion concerns). Contrary to hypothesis, results provided little evidence to classify heterosexual participants’ reactions to same-gender flirters as homonegative. Firstly, heterosexual participants showed the same degree of negative affect and avoidance behavior in the same-gender flirtation condition as LG participants did in the other-gender flirtation condition. Only positive affect scores were somewhat lower for heterosexual participants in the same-gender flirtation condition compared to LG participants in the other-gender flirtation condition. Secondly, when anti-LG attitudes and social contagion concerns were considered together, only social contagion concerns contributed to explaining variance in heterosexual participants’ response to same-gender flirters. Specifically, the impact of social contagion concerns on heterosexual participants’ avoidance of same-gender flirters was mediated by (lacking) positive affect, but not negative affect.
... As a result, sexually motivated approaches based on such nonspecific cues are more likely to have negative consequences for one or both parties involved, ranging from mild frustration to norm-violating (e.g., sexually offensive) behavior, depending on whether (and when) the man eventually recognizes the diverging interests and how he subsequently responds. Individual differences in the 1 While there are flirting motivations other than initiating sexual contact, men tend to associate flirting cues with sexual intentions (Henningsen, 2004). Since the present study specifically aimed to measure heterosexual men's responses to female flirting cues in a state of sexual arousal, it focused on men's dominant view of flirting cues as signs of sexual interest. ...
... In addition to these established questionnaires, we had participants answer a self-constructed questionnaire on their propensity for socially problematic (e.g., manipulative) flirting behavior (see Measures Section for details on all questionnaires). We made this particular addition since we also chose a flirting framework for our selection task to draw on an everyday realworld experience often accompanied by a sexual objective (Henningsen, 2004;Moore, 2010). Moreover, flirting usually takes place dyadically, so prioritizing specific affective over global sexual cues should provide a favorable (i.e., socially appropriate as well as more promising) basis for selection. ...
Assessing another person’s intention to flirt and, relatedly, their sexual interest is based on the interpretation and weighting of global (e.g., clothing style) and specific (e.g., facial expression) cues. Since cue incongruency increases the risk of erroneous judgments and thus can entail undesirable outcomes for both parties involved, detection of an individual propensity for overly relying on global (sexual) rather than specific (affective) cues is of social and clinical-forensic importance. Using a purpose-designed and pre-validated stimulus set, we developed a mouse-tracking task as an indirect behavioral measure for males’ overreliance on global cues (OGC) in the context of sexual flirting. In a convenience sample of heterosexual cisgender men (N = 79), experimentally induced sexual arousal was shown to increase the probability of OGC as a function of task difficulty (i.e., congruent or incongruent combinations of global and specific cues displayed by a potential female flirting partner). While error rate and reaction time proved to be indicators of OGC, the spatial measures maximum deviation and area under the curve provided less consistent results. In addition, error rate suggested sex drive and sexual objectification to act as moderators of the relationship between sexual arousal and OGC. Exploratory analysis further revealed a theoretically meaningful pattern of correlations between mouse-tracking measures and self-report measures of problematic (e.g., disinhibited, exploitative) sexuality. Implications of the results are discussed and a framework for differentiating potential causes of OGC (i.e., misperception, lack of self-control, and egocentric hedonism) is proposed.
... To resolve this conflict, the human animal has developed a courtship style that involves the enaction of coy and indirect behaviors intended to both convey sexual and/or romantic interest and to disguise such attraction if an overture is rejected (Gersick & Kurzban, 2014;Kozin, 2016). This diverse set of courtship behaviors is commonly known as flirtation (Henningsen, 2004). As flirtation consists largely of indirect behaviors, any resulting "rejection" can be dismissed with claims that any sexual and/or romantic interest was unintended. ...
... Adding to the complexity of detecting sexual and/or romantic interest, people have different motivations to flirt. Henningsen (2004) identified six motivations for flirting. Although two of the six motivations align with the presumed intention of flirting (to attract a mate and to intensify an existing relationship), people sometimes flirt just for the fun of it. ...
... Also, individuals may flirt to help determine their current mate value (Givens, 1978;Luscombe, 2008). While flirting may be used for many purposes, such as fun, to increase self-esteem, or to gain material goods or services (e.g., Henningsen, 2004), it undoubtedly is part of mating. Indeed, the overwhelming bulk of the literature clearly pertains to how it involves signaling to a potential mate that one is interested in dating/ spending time with them (see J.L. Downey & Vitulli, 1987;Henningsen, 2004;M.M. Moore, 2002M.M. Moore, , 2010Whitty, 2003). ...
... While flirting may be used for many purposes, such as fun, to increase self-esteem, or to gain material goods or services (e.g., Henningsen, 2004), it undoubtedly is part of mating. Indeed, the overwhelming bulk of the literature clearly pertains to how it involves signaling to a potential mate that one is interested in dating/ spending time with them (see J.L. Downey & Vitulli, 1987;Henningsen, 2004;M.M. Moore, 2002M.M. Moore, , 2010Whitty, 2003). ...
Here we explored nonverbal actions women use to flirt competitively against each other for the purposes of accessing a mate. We also investigated the perceived effectiveness of these competitive flirting actions. Using act nomination, Study 1 (n = 91) yielded 11 actions (eye contact with the man, dancing in his line of sight, smiling at him, touching him, giggling at his jokes, butting in between the other woman and the man, showing distaste for her, brushing against him, hugging him, flirting with other men, waving to him) for competitive flirtation against other women. Actions that signal possession (e.g., tie-signs) were predicted to be perceived as the most effective. While other actions were included in Study 2 (n = 139), results showed the most effective actions were tie-signs: touching him, initiating eye contact, hugging him, giggling at his jokes, and butting in between him and the rival. These findings are discussed in terms of prior research.
... These findings suggest that flirtatious expressions in women convey interest and are successfully acknowledged by men. Although women's motives for flirting may not always be sex-related (e.g., see Hall et al., 2010;Henningsen, 2004), men are more inclined to perceive flirtatious expressions as an indication of sexual interest (e.g., Henningsen et al., 2008) and believe that flirting is an invitation to initiate sexual relationships with women (Koeppel et al., 1993). Sex words were also identified faster than non-words, which may be due to men's greater inclination to interpret women's behaviors as more sexual in cross-sex interactions (Abbey, 1982;Henningsen, 2004;Koeppel etal., 1993;Shotland & Craig, 1988). ...
... Although women's motives for flirting may not always be sex-related (e.g., see Hall et al., 2010;Henningsen, 2004), men are more inclined to perceive flirtatious expressions as an indication of sexual interest (e.g., Henningsen et al., 2008) and believe that flirting is an invitation to initiate sexual relationships with women (Koeppel et al., 1993). Sex words were also identified faster than non-words, which may be due to men's greater inclination to interpret women's behaviors as more sexual in cross-sex interactions (Abbey, 1982;Henningsen, 2004;Koeppel etal., 1993;Shotland & Craig, 1988). ...
Internal states may be conveyed to others nonverbally through facial expression. We investigated the existence of a particular facial cue that may be effectively used by women to indicate interest in a man. Across six studies, men generally recognized a female facial expression as representing flirting. Flirtatious expressions receiving low recognition by men differed in morphology from the highly recognized flirting expressions. The discrepancies are indicative of individual differences among women in effectively conveying a flirtatious facial cue and among men in recognizing this cue. The morphology of the highly recognized flirtatious facial expressions, coded using the Facial Action Coding System (FACS), included: a head turned to one side and tilted down slightly, a slight smile, and eyes turned forward (toward the implied target). Results from experimental studies showed that flirtatious facial expressions, as compared with happy or neutral expressions, led to faster identification of sex words by men. These findings support the role of flirtatious expression in communication and mating initiation.
... Specifically, women's perceptions of the male confederate's interest in them as a mate did not predict how much they flirted with him. Although we expected an association between women's mating perceptions and flirting behavior based on past research demonstrating associations between sexual perceptions and unrestricted sociosexuality (e.g., Howell et al., 2012), flirting in a specific (laboratory) context with a specific individual, on one hand, and general sexual motivation, on the other, are not equivalent (see Henningsen, 2004). Accordingly, the obtained results may not necessarily reflect the lack of a casual pathway between women's perceptions of male mating intent and unrestricted sexual behavior. ...
... PATERNAL DISENGAGEMENT AND PERCEIVED MALE INTENT captured more global attitudes and intentions regarding casual and uncommitted sex (an aggregate measure), the null mediational result in Study 4 was obtained within the context of an isolated lab-based interaction with a particular male confederate. Observed flirting is an imperfect index of sociosexuality/sexual motivation, as it reflects a thin slice of behavior and is not equivalent to sexual motivation among women (Henningsen, 2004;Henningsen, Braz, & Davies, 2008). Further, women's tendency to flirt in this situation could have been influenced by myriad factors, in addition to their perceptions of the man's mating interest (e.g., their desire to find a relationship partner, comfort during the recorded interaction, or individual levels of extraversion/intraversion). ...
Previous research demonstrates reliable associations between low paternal investment and daughters’ precocious and risky sexual behavior. However, little is known about the psychological changes that occur in response to paternal disengagement that encourage these patterns. Here, we aim to redress this empirical gap by testing the effects of paternal disengagement on women’s perceptions of male mating intent. In 4 experiments, women who described their fathers’ absence (vs. a comparison state) perceived greater: mating intent in the described actions of a hypothetical dating partner (Study 1), sexual arousal in male target faces (Studies 2 and 3), and mating interest from a male confederate (Study 4). In a mixed-methods study (Study 5), women with greater developmental exposure to harsh-deviant paternal behavior perceived greater sexual intent in men’s actions than women with lesser exposure. Moreover, these perceptual differences predicted unrestricted sociosexuality among women in this sample. An internal meta-analysis (N = 408) across studies provided support for a relationship between paternal disengagement and women’s perceptions of male sexual intent. Together, this research suggests that low paternal investment (including primed paternal disengagement and harsh-deviant fathering) causes changes in daughters’ perceptions of men that may influence their subsequent mating behavior.
... The motivations for dating and flirting in the workplace are, however, idiosyncratic. Just as men and women flirt for a variety of reasons (Henningsen, 2004), members of an organization enter into romantic relationships for a range of romantic and instrumental reasons (Dillard, Hale, & Segrin, 1994). Thus, it is important to determine the effect context may have on the activation of relational frames. ...
... Güç teorisi aile ve yakın partner şiddetine cinsiyetler arasında yaşanan güç eşitsizliğinin ve çatışmalarının neden olduğunu ifade etmektedir (Coleman ve Straus, 1986 (Henningsen, 2004). Flört ilişkilerinde partnerler birbirlerine karşı şiddet veya kötü muamele olabilecek olumsuz tutum ve davranışlar içerisine girebilmektedirler. ...
Bu araştırmanın amacı üniversite öğrencilerinin yakın partner ilişkilerinde psikolojik şiddete yönelik tutum ve deneyimlerinin bağlanma stilleri, toplumsal cinsiyet rolleri ve parasosyal etkileşimleri bağlamında incelenmesidir. Bu doğrultuda karma yöntem araştırma yöntemi desenlerinden biri olarak açıklayıcı sıralı desen yöntemi kullanılmıştır. Araştırmanın nicel aşamasında yordayıcı korelasyon araştırma modeli, nitel aşamasında ise fenomenolojik araştırma yaklaşımlarından yorumlayıcı fenomenolojik analizden yararlanılmıştır. Araştırmanın nicel aşamasında 18-25 yaş arasında toplam 508 üniversite öğrencisine ulaşılmıştır. Araştırmada veri toplama araçları olarak Kişilerarası İlişkilerde Bağlanma Stilleri Ölçeği, Parasosyal Etkileşim Ölçeği, Toplumsal Cinsiyet Oluşumu Ölçeği ve Flörtte Uygulanan Psikolojik Şiddete Yönelik Tutum Ölçekleri ve araştırmacı tarafından oluşturulan kişisel bilgi formu kullanılmıştır. Nitel aşamada ilişkisinde psikolojik şiddeti deneyimleyen 19-24 yaş arasında toplam 14 üniversite öğrencisi ile görüşmeler gerçekleştirilmiş, görüşmede araştırmacı tarafından oluşturulan yarı yapılandırılmış görüşme formu kullanılmıştır. Araştırmada ilişkisel tarama modeli kullanılmıştır. Araştırma grubu uygun örnekleme yoluyla belirlenmiştir. Araştırmada; betimsel analizler, bağımsız grup t testi, Pearson çarpım moment korelasyon analizi, çoklu regresyon analizi ve yapısal eşitlik modeli (YEM) uygulanmıştır. Elde edilen veriler bilgisayarda "SPSS for Windows 26.0" ve MPLUS6 programında çözümlenmiş, manidarlıklar minimum p<,05 düzeyinde sınanmış, diğer manidarlık düzeyleri ayrıca belirtilmiş ve ulaşılan bulgular araştırmanın amaçlarına uygun olarak tablolar halinde sunulmuştur. Nitel aşamada veriler MAXQDA2020 bilgisayar programından faydalanılarak çözümlenmiş, yorumlayıcı fenomenolojik analiz basamakları doğrultusunda analizler gerçekleştirilmiş ve bulgular tablolar halinde sunulmuştur. Araştırmanın nicel aşamasında gerçekleştirilen analizler sonucunda; üniversite öğrencilerinin erkeğin flörtte uyguladığı psikolojik şiddete yönelik tutum puanlarında kaygılı bağlanma, kaçıngan bağlanma, parasosyal empati ve geleneksel ve eşitlikçi toplumsal cinsiyet rollerinin yordayıcı olduğu saptanmıştır. Kadının flörtte uyguladığı psikolojik şiddete yönelik tutum puanlarında güvenli, kaygılı ve kaçıngan bağlanma stilleri, parasosyal arkadaşlık düzeyleri ve geleneksel ve eşitlikçi cinsiyet rollerinin anlamlı bir yordayıcı etkisinin olduğu saptanmıştır. Gerçekleştirilen yapısal eşitlik modeline göre kaygılı bağlanma ve kaçıngan bağlanma kadının flörtte uyguladığı psikolojik şiddete yönelik tutumu; kaygılı bağlanma ise erkeğin flörtte uyguladığı psikolojik şiddete yönelik tutumu yordamaktadır. Dolaylı ve doğrudan etkiler incelendiğinde bağlanma stilleri ve flörtte psikolojik şiddete yönelik tutum değişkenleri arasında geleneksel ve eşitlikçi cinsiyet rolleri ve parasosyal empati değişkenlerinin aracı etkilerinin bulunduğu saptanmıştır. Nitel aşamada ilişkisinde psikolojik şiddeti deneyimleyen üniversite öğrencilerinin bağlanma stillleri, medya etkileşimleri, toplumsal cinsiyet ve romantik ilişki yaşantılarına yönelik algıları romantik ilişkiler bağlamında yorumlayıcı fenomenolojik analiz gerçekleştirilerek incelenmiştir. Katılımcıların bağlanma stillerine yönelik deneyim ve görüşlerine ilişkin yapılan yorumlayıcı fenomenolojik analiz sonucunda benlik, ilişkilerde tutum, ilişkileri değerlendirme eğilimleri ve ilişki sürdürme biçimleri olarak dört ana tema etrafında şekillendiği; toplumsal cinsiyete ilişkin algılarının kadın erkek eşitliği, ilişki rolleri olarak iki ana tema etrafında toplandığı; medya etkileşimlerinin, etkileşim kurma, sosyal öğrenme etkisi, medyanın ilişkideki konumu olarak üç ana tema etrafında şekillendiği ve son olarak romantik ilişki yaşantılarının ilişki deneyimleri, ilişki beklentileri, ilişkideki problemler ve flört şiddeti olmak üzere dört ana tema etrafında şekillendiği tespit edilmiştir.
... More specifically, the use of multiple interactions allowed us to identify individual proneness to misestimate flirtation across varied interactions, suggesting a general tendency rather than effects tied to a particular instance or standardized interaction. Third-party observations also help rule out a host of other potential causal factors inherent to flirting in naturalistic first-person encounters, such as one's own motivations for perceiving flirtation (Henningsen, 2004) and perceptions of mate value (Haselton, 2003), that may interface with the processing of facial emotions. ...
Emotional facial expressions are relevant to flirtation because they provide information on an individual’s intentions or motivations. Individual differences in the ability to accurately detect and discriminate between normative facially expressed emotions could lead to misperceptions of the level of sexual interest being conveyed, which has been linked to sexual assault and harassment. To explore this notion, we recruited a national sample of college aged male and female participants (N = 219) who completed a novel facial expression recognition task used to detect accuracy in processing facial emotions of happiness, surprise, anger, and disgust. Participants also viewed multiple video clips of blind dates between two different-sex participants and rated each partner on their degree of flirtatiousness. Consistent with predictions, we found that individuals who misidentified other facial emotions for happiness appeared to overestimate flirtation. Though not predicted, participants who failed to accurately identify happy faces also overestimated flirtation, whereas individuals who took longer to respond to emotional facial expressions and misidentified an emotion as conveying happiness made greater errors in perceptions of flirtatiousness. Overall, these findings suggest that individual differences in the ability to detect and discriminate happiness through facial expressions are relevant to misperceptions of flirtatious behavior, and more broadly illuminates the role of basic emotion recognition on perceptions of flirtatiousness.
... Although flirting could be used for purposes other than mating (Henningsen, 2004;Henningsen, Braz, & Davies, 2008), including building one's own self-esteem (Loe, 1996) or accomplishing an instrumental goal such as having someone to buy you a drink (Yelvington, 1996), it is primarily used to attract mates. Thus, in the context of mating, flirting refers to covert signals sent between individuals to indicate sexual interest and begin courtship (White, Lorenz, Perilloux, & Lee, 2018 see also Frisby, 2009 for flirting between people who are already in a relationship). ...
Flirting is essential for attracting mates yet, many people do poorly in it. Accordingly, the current research aimed to address the question what are dealbreakers in flirting. More specifically, by using open-ended questionnaires in a sample of 212 Greek-speaking participants, Study 1 identified 69 acts and traits that people find off-putting in flirting. Study 2, asked a sample of 734 Greek-speaking participants to rate how off-putting they found these traits in a partner. On the basis of participants' responses, these traits were classified into 11 broader flirting dealbreakers. The most off-putting ones, included having a slimy approach, bad hygiene, and not demonstrating exclusive interest. It was also found that women and older participants were more sensitive to almost all of the identified dealbreakers than men and younger participants.
... Flirtation tactics are thus behaviors that aim to establish initial contact or initiate more romantic or sexual behavior with a potential partner. Flirtation may either aim to acquire sexual contact or establish a romantic relationship (Henningsen, 2004;Moore, 2002;Wade & Feldman, 2016;Whitty, 2003). Thus, flirtation is about what one does (Wade & Feldman, 2016), who one is (Apostolou & Christoforou, 2020), and how one is perceived (Bendixen, Kennair, Biegler, & Haselton, 2019;Hughes, Harrison, & de Haan, 2020). ...
Flirting involves various signals communicated between individuals. To attract potential mates, men and women exhibit flirtatious behavior to get the attention of, and potentially elicit sexual or romantic interest from, a desired partner. In this first large, preregistered study of judgement of the effectiveness of flirtation tactics based on Sexual Strategies Theory, we considered the effects of flirter’s (actor) sex and mating contexts in addition to rater's (participant) sex across two cultures, Norway and the U.S. Culturally relevant covariates such as sociosexuality, extraversion, mate value, age, and religiosity were examined. Participants from Norway (N = 415, 56% women) and the US (N = 577, 69% women) responded to one of four different randomized questionnaires representing a factorial design considering either short-term versus long-term mating context and either female or male sex of actor. We found that sexual availability cues were judged more effective when employed by women in short-term mating contexts. Friendly contact, such as hugs or kissing on the cheek, was not. Cues to generosity and commitment were judged more effective when employed by men in long-term mating contexts. Humor was rated as more effective when used by men and in long-term contexts, and least effective when used by women in short term contexts. However, laughing or giggling at someone's jokes was an effective flirtation tactic for both sexes. Overall, predictions for culturally relevant covariates were not supported, but cultural differences were found in bodily displays, initial contact, and generosity. These findings dovetail neatly with findings from the self-promotion literature, and further support that flirtation is a universal mate signaling strategy.
... 483). In his research on motivations for flirting Henningsen (2004) found six different reasons for flirtatious communication. These include sexual motivation, relational motivation, fun motivation, exploring motivation, esteem motivation and instrumental motivation. ...
Because technologies are frequently used for sexual gratification it seems plausible that artificial communication partners, such as voice assistants, could be used to fulfill sexual needs. While the idea of sexualized interaction with voice assistants has been portrayed in movies (e.g., “Her”), there is a lack of empirical research on the effect of the ontological class (human versus artificial) on the voice’s potential to evoke interest in a sexualized interaction and its perception in terms of sexual attractiveness. The Sexual Interaction Illusion Model (SIIM), which emphasizes influences on sensations evoked by artificial interaction partners, furthermore suggests that there may be contextual influences, especially sexual arousal, that may be crucial for the question of engaging in a sexualized interaction with an artificial entity. To empirically investigate whether the ontological class of the speaker (computer-mediated human in comparison to voice assistants) and the level of sexual arousal affects the heterosexual males’ interest in hearing more flirtatious messages and the perception of the communication partner’s sexual attractiveness, an online experiment with between subject design was conducted. Two hundred and fifty seven respondents were confronted with at least four, and voluntarily six messages from either a computer-mediated human or a flirtatious voice assistant, in interaction with being previously primed sexually or neutrally. The results demonstrated that the effect of sexual arousal was not prevailing on the interest in further messages and the attractiveness perception of the interaction partners, while the ontological class did so. Here, the voice assistant evoked more interest in further messages and the technology itself, while the computer mediated human was perceived to be more sexually attractive and flirtatious, and evoked more social presence. The communication partners social presence was shown to be the predictor with most explanatory power for the interaction partners perceived sexual attractiveness, regardless of whether it was human or artificial. The results underline differences between artificial and human interaction partners, but also underline that especially social presence and the feeling that the user is addressed (in terms of flirtatiousness) is crucial in digitalized intimacy regardless of the ontological class.
... Based on this asymmetry in the two possible inferential errors, Haselton and Buss (2000) hypothesized that men possess intentionreading adaptations that are designed to make the less costly errorto over-infer women's sexual intentin order to minimize the frequency of missed sexual opportunities. In support of this hypothesis, numerous studies have demonstrated that men overestimate women's sexual intent, a phenomenon now known as the 'sexual overperception bias' (e. g., Haselton & Buss, 2000;Haselton, 2003;Henningsen, 2004;Mongeau & Johnson, 1995; for nuanced analyses and discussion, see Henningsen & Henningsen, 2010;Henningsen, Henningsen, McWorthy, McWorthy, & McWorthy, 2011;Koenig, Kirkpatrick, & Ketelaar, 2007). ...
People must make inferences about a potential mate's desirability based on incomplete information. Under such uncertainty, there are two possible errors: people could overperceive a mate’s desirability, which might lead to regrettable mating behavior, or they could underperceive the mate’s desirability, which might lead to missing a valuable opportunity. How do people balance the risks of these errors, and do men and women respond differently? Based on an analysis of the relative costs of these two types of error, we generated two new hypotheses about biases in initial person perception: the Male Overperception of Attractiveness Bias (MOAB) and the Female Underperception of Attractive Bias (FUAB). Participants (N = 398), who were recruited via social media, an email distribution list, and snowball sampling, rated the attractiveness of unfamiliar opposite-sex targets twice: once from a blurred image, and once from a clear image. By randomizing order of presentation (blurred first vs. clear first), we isolated the unique effects of uncertainty—which was only present when the participant saw the blurred image first. As predicted, men overperceived women's attractiveness, on average. By contrast, as predicted, women underperceived men's attractiveness, on average. Because multiple possible decision rules could produce these effects, the effects do not reveal the algorithm responsible for them. We explicitly addressed this level of analysis by identifying multiple candidate algorithms and testing the divergent predictions they yield. This suggested the existence of more nuanced biases: men overperceived the attractiveness of unattractive (but not attractive) women, whereas women underperceived the attractiveness of attractive (but not unattractive) men. These findings highlight the importance of incorporating algorithm in analyses of cognitive biases.
... Almost half a century of research findings shows that men overperceive sexual interest in women (e.g., Abbey, 1982;Henningsen, 2004;Koeppel et al., 1993;La France et al., 2009;Levesque et al., 2006;Treat et al., 2015), a finding aptly termed as the "sexual overperception bias" (Haselton, 2003;Haselton & Buss, 2000). It has been suggested that this bias might rely on (1) projecting one's own interest onto a given partner and (2) on the set of behaviors employed in partner selection (i.e., mating strategy) (Howell et al., 2012;Koenig et al., 2007). ...
A consistent finding in the literature is that men overperceive sexual interest in women (i.e., sexual overperception bias). Several potential mechanisms have been proposed for this bias, including projecting one’s own interest onto a given partner, sexual desire, and self-rated attractiveness. Here, we examined the influence of these factors in attraction detection accuracy during speed-dates. Sixty-seven participants (34 women) split in four groups went on a total of 10 speed-dates with all opposite-sex members of their group, resulting in 277 dates. The results showed that attraction detection accuracy was reliably predicted by projection of own interest in combination with participant sex. Specifically, men were more accurate than women in detecting attraction when they were not interested in their partner compared to when they were interested. These results are discussed in the wider context of arousal influencing detection of partner attraction.
... Communicating with ex-partner back burners may communicatively create fiery limbo, 16,17 tempting admirers to move beyond mere communication and engage in sexual activity with their back burner. The connection between CMC and sex is not surprising: social media helps facilitate sexual flirtation 18,19 (as well as other behaviors related to infidelity). 20 Infidelity should result in negative affect. ...
Back burners are people with whom one communicates to potentially establish a future romantic or sexual relationship, and these relationships are common among college students. Using a sample of noncollege adults currently in committed relationships (N = 246) obtained via Amazon's MTurk, this study examines how a prior relationship role with a desired back burner (i.e., whether a back burner was an ex-partner or not) affects digital communication and sexual activity with back burners, and participants' negative affect. Sequential mediation analysis revealed that when the most-desired back burner was also an ex-partner (vs. not), participants digitally communicated more, increased communication was positively related to sexual activity with that back burner, and sexual activity was associated with negative affect in the participant. Even in the absence of sexual activity, both increased digital communication and simply having an ex-partner as one's most-desired back burner were associated with negative affect. Limitations and implications for staying in touch with ex-partners are discussed.
... Conveying and reading romantic interest in social-sexual encounters between men and women can be complex, because messages are often masked by. This often arises because men and women use a complex interchange of verbal and nonverbal cues to indicate and explore their sexual interest in one another (Henningsen, 2004). Used mainly as a safeguard from potential embarrassment or rejection, these behaviours also allow for multiple interpretations of sexual interest and can result in misperceptions (Lindgren et al., 2008). ...
Although many researchers have documented men’s tendency to interpret individual’s behaviours more sexually than do women, few have considered how perceived sexual interest differs depending on the male–female relationship. This study addresses this gap in a diverse sample of six-hundred participants who viewed one of six vignettes depicting a short interaction between a male and a female actor (targets) where relationship type and alcohol presence were experimentally manipulated. Unexpectedly female participants perceived more sexual interest (from observations of both male and female targets) than males did. Participants rated more sexual interest in the actors who were in the casual dating and long-term dating conditions, compared to the friendly condition. Male and female actors were generally perceived to be equally sexually interested, but when gender role and rape myth attitudes were controlled for, the female actor was perceived to be more sexually interested than the male actor (by both male and female participants). Surprisingly, participants did not perceive more sexual interest when alcohol was present in the interaction compared to when it was not. These findings suggest that while contextual factors can affect perceptions of sexual interest, gender role and rape myth attitudes should also be considered. The implications of the study’s findings are discussed with reference to how men and women are viewed across different situations in susceptibility to sexual misperception, and hence potential sexual aggression.
... One way to overcome this challenge is by flirting. Flirting involves indicating to potential mates that one is interested in dating/spending time with them (see Downey & Vitulli, 1987;Henningsen, 2004;Moore, 2002;Whitty, 2003). Apostolou and Christoforou (2020), whose findings were consistent with Wade and Feldman (2016), report that being intelligent, and having a gentle approach are the most effective flirtation traits. ...
... The people flirt for a variety of reasons including the desire to increase sexual interaction. The motivational needs associated with flirting are sex (wants to have a physical intimacy); fun (as one of activity to feel good); exploring (modality to experience this behavior); relational (enhance intimacy in interaction or relationship); esteem (to enhance one's self-image) and instrumental (goal of getting something out of the relationship) [5]. The present study also had corroboration from error management theory which showed that men tend to over perceive sexual interest from women, while women tend to under perceive sexual interest from men [6]. ...
... Indeed, one of the few programmatic research programs discovered in the entire review of the literature review focused on the relationships between flirting and sexual interest. Specifically, in one study, Henningsen (2004) found that women tended to see flirting as more related to relational initiation or having fun, whereas men were more likely to attribute it to being sexual. A follow-up study Valde, 2006) again revealed that men and women interpret the same flirting interactions differently, with men seeing more cues as indicating sexual interest than did women. ...
This article features a review of communication scholarship about sex from the past two decades (2000-2020). A typographic analysis of relevant research reveals 11 primary topic areas related to how interpersonal sexual communication is commonly researched in communication studies. Six of these topic areas are relationship-oriented in nature: flirting and initiation; pleasure and desire; sexual expectations; relational and sexual satisfaction; communication after sex; and negative aspects of sex and sexuality. Three of the topics are health-oriented in nature: sex education, especially in consideration of how parent-child talk happens in families; negotiation of safe sex practices; and sexual dysfunction. Finally, two of the topics are cultural in nature: social factors and influences; and media influences and representations. Scholarship is also reviewed in terms of theoretical commitments, with most research following sociopsychological or critical traditions but with a noteworthy number also embracing sociocultural or biological paradigms. Based on these observations, five directions are offered for future research: supporting programs of interpersonal sex research; advancing and/or creating methods related to communication sex research; eliminating heteronormativity; considering the practical aspects of sex research; and, perhaps most importantly, theorizing sex as communication.
... Also contributing to an SOE is a disproportionately greater number of men than women present. Consistent with the enactment of traditional gender roles described above, research demonstrates that men are more likely than women to perceive the world in sexual terms and to mistake friendliness for seduction (Abbey, 1982;Edmondson & Conger, 1995;Henningsen, 2004;Saal, Johnson, & Weber, 1989). Other research has alternately suggested that men are able to discriminate between sexually interested and friendly behavior (Shotland & Craig, 1988) but continues to confirm that men perceive more situations in general as sexually oriented than do women. ...
Music videos have been implicated in the dissemination of sexually provocative dance styles, gestures and nudity. The prevalence of the internet has further aggravated the situation, with a myriad of music video websites. Online Nigerian pop music videos have further been named as a media that gains attention from viewers by featuring sexually objectifying content. This study set out to identify elements of sexual objectification in online Nigerian music videos. The study adopted the content analysis research design. 50 online Nigerian pop music video was purposively chosen from a population of top 100 online Nigerian pop music videos from 2014-2018. The instrument for data collection was the code sheet. Data obtained revealed that sexual objectification elements abound in online Nigerian pop music videos. Sexual objectification was evident through stomach, chest/cleavage, upper thigh, and buttocks revelation in shots and that female body parts were often on display. The study also revealed that sexual objectification patterns come in the form of sexual gestures. Females are predominantly seen to carry out self-touching. Touching was predominant among the males. The study recommended that stakeholders in the industry should practice self regulation. There should be a conscious effort to produce Nigeria pop music videos the do not sexually objectify either gender.
... Este comportamiento se ve facilitado por la amplia red de personas a las cuales se puede acceder vía internet (e.g., Facebook), dentro de las cuales pueden estar personas con las cuales alguna vez existió alguna atracción o relación amorosa. Para indagar las motivaciones que tuvo la persona para involucrarse en sexo cibernético en el caso del flirteo, se pueden emplear los parámetros motivacionales propios de las relaciones cara a cara, que son: (a) facilitar el contacto sexual (motivación sexual), (b) para avanzar hacia la concreción de una relación de pareja (motivación relacional), (c) por diversión (motivación de diversión), (d) para explorar la potencialidad de una relación romántica (motivación de explorar), (e) para aumentar la autoestima (motivación de autoestima), y (f) para animar a otros a hacer algo por la persona (motivación instrumental) (Henningsen, 2004;Henningsen, Braz, & Davies, 2008). En experiencia de los autores, la utilización de estas motivaciones y su profundización en la indagatoria, son útiles para el flirteo tanto con y sin anonimato. ...
The technological development of the Internet has facilitated the connectivity between people with very diverse motivations. One is accessing sexual content and connecting with others who share this interest. The use of the Internet for sexual purposes includes a wide range of behaviors, some of which can generate a crisis in a stable and committed couple relationship, being signified as an infidelity. The characteristics of the media and Internet users for sexual purposes, challenges therapists to acquire new psychotherapeutic tools to help couples in conflict. The article aims to a) to disclose the main concepts related to the use of the Internet for sexual purposes (b) to describe the characteristics of the cyber affair and behaviors signified as infidelity (c) to establish psychotherapeutic guidelines for the treatment of this type of cases.
... Wanting to avoid hurting someone's feelings with a direct "no" reflects the expectation that one will go to certain lengths to allow someone to save face (Goffman, 1967). In contrast, men often overestimate women's interest in sex or misperceive friendliness as seduction (Abbey, 1982;Henningsen, 2004); men may also interpret women's indirect or faint refusals as a desire to not appear sexually "easy" (O'Byrne et al., 2006). Together, gendered expectations shape how consent is given and not given. ...
At a moment when college sexual assault is described as an epidemic, it is important to understand college students’ implicit meanings of consent. Through 83 interviews, we examine students’ interpretations of a vignette in which neither character asked nor gave consent to sex. Gendered expectations significantly shaped whether students interpreted the male or female character as giving consent. When considering how students indicate interest in kissing or having sex, students interpreted acts such as leaving a party as indications of a man’s sexual interest and a woman’s willingness. That is, college students “expected” and employed implicit, gendered readings of actions that inform their understandings of implicit consent.
... The usual way to achieve this goal is through flirting, a universal and essential aspect of human interaction (Eibl-Eibesfeldt & Hass, 1967;Luscombe, 2008). Flirting could be used to serve purposes other than mating (Henningsen, 2004;Scheflen, 1965). In particular, people may flirt because it constitutes an enjoyable form of interaction (Guerrero, Andersen & Afifi, 2001), in order to build their own self-esteem (Loe, 1996) and in order to accomplish an instrumental goal, such as having someone to buy them a drink (Yelvington, 1996). ...
Flirting is an essential aspect of human interaction and key for the formation of intimate relationships. In the current research, we aimed to identify the traits that turn it more effective. In particular, in Study 1 we used open-ended questionnaires in a sample of 487 Greek-speaking participants, and identified 47 traits that make flirting effective. In Study 2, we asked 808 Greek-speaking participants to rate how effective each trait would be on them. Using principal components analysis, we classified these traits into nine broader factors. Having a good non-verbal behavior, being intelligent and having a gentle approach, were rated as the most important factors. Sex difference were found for most of the factors. For example, women rated gentle approach as more effective on them, while men rated good looks as more effective. Last but not least, older participants rated factors, such as the "Gentle approach," to be more effective on them.
... Montgomery (1989; referenced in Keyton, 1993, p. 5) observed that, "in general, these behaviors are prosocial, providing relational rewards through positive reinforcement." Across the qualitative literature describing scenes of flirting and sexual banter, these behaviors are described as playful and fun (Abrahams, 1994;Downey & Vitulli, 1987;Giuffre & Williams, 1994;Henningsen, 2004;Henningsen, Braz, & Davies, 2008). ...
The current research examines the understudied consequences of non-harassing social sexual behavior in the workplace. In a programmatic series of studies, we argue and test the proposition that being the recipient of enjoyed social sexual behavior can provide psychosocial resources (such as feeling powerful, socially connected, and physically attractive) that protect recipients from stress and its negative outcomes. In Study 1, we develop and validate a measure of non-harassing social sexual behavior that is conceptually and empirically distinct from sexual harassment and is positively correlated with daily resource accumulation. We also uncover two distinct forms of social sexual behavior: flirtation and sexual storytelling. In Study 2, we use time-lagged data to demonstrate that the frequency of receiving flirtation at work is more positively related to psychosocial resource accumulation to the extent that it is enjoyed, and the resulting resources predict lower levels of stress. Finally, in Study 3, we use multi-source data to demonstrate that enjoyed flirtation buffers the relationship between workplace injustice and the stress-related outcomes of job tension and insomnia.
... Furthermore, women tend to have a lower threshold than men for labeling behaviors as harassing, uncomfortable, offensive, or unacceptable (Basford, Offermann, & Behrend, 2013;Franke, Crown, & Spake, 1997;Henningsen, 2004;McCord, Joseph, Dhanani, & Beus, 2018;Rotundo, Nguyen, & Sackett, 2001;Schumann & Ross, 2010). Thus, objective definitions of inappropriate behavior will be difficult to ascertain, and many violations can occur without explicit overtones or bad intent. ...
... eye contact, laughter, fluency, and vocal tone. Additionally, researchers using scripts of flirtatious acts have found that women are more likely to report flirtation as serving the primary function of "having fun" or maintaining a relationship while men report flirtation as "sex-directed" (Henningsen, 2004). Thus, researchers have collected self-report data on whether the function of flirtation is primarily sexoriented, for fun, or as invitation (Koeppel et al.). ...
Much research in flirtation has been approached from a socio-cognitive perspective and has overemphasized subjective self-reports rather than overt behavior. Existing work pertinent to flirtation is reviewed here in addition to proposing a behavior-analytic perspective on the topic with a conception that includes both rule-governed and contingency-shaped behavior. Of particular interest within a verbal behavior conception of flirtation is the importance of autoclitics—features of a verbal response that affect the listener’s reaction to the rest of the verbal response. Applications of a behavior analytic conception of flirtation and future directions relevant to research on interpersonal relationships are discussed.
... This is consistent with previous research that reported that men have a sexual motivation and interest for flirting. 18 Second, women are more likely to flirt for pleasure. This supports other findings that women flirt because it is fun. ...
The objective of this study was to investigate specific interpersonal communication motives that college students use to flirt through texting versus face to face (FtF). Four hundred college students (101 men, 299 women) were surveyed and reported using various communication motives to flirt using texting with a potential romantic partner. College students reported specific motives for flirting. Women reported flirting through text and FtF for pleasure motives significantly more than men, whereas men reported flirting for control and relaxation. In addition, men were more likely to flirt FtF for escape compared with women. Findings suggest that individuals are likely to flirt for pleasure if they are in a committed romantic relationship compared with those not in a committed relationship.
... This ambiguity creates a risk for misperceiving sexual interest by those responding to sexual cues. The tendency for women to interpret cross-sex interaction as less sexually charged than men makes ambiguity particularly fraught (Abbey, 1982;Abbey & Melby, 1986;Henningsen, 2004;Henningsen, Henningsen, & Valde, 2006;Johnson, Stockdale, & Saal, 1991;Shotland & Craig, 1988) and may lead men to have comparatively higher expectations for sexual activity, which is a known risk factor for sexual assault perpetration (Muehlenhard & Linton, 1987). ...
Sexual victimization of women by men on college campuses is a growing societal concern, with research identifying a host of situational and characterological factors that may predict men’s likelihood to engage in sexual misconduct. In the present study, we examined the relative contribution and potential interplay of these various determinants on college men’s perceptions of women’s sexual desire and consent in hypothetical dating scenarios depicting a sexual interaction. We found that the men (N = 145) in this sample (a) conflated sexual desire with consent, (b) varied their appraisals of consent and desire depending on whether and how the woman in the vignette communicated consent or refusal, (c) perceived higher levels of consent if the man in the vignette had intercourse with the woman previously and as a function of escalating sexual intimacy in the ongoing interaction, (d) endorsed higher levels of perceived desire and consent across situations if they more strongly held rape-supportive attitudes, and (e) moderated their association between situational factors and perceptions of a woman’s sexual intentions based on their endorsement of rape myths and a hypermasculine ideology. We conclude that efforts to prevent sexual violence among college students may benefit from being modeled on our findings that some men are likelier to infer consent regardless of the situation, that specific situational factors can foster misperceptions of consent across men in general, and that certain individuals in particular situations may pose the greatest risk for sexual misconduct.
Technological advances have brought a revolution in communication, which in turn has influenced many aspects of personal relationships. According to the literature, young adults utilize the newest technological means in their communications and sexting has become a frequent means of sexual communication in romantic relationships. On the one hand, sexting is captured as a tremendous concern due to its possible negative effects on individual and relational level, but on the other, it is seen as part of normal sexual development which could also promote partners' sexuality and satisfaction. The aim of this chapter is to build on the existing literature to explore the determinants of sexting, as well as the effects of sexting on romantic relationships, by focusing on young university adults. The chapter will conclude with implications for education, clinical practice, and policy, which could facilitate practitioners' work, as well as others who directly and indirectly relate to young university students.
How and where do individuals signal their desire to become romantically involved with another person, and who initiates this process? Although this is a theorized transitional stage in relationship-development models, answers to these questions do not currently exist because prior research has focused largely on the sexual-interest phase of human relationships (i.e., flirtation). Four independent samples of cisgender, heterosexual students at three universities (total N = 688) reported on who (man, woman, both) expressed romantic interest first, where it was expressed, and the cues (verbal, nonverbal) that were used. Men and women agreed on who signaled first, where, and the verbal and nonverbal cues that were used by each other. Our discussion focuses on how the expression of romantic interest is not only memorable to men and women, but also different from what has been documented in the literature about flirtation among cis-gender, heterosexual individuals.
This chapter primarily covers the nonverbal expression of sexual interest in cisgender, heterosexual individuals, from their libidinal urges to their post-sex behaviors, with a major focus on flirtation. The focus on flirtation necessitates consideration of the theoretical frameworks and methodological issues that might elucidate, cloud, or distort a true understanding of this domain of scientific inquiry. In part 1, a new framework for defining and discussing gender differences in the human courtship sequence (e.g., expressions of sexual interest or flirting) is offered. In part 2, historical and contemporary research pertaining to how sexual interest is nonverbally expressed and gender differences in the same are discussed in the following areas: sex drive; flirtation; sexual arousal; consent to sex; sex activity; the orgasm gap; and post-copulation. Findings pertaining to non-heterosexual individuals are integrated within each of the covered areas, unless they were extensive enough to warrant separate treatment, which was the case with flirtation and sexual consent.
Research typically examines the effectiveness of different hook-up strategies used by people to attract potential partners. And yet, only a limited number of studies have addressed self-perceptions regarding flirting skills and which variables contribute to those perceptions. To address this research gap, we developed the Perceived Flirting Self-Efficacy (PFSE) scale and assessed its psychometric properties and individual correlates in a sample of Colombian young adults (N = 857). Results showed the validity and reliability of this measure in assessing perceived self-efficacy for flirting in both social media (PFSE-SM) and face-to-face contexts (PFSE-F2F). Multiple regression analyses showed that higher PFSE-SM scores were associated with being younger, sociosexually unrestricted, and more connected to social networks. Higher PFSE-F2F scores were associated with being more extroverted, more open to experiences, sociosexually unrestricted, and more connected to social networks. Our findings highlight the importance of distinguishing flirting behaviors in different contexts, emphasizing the importance of future research to delve deeper into self-perceptions when examining flirting dynamics.
Why do people fall in love? Does passion fade with time? What makes for a happy, healthy relationship? This introduction to relationship science follows the lifecycle of a relationship – from attraction and initiation, to the hard work of relationship maintenance, to dissolution and ways to strengthen a relationship. Designed for advanced undergraduates studying psychology, communication or family studies, this textbook presents a fresh, diversity-infused approach to relationship science. It includes real-world examples and critical-thinking questions, callout boxes that challenge students to make connections, and researcher interviews that showcase the many career paths of relationship scientists. Article Spotlights reveal cutting-edge methods, while Diversity and Inclusion boxes celebrate the variety found in human love and connection. Throughout the book, students see the application of theory and come to recognize universal themes in relationships as well as the nuances of many findings. Instructors can access lecture slides, an instructor manual, and test banks.
Role‐taking is the process of mentally and affectively placing the self in the position of another. This study used a mixed‐methods approach to highlight how a traditional sexual script often imposes gendered expectations of role‐taking. To explore role‐taking within flirtatious exchanges, a sample of college students read a Snapchat conversation and then inferred what each character was thinking and feeling. Hooking up was the most common qualitative theme among the undergraduate participants; however, this theme was more prominent when considering the perspective of the male character, and this expectation was strengthened by the presence of emoji. The male character was expected to be excited or aroused, more focused on social cues—such as their roommate not being present—and to have the female character over to study as a way to pressure her for physical intimacy. The participants were more likely to think that the female character just wanted to study, was anxious or nervous, and was more aware of the male character's perspective. These findings highlight the complex nature of conveying sexual interest, which often forefronts desire and agency from a male perspective.
Order and stability are tenuous and fragile. People have to work to create and sustain a semblance of stability and order in their lives and in their organizations and larger communities. Order on the Edge of Chaos compares different ideas about how we coordinate and cooperate. The ideas come from 'micro-sociology', and they offer new answers to the classic question of Thomas Hobbes: 'how is social order possible?' The most common answers in sociology, political science, and economics assume a fundamental tension between individual and group interests. This volume reveals that social orders are problematic even without such tension, because when people interact with each other, they verify their identities, feel and respond to emotions, combine different goal frames, and develop shared responsibility. The ties of people to groups result from many aspects of their social interactions, and these cannot be explained by individual self-interest.
This Chapter “Models of rational love” presents realistic and pragmatic models of love, which are opposites of romantic models. They have been common in real life of people throughout centuries. The modern scholarship has elaborated several specific rational models, which consider love in light of such characteristics as investment, social, and economic exchange. The communal and equitable models of love are juxtaposed here—they are rational, yet different from others in the group. This chapter also describes such psychologically disengaged love, which can be labeled as role-play, gamified, and ludus models of love. They came under the umbrella term of performing models because they are the exhibiting and demonstrative ways of love, rather than really experiencing ones. Their joy is the joy of an actor and gambler.KeywordsRational loveRealistic lovePragmatic loveIdeal loveChoice in loveIdealistic perception in loveRealistic perception in loveLove as actionLove through doingLove as exchangeMobility in loveLove as investmentEmotional investment in loveCommunal loveEquitable loveEquity in loveEquality in loveLove as a playLove as a gameLove as performanceFlirting in lovePlayful loveMating gameSexual gameRelationship gameLudus loveLove as manipulationLove as conquering
Romantic partners expect and follow implicit rules for flirtatious texting. This mixed-methods exploratory study reviewed survey data and content analyzed flirtatious texts from 200 participants to discover specific communication rules and the level of flirtatious texting similarity. Each participant uploaded five to seven screenshots of recent flirtatious texts for analysis. Coding included similarity in emoji use, message length, timing, and the number of texts sent. Results from the quantitative survey, open-ended questions, and coding of 1042 uploaded screenshots revealed that communicators desire and provide a high degree of similarity when flirting, including emoji use as well as the length, frequency, and timing of texts.
Current models of romantic relationship development in cisgender, heterosexual individuals have a gap. They include the initial stages of human courtship—what happens before people become romantically committed (for example, flirting), and they also focus on what happens after a romantic relationship has been established. We focus on the missing phase, which we call the communication of romantic interest. This is the point in this sequence when at least one person’s desire or intention to enter into an emotionally (and, possibly sexually) close, committed relationship is expressed. We compare the verbal and nonverbal cues used by men and women to flirt, based on the literature, to those they use to express romantic interest, based on our research. Finally, we emphasize the need to explore the courtship process for different genders and sexual orientations, which is important for both theoretical and practical reasons.
Background: This study is the promotion of a series of studies on ludic competence/playfulness, one of the seven components of which is flirt. Purpose: To define and describe the semantic parameters of the stimulus “flirting person” in the linguistic consciousness of the Russian-speaking people of Ukraine. Materials and Methods: The main method of the research was a psycholinguistic experiment whose major stage was the controlled associative experiment with the stimulus “flirting person”. The sample comprised 215 young people (aged 21-35), 112 females and 103 males. Results: The experiment results allowed to define 26 semantic parameters for the stimulus “flirting person” including: (flirting person) – what is the person by marital status?, what is state of the person’s finances?, how cultured is the person?, etc. 26 association fields have been respectively built. This study describes the association field of the semantic parameter “Motive – why is the person flirting?” – “By motive – what is the motive?”. The analysis of the obtained reactions made it possible to single out and describe such clusters of this semantic parameter, core clusters (equals or more than 10%): “exploratory motive” (29.77%), “social motive” (17.21%), “sexual motive” (17.21%), “entertaining motive” (15.81%); peripheral clusters (less than 10% and more than 1%): “assertive motive (self-esteem)” (7.44%), “instrumental motive” (7.44%); “indefinite motive” (2.79%), “intrinsic motive” (2.33%); extreme periphery clusters (less than or equal to 1% and more than 0.5%); single case cluster: “polymotivation” (0.47%). Conclusions: The semantic content of this semantic parameter depends on gender identification based on the results of the analysis of female and male associative fields. Males are driven by the sexual or indefinite motives, whereas females have social and entertaining ones.
Given the vast amount of time people spend communicating at work, relationships naturally develop. In addition, friends or romantic partners sometimes become coworkers. These interpersonal relationships involve work and life dimensions. We refer to them as personal workplace relationships: voluntary, informal, mutual, and consensual relationships between two members of the same organization that are marked by a strong emotional component and the partners’ knowing and communicating with each other as whole, unique persons. In this review, we summarize research examining these relationships. Specifically, studies of workplace peers, workplace friendships, and workplace romances are reviewed. In doing so, we highlight key research and theoretical perspectives from various disciplines. The review concludes with a discussion and recommendations for future research.
The current studies examined why hospitality employees flirt with customers, and the interaction between flirting and authentic or faked emotional displays. In Study 1, 245 restaurant servers reported their flirting motivations, emotional labor strategy, and perceived rapport. Flirting motivations had a positive effect on rapport when servers engaged in either surface acting or deep acting but not when servers engaged less in emotional labor strategies. In Study 2, 130 servers reported their flirting displays, emotional labor strategies and tip sizes. Flirting displays only increased tips when deep acting was involved. The theoretical and practical implications of flirting are discussed.
O flerte se apresenta como importante estratégia para exprimir o desejo pelo outro. Este artigo reflete sobre como os diferentes agenciamentos e affordances dos serviços online de paquera transformam os relacionamentos na contemporaneidade. Após uma historicização das práticas amorosas e sexuais em diferentes tempos e culturas, este artigo discute os resultados de um questionário online que obteve 397 respostas. Conforme nossos achados, comprovou-se que Tinder é o aplicativo mais popular no segmento. Para além da busca por parceiros sexuais, identificou-se significativo uso desses serviços digitais para encontros românticos. Discute-se também as formas de apresentação de si e abordagem, a centralidade das imagens na interface desses sistemas, as conversações fluidas, a transição do flerte do ambiente online para o offline e a agência dos aplicativos.
To understand the frequencies and communicative motivations of men engaging in street harassment, men’s tolerance of sexual harassment, and the relationship between power and street harassment experiences for both men and women using the frameworks of dyadic power theory and feminist theories, we surveyed 348 undergraduate participants at a university in the Pacific United States. Results indicated that men who believe they have lower power than women were the most likely to report engaging in street harassment. Results also indicated a positive relationship between men’s reported tolerance for sexual harassment and men’s reports of engaging in street harassment.
Love and Electronic Affection: A Design Primer brings together thought leadership in romance and affection games to explain the past, present, and possible future of affection play in games. The authors apply a combination of game analysis and design experience in affection play for both digital and analog games. The research and recommendations are intersectional in nature, considering how love and affection in games is a product of both player and designer age, race, class, gender, and more. The book combines game studies with game design to offer a foundation for incorporating affection into playable experiences.
The text is organized into two sections. The first section covers the patterns and practice of love and affection in games, explaining the patterns and practice. The second section offers case studies from which designers can learn through example. Love and Electronic Affection: A Design Primer is a resource for exploring how digital relationships are offered and how to convey emotion and depth in a variety of virtual worlds.
This book provides:
• A catalog of existing digital and analog games for which love and affection are a primary or secondary focus.
• A catalog of the uses of affection in games, to add depth and investment in both human-computer and player-to-player engagement.
• Perspective on affection game analyses and design, using case studies that consider the relationship of culture and affection as portrayed in games from large scale studios to single author independent games.
• Analysis and design recommendations for incorporating affection in games beyond romance, toward parental love, affection between friends, and other relationships.
• Analysis of the moral and philosophical considerations for historical and planned development of love and affection in human–computer interaction.
• An intersectionality informed set of scholarly perspectives from the Americas, Eurasia, and Oceania.
This study examined the flirtation phenomenon in hospitality services, particularly whether flirting displays comprise an expression of emotional labor or a manifestation of commercial friendship. The study explored two samples. Forty structured in-depth interviews were conducted, 20 with hospitality employees and 20 with customers, eliciting their respective views of flirting during bar interactions. Findings suggest that flirting derives from mixed motives aimed at establishing a special atmosphere. Unlike emotional labor, flirting requires a prior acquaintance with the customer. Managers indirectly encourage hospitality employees to flirt to maintain an appropriate customer feeling. Customers saw flirting as a kind of game employees ‘play’ to increase profits. Flirting comprises an element of hospitality employees’ informal protocol, irrespective of the customer’s message. Customers perceived flirting as a blatant violation of the normative commercial friendship. Benefits and costs of flirting to both employee and customer are discussed. Practical implications are offered.
Fifteen strategies were inductively derived from written accounts of subjects' attempts to intensify dating relationships. Both gender and the question of whether one's self or one's partner was first to want an intensified relationship significantly affected reported strategy use. In addition, the results suggested that intensification may be a multiple-act process in most relationships and that the strategies of `increase contact' and `increase rewards' may be important in the construction of strategy sequences. Multivariate analysis revealed that Intimate versus Nonintimate, and Dominant versus Submissive were underlying dimensions of the typology, and that the strategies grouped together into four clusters called Social Rewards and Attraction, Implicitly Expressed Intimacy, Passive and Indirect, and Verbal Directness and Intimacy.
Ethological researchers have demonstrated that during courtship, women exhibit a constellation of subtle facial expressions and gestures commonly labeled flirting. According to the tenets of evolutionary psychology, women are expected to use nondirect tactics to signal interest in a potential partner because their greater investment in the outcome requires the selection of a partner more willing to invest resources in the relationship. Such tactics may require experience to refine signaling effectiveness. In the current research, I attempted to uncover evidence for developmental differences in courtship behavior by using field methodology. Adolescent girls were covertly observed in mixed‐gender settings to document the number and type of facial expressions and gestures used to indicate interest in boys. These data were compared to similar work done with women in the construction of a catalog of nonverbal courtship signals. The results showed girls used many of the same signals commonly exhibited by women in earlier studies. There were, however, striking differences, such as the more frequent use of play or teasing behavior and the exaggerated form of many signals. These findings help to explain the process through which women acquire and refine the nonverbal behaviors used in courtship.
There is a class of nonverbal facial expressions and gestures, exhibited by human females, that are commonly labeled “flirting behaviors.” I observed more than 200 randomly selected adult female subjects in order to construct a catalog of these nonverbal solicitation behaviors. Pertinent behaviors were operationally defined through the use of consequential data; these behaviors elicited male attention. Fifty-two behaviors were described using this method. Validation of the catalog was provided through the use of contextual data. Observations were conducted on 40 randomly selected female subjects in one of four contexts: a singles' bar, a university snack bar, a university library, and at university Women's Center meetings. The results indicated that women in “mate relevant” contexts exhibited higher average frequencies of nonverbal displays directed at males. Additionally, women who signaled often were also those who were most often approached by a man: and this relationship was not context specific.I suggest that the observation of women in field situations may provide clues to criteria used by females in the initial selection of male partners. As much of the work surrounding human attraction has involved laboratory studies or data collected from couples in established relationships, the observation of nonverbal behavior in field settings may provide a fruitful avenue for the exploration of human female choice in the preliminary stages of male-female interaction.
This study examined maintenance strategies used by hetero-sexual participants in opposite-sex friendships. Individual reasons for adhering to a platonic relational definition and equity were used to predict maintenance behaviors. Factor analyses revealed six reasons for maintaining opposite-sex friendships as platonic: Not Attracted, Network Disapproval, Time Out, Safeguard Relationship, Third Party, and Risk Aversion. Relying on equity theory, we also investigated maintenance strategies of Support, No Flirting, Share Activity, Openness, Avoidance, and Positivity according to equity group membership. Finally, both motives and inequity (overbenefitedness and underbenefitedness) were associated with the use of six maintenance strategies. Results revealed that positive and proactive maintenance behaviors were used in equitable (versus under-or overbenefited) friendships and that reasons for maintaining the platonic nature of opposite-sex friendships predict maintenance strategies that friends employ. In particular, Safeguard Relationship was a consistent predictor of maintenance behaviors. (ln)equity also predicted the use of four maintenance strategies. Overall, support was found for using people's motives in conjunction with equity to predict relational maintenance strategies of opposite-sex friends.
Sexual, racial and other forms of harassment may create a devastating impact on individuals affected and can lead to severe loss of morale and efficiency. Examines issues surrounding this sensitive area which relate to legal definition, organisational policies in general and the hospitality industry specifically. Provides evidence of the current views on sexual harassment of hospitality industry personnel directors. Examines issues of hospitality service staff, encouraged to sell “sexuality” or “flirt” as a job requirement.
This study examined the reported frequency of flirtation behaviors in cross‐sex platonic and romantic relationships. Four types of flirtation behavior were revealed through factor analysis: display, stereotyped, attentiveness, and conversational behaviors. Results revealed that although both cross‐sex platonic and romantically involved partners report using flirtation to varying degrees, how flirtatiousness is actually displayed and how it relates to evaluations of appropriateness and communication competence differs between the two types of relationships. Discussion examines the nature of flirtation behaviors in cross‐sex platonic relationships and the ways in which these behaviors differ from those of romantic cross‐sex relationships.
Through empirical studies we explored the perceived effectiveness and reported usage of tactics to promote sexual encounters. In the first study (N = 58) we identified 122 acts and 34 tactics for promoting sexual encounters. In the second study (N = 50) we examined the perceived effectiveness of each tactic when used by a man and when used by a woman. In the third study (N = 100) we examined the reported frequency with which men and women performed each tactic, as well as the frequency of beingtherecipient of each tactic from the other sex. Tactics were generally perceived as more effective for women than for men. Women were particularly effective, however, when conveying signals of immediate sexual access and enhanced physical appearance. Despite the effectiveness of signaling immediate sexual access, women performed these acts only infrequently. The most effective male tactics for promoting a sexual encounter involved investing time and attention and communicating love and commitment to a woman. Overall, the sexes showed much similarity in what types of tactics they performed, despite the large differences in perceived effectiveness, largely because women typically refrained from performing the most effective tactics for promoting sexual encounters. Discussion focuses on a framework for understanding the sex of actor differences in tactic effectiveness and performance and on examining the factors that likely contribute to sexual miscommunication.
Conducted a laboratory experiment in which a male and female participated in a 5-min conversation while a hidden male and female observed this interaction. 36 sessions, involving 144 undergraduates, were completed. Male actors and observers rated the female actor as being more promiscuous and seductive than did female actors and observers. Males were also more sexually attracted to the opposite-sex actor than were females, and rated the male actor in a more sexualized fashion. Results suggest that males are more likely than females to perceive interactions in sexual terms and to make sexual judgments. Males seem to perceive friendliness from females as seduction, but this appears to be merely one manifestation of a broader male sexual orientation. (25 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
In four conditions, a female confederate established eye contact with a male in a drinking establishment. Eye contact was established once or multiple times within a 5-min. period. After eye contact was established, the confederate smiled or did not smile. In a fifth condition, the female smiled and looked down in the general direction of the designated subject. The dependent variable was whether or not the subject approached and talked to the confederate within a 10-min. period. Two attractive female confederates were each assigned 10 subjects in each of the five conditions. The highest approach behavior (60%) was observed in the condition in which there was repeated eye contact plus smiling. In each of the remaining four conditions, the confederate was approached less than 20% of the time. It was suggested that males may need certain encouragement before approaching a female stranger in a bar environment and that this encouragement is most likely to be effective when it is both repeated and when it is delivered by multiple nonverbal channels.
Results of several studies indicate that men attribute more sexual meaning to heterosexual interactions than do women. Based on Abbey's (1982) findings, we hypothesized that males, in comparison to females, would attribute more sexuality to opposite-sex partners. Based on findings from several self-monitoring dating studies, we predicted that high self-monitors would rate their partners and themselves higher on sexuality and likability traits than would low self-monitors. A laboratory study was conducted in which mixed-sex pairs of participants discussed their likes and dislikes about college life. Participants then rated themselves and their opposite-sex partners on a set of sexuality and likability trait adjectives and indicated their interest in getting to know their partner better. Results supported the gender hypotheses, whereas they only partially supported the self-monitoring predictions. The self-monitoring effects on self-ratings of sexuality and partner ratings of likability are used to explain why high self-monitors are more successful than low self-monitors in establishing heterosexual relationships.
In this study, two phases of the initiation of courtship behavior are distinguished, namely the first move of making the contact, and the self-presentation after the contact has been established. Gender differences with respect to cognitions and expectations of courtship behavior were analyzed through self-report in a Dutch Caucasian student population. Our goal was to assess male and female roles in these two phases, and to relate the findings to hypothesized gender role changes. It appeared that both men and women were apparently unaware of which gender usually initiates courtship. Furthermore, both genders reported eye contact as the most frequently used initiation tactic. However, the genders differed in other tactics, women reporting the use of indirect nonverbal tactics more often than men, and men reporting their engagement in direct verbal ones more often than women. In presenting themselves, men stressed personal characteristics that are traditionally interpreted as female-valued (such as tenderness) more than women did, whereas women stressed characteristics that are traditionally interpreted as male-valued (such as being prestigiously occupied) more than men did. This apparent change in gender role pattern is discussed against the background of the assumed function of courtship behavior and societal developments.
A new method for the assessment of qualitative description of nonverbal behavior (automatic movie analysis) is introduced. This model-free method does not use any assumptions on the structure and organization of nonverbal behavior. Cross-cultural comparison (Germany, Japan) of unobtrusively filmed initial interactions between 2 opposite-sex strangers revealed no consistent courtship repertoire of directly observable behavior categories. Furthermore, an extensive analysis of gaze behavior and speech revealed differences between the countries but also showed no consistent relation to interest. Motion energy detection demonstrated in both cultures that female movement quality score (number of movements, duration, size, speed, and complexity) covaries with female interest. This effect is in concordance with the theory that in early stages of interactions manipulative efforts occur in order to avoid possible deception in high-risk situations.
Although ethologists have detailed courtship rituals for many species, courting behavior of humans has not received extensive study from an ethological standpoint. Yet there are clearly facial expressions and gestures that are commonly labeled "flirting behaviors." These nonverbal signals have been documented recently by several investigators in field studies, but the receptivity of nonverbal courtship signals is still in question. The current research project attempted to assess the perceptual skill of naive male and female observers who were presented videotaped samples of females' nonverbal courtship and rejection behaviors and asked to rate their intensity. The results showed that overall, men rated invitational behaviors more positively than women. In contrast, signals of rejection were seen by men as sending a less potent message than that perceived by women. Evolutionary theory may offer a framework for understanding these results.
Depending on its location, epiploic appendagitis may mimic nearly any acute abdominal condition. We present the case of a patient with left lower quadrant pain. Sonography demonstrated an ovoid, hyperechoic, noncompressible lesion at the point of tenderness but no inflammatory changes in the adjacent colonic wall. Color Doppler sonography showed no flow in the lesion. Based on the sonographic diagnosis of epiploic appendagitis, conservative treatment was given, with complete recovery in 5 days. Awareness of these sonographic findings may aid in the early diagnosis of epiploic appendagitis and avoid unnecessary treatment. (C) 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
The objective of this exploratory research was to quantify the attributional responses of a number of demographic groups of college students with respect to their perception of diverse flirting situations. 93 undergraduates were classified along 7 demographic variables including marital status, sex, age, college class, grade-point average, ethnic origin, and religious affiliation. A 32-item questionnaire pertaining to interpersonal flirting was constructed to represent a wide range of situations. The questionnaire was administered to students in classroom situations. A Kruskal-Wallis one-way analysis of variance by ranks applied to individual items across different demographic groups offered support for certain widely held beliefs such as the findings that men show more interest in returning a flirtation, and married people are less likely to want to follow up a flirtation. Other results were quite unexpected, such as women and single people being less optimistic about the number of people they could “seduce” if they chose to try. Attributions are discussed in terms of intentions or behaviors.
(from the preface) This book of selected readings is appropriate for undergraduates taking a 1st or 2nd course in nonverbal communication, and for beginning graduate students who would like to see a sampling of classic and contemporary work in the nonverbal area. The 1st part defines basic terms related to nonverbal communication, describes nonverbal communication skills, and provides an overview of common nonverbal research methods. The 2nd part describes the "areas" of nonverbal communication, including the body, face, and eyes; appearance and adornment; space and touch; the voice and silence; and the environment and time. The 3rd part focuses on how messages from the different codes work together to accomplish goals such as sending emotional or relational messages, managing interaction, or persuading and influencing others. The 4th and final part examines 5 communication theories that focus on how messages are exchanged between interaction partners. Taken together, the 4 sections of this reader introduce students to the field of nonverbal communication, give them an in-depth look at each of the nonverbal codes, illustrate how messages from various codes work together to fulfill communication functions, and explain how people respond to the messages of others.
This article is based on ethnographic research carried out in a factory in Trinidad. In the factory, almost all the line workers are Black and East Indian women, while all of their supervisors are men, most of whom are White, the rest being East Indian. Relations between female workers and their male co-workers and supervisors are characterized by a cultural idiom here called flirting. Flirting is analysed in a serious way in order to explicate it not only as an idiom for expressing sexuality and desire, but as a medium for the constitution and construction of identities as well as an instrument for the exercise of power along the axes of ethnicity, class and gender.
Research indicates that males perceive people to be more interested in sex than do women and are less able than women to differentiate among liking, love, and sexual involment. Does this mean, as Abbey (1982) hypothesized, that males cannot differentiate between friendly and sexually interested behavior? Videotapes were prepared of five couples, each showing a male and a female behaving in either a friendly or a sexually interrested fashion. The design was 2 (sex of subject) X 2 (male intent) X 2 (female intent) X 2 (sex of actor), with sex of actor as a within-subject factor. The data were analyzed by means of a MANOVA. Results of subjects' ratings of videotapes indicate that 1) males perceive both males and females as having more sexual interest than do females, and 2) both males and females differentiate between friendly and interested behavior. We concluded that 1) males and females have different thresholds for the perception of sexual intent, and 2) members of either sex can make errors, depending upon their perceptual threshold and the emotivity of the actors. The gender difference in the perception of sexual intent is thought to result from the male's greater sexual appetite, which the male uses as a model for the attribution of the appetites of others.
A set of three studies replicated and extended Abbey's (1982) research, indicating that men perceive less friendliness, but more sexuality than women when observing women's social interactions. Study 1 was based on 49 previously unacquainted male-female pairs who engaged in brief face-to-face discussions, and 48 males and 61 females who observed one of those discussions. Study 2 was based on videotaped exchanges between a male store manager and a female cashier, and Study 3 between a male professor and a female student; 75 males and 88 females participated in Study 2, while 98 males and 102 females participated in Study 3. In all three studies, the men saw less friendliness, but more “sexiness” in the woman's behavior than the women. These results support the idea that some of the less severe forms of sexual harassment in business and academic settings may be better understood eventually through research and theory development that considers these sex differences in social perceptions.
This article discusses three basic strategies used by women coal miners to manage sexual harassment. “Ladies” sought to cast men into roles as gentlemen and withdrew socially when they encountered offensive behavior. This approach was often effective for older women but inhibited Ladies' promotion aspirations. “Flirts” engaged in interactions with men in a way perceived to be seductive. They were likely to receive come-ons from men which Flirts interpreted as flattery. However, they experienced severe harassment as a consensus grew that the women were using their sexuality to obtain preferential treatment. “Tomboys” emphasized an identity as miners and engaged in jocular/sexual interactions associated with the work role. They experienced a great deal of sexual “razzing” but this was often intended and interpreted as friendly, inclusionary treatment. Those Tomboys who reciprocated the level of vulgarity typical of men, however, risked escalation of razzing into harassing episodes that distressed them. Policy implications of the study include supportive programs for women and greater structuring in training and assignment procedures.
This study examined observers' perceptions of nine different types of touch (including a "no touch" control condition) used in cross-sex relationships between coworkers. Results showed that face touch sends particularly strong relational and emotional messages. A soft touch in the cheek area of the face was seen as signaling more affection, attraction, flirtation, and love than the other types of touch. Face touch was also rated as the most inappropriate and sexually harassing of the nine types of touch examined. Arm around the waist was also rated as showing relatively high levels of attraction and flirtation, as well as inappropriateness and harassment. No touch and handshaking conveyed the most formality. Observers rated women as more affectionate, trusting, happy, and composed than men across the touch conditions. Men, however, were judged to be more attracted to their cross-sex partners than were women. These and other findings are discussed to shed light on the multiple interpretations of touch within the context of relationships between cross-sex coworkers.
This study examined whether gender differences in sexually based perceptions of social interactions persist when traditional male-female power roles are reversed, when the interaction becomes progressively more sexually harassing, and when the response to the harassment is accepting or rejecting. A laboratory experiment was conducted in which 187 female and 165 male undergraduate students viewed a 5-minute videotape. Twelve versions of a scenario depicting a professor interacting with a cross-sex student were created which manipulated the sex of the powerholder, level of harassment, and response to harassment. Results indicated that men perceived the female target as behaving in a “sexier” manner regardless of her status, the level of harassment, or the victim's response. Women's sexually based perceptions of the most harassing male professor were greater than men's, however. Incorporating these gender differences in perceptions into a much-needed comprehensive model of sexual harassment (Zedeck & Cascio, 1984) appears to be warranted.
The use of direct verbal sexual initiative by females and its reported effect on male partners were examined employing a sample of college students. It was found that over one‐half of the females reported directly asking for sex. These women were no more likely to report being rebuffed by their male partners than those not employing direct means. Additionally, females asking directly were found to be generally less conventional, more assertive, more likely to be involved with males who also use explicit means of asking for sex and whom they regarded as able to cope with direct female requests. On the other hand, males tended to report compliance with their female partner's request for sex whether direct or indirect. When sex occasionally did not occur when requested, very few individuals reported the type of approach of self or other as the main reason for noncompliance. Finally, the evidence indicates a generalized belief among the females that males may be “turned off” by female sexual assertiveness.
Recently the question of sexual interaction between students and educators has emerged as a significant social issue. In order to determine the purpose and consequences of one form of sexual interaction between students and faculty, namely, flirting, a questionnaire was mailed to 391 students attending a private college in the midwest. This questionnaire asked subjects a number of fixed‐choice questions regarding their personal characteristics, their conception of what constituted flirting between faculty and students, their perception of the frequency and consequences of such flirting, and their own flirting experiences with faculty. Of the 184 respondents (59.8% female and 41.2% male), over one‐third of both sexes reported flirting with their instructors, while 46% of females and 32% of males felt that instructors had flirted with them. Nearly three‐quarters of the subjects believed that flirting could raise a female student's grade. About one‐half of the subjects believed flirting could raise a male student's grade as well. Less than 25% of the subjects however, indicated that flirting might lower a student's grade. Despite these findings, only 8% of the subjects reported that their grades had been changed as a result of flirting, and only 4.4% considered flirting to be a serious problem on campus. These findings are discussed in terms of sex differences in the perception and consequences of flirting, sex role expectations, the students' use of flirting as an effective grade strategy, and possible sexual harassment of students by their instructors.
Perceptual dimensions underlying flirtatiousness judgments were examined in a three‐phased study. This study was conducted to answer the following research questions: (a) What perceptual dimensions underlie flirtatiousness judgments? (b) Do men and women use similar perceptual dimensions in assessing flirtatiousness? and (c) Do men and women vary in the degree to which they employ these perceptual dimensions in making their judgments? Based on an INDSCAL procedure and regression analyses completed on the sorting data of 94 participants (47 men and 47 women), six perceptual dimensions underlying flirtatiousness judgments were found: sexual assertiveness, overtness, invitation, playfulness, nonverbalness, and unconventionality. Additionally, men and women used identical dimensions in assessing the flirtatiousness of the episodes employed as stimuli. With a slight exception for perceptions of invitation, men and women judged the flirtation episodes similarly on the uncovered dimensions. The practical and theoretical implications of these results are discussed.
Two studies identified 21 verbal and 15 nonverbal cues that convey a woman's interest in dating a man. Lists were compiled of 23 verbal and 18 nonverbal behaviors that seemed likely to be cues. For each behavior, two sets of male-female conversations were videotaped. For verbal behaviors, there were two conversations per set, one that used the behavior and one that did not. For nonverbal behaviors, there were three conversations per set, in which the woman used a high, medium, or low level of the cue. In a between-subjects design, 551 male and 225 female undergraduates watched the tapes and rated the probability that the woman would accept a date with the man. In addition, men rated the female model's attractiveness, and women rated the appropriateness of her behavior and the likelihood that they would behave similarly. A behavior was considered to be a cue if men thought the woman was more likely to accept a date with the man when she engaged in the behavior. The role that sending cues plays in women's dating initiation and the importance of empirically investigating what skills to teach in social skills training programs are discussed.
This study investigated how men's cue-reading skills relate, to their dating frequency and Survey of HeteroSexual Interactions (SHI) scores. A series of 2-min male-female conversations was shown to 106 male undergraduates. After each conversation, participants rated: (a) whether the woman was positive, neutral, or negative toward the man, (b) how certain they were of their ratings, and (c) the probability of the woman's accepting a date with the man. Cue-reading skill was measured in terms of how well participants judged what each woman was trying to convey and how close they were to the group consensus. High- and low-frequency daters did not differ significantly on any measure of cue-reading skill or certainty about their ratings. Participants with high, moderate, and low SHI scores differed significantly on only one of three measures of cue-reading skill: Moderate-SHIs were closer to the consensus than high-SHIs on the probability of the woman's accepting a date. Although high-SHIs were not superior on any cue-reading skill measure, they were significantly more certain of their ratings. Neither dating frequency nor SHI scores were related to how optimistically participants interpreted the woman's cues.
The studies described in this article examine retrospective reports of naturally occurring misperceptions of friendliness as sexual interest. Previous research has demonstrated that men perceive other people and situations more sexually than women do. The purpose of this research was to examine how this gender difference in perceptions of sexuality is exhibited in actual interactions between women and men. Two surveys of undergraduates were conducted. The results indicated that a large percentage of both women and men had experienced such misperceptions, although more women had than men. Most of these incidents were quickly resolved without problems; however, others involved some degree of forced sexual activity and left the individual feeling angry, humiliated, and depressed. Gender differences in the characteristics of these incidents and reactions to them are described. The implications of these findings for future research on gender differences in perceptions of sexual intent are discussed.
▪ Abstract Flirting, bantering, and other sexual interactions are commonplace in work organizations. Not all of these interactions constitute harassment or assault; consensual sexual relationships, defined as those reflecting positive and autonomous expressions of workers' sexual desire, are also prevalent in the workplace and are the focus of this paper. We begin by reviewing research on the distinction between sexual harassment and sexual consent. Next we examine popular and business literatures on office romance. Finally we discuss sociological research on consensual sexual relationships, including research on mate selection, organizational policy, and workplace culture. We argue that sexual behaviors must be understood in context, as an interplay between organizational control and individual agency.
According to cultural stereotypes, men are more eager for sex than are women; women are more likely to set limits on such activity. In this paper, we review the work of theorists who have argued in favor of this proposition and review the interview and correlational data which support this contention. Finally, we report two experimental tests of ihis hypothesis. In these experiments, conducted in 1978 and 1982, male and female confederates of average attractiveness approached potential partners with one of three requests: "Would you go out tonight?" "Will you come over to my apartment?" or "Would you go to bed with me?" The great majority of men were willing to have a sexual liaison with the women who approached them. Women were not. Not one woman agreed to a sexual liaison. Many possible reasons for this marked gender difference were discussed. These studies were run in 1978 and 1982. It has since become important to track how the threat of AIDS is affecting men and women's willingness to date, come to an apartment, or to engage in casual sexual relations.
Explored perceptions of flirting in 79 undergraduates using an 8-item questionnaire that asked Ss to imagine themselves in each of the situations described and to decide whether or not the person who addressed them was flirting. Three variables were systematically manipulated within the questions. The situations described a school or a bar (place), effort expended (e.g., crossing a room or not), and a person asking for the time or giving a compliment (type of comment). A personal compliment was seen as more flirtatious than simply asking for the time. A situation where the person put forth some effort to initiate contact was seen as more flirtatious, and an interaction in a bar was more likely to be interpreted as flirting. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
This book is woven around two themes—biology and love. It is also about how people see love: how the lovers see each other, and how scientists, scholars, and laypeople have seen intimacy and its relationship to our cultural, social, and biological lives.
My purpose is to describe how love, intimacy, and courtship grow from a biological core to affect our entire lives. And the warp and weft of this purpose are two themes: the courtship sequence and biosocial functionality. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
Attempted to replicate findings of T. Perper (1985) and M. M. Moore (see record
1987-04014-001) by extending naturalistic observation of nonverbal flirtation to bar settings. Hypotheses were offered that, compared with men, women would exhibit more escalation behaviors (communicating attraction) and more deescalation behaviors (commmunicating rejection). Findings from 70 cross-gender couples (aged 18–39 yrs) resembled those of Perper and Moore. Women were more likely than men to gaze at and briefly touch their partners, exhibit positive facial expressions, use grooming gestures, and display closed body postures. Men used more intimate touching than women. Gender-related differences in flirtation varied over time; women deescalated flirtation more in the beginning of the interaction, and men deescalated more later. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
This article examines the dynamics of Bazooms. a “restaurant” in which power, gender, and sexuality come together to color relations between the three major “players” involved: waitresses, managers, and customers. Job-based power relations and inequities, gender roles, implicit and explicit sexual roles, and sexual harassment are all “at work” in such a workplace. But definitions of power, gender roles, sexual identities. and harassment are in constant flux with each interaction among the players inside the Bazooms world. The women who work at Bazooms–the “Bazooms girls”—are disadvantaged in these interactions, but they are not helpless. Dynamics within the restaurant are constantly being negotiated and altered (within constraints) as these women exercise agency in the workplace.
The effects of several nonverbal cues on perceptions of male and female stimulus persons' sexuality were examined. Based on the findings of Abbey (Sex Differences in Attributions for Friendly Behavior: Do Males Misperceive Females' Friendliness? Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 1982, 42, 830–838) and other investigators, we hypothesized that in general males would attribute more sexuality to both male and female targets than would females. Furthermore, we hypothesized that males' and females' perceptions of sexual intent would be most divergent in situations in which the nonverbal cues were most ambiguous (e.g., causal touch, moderate interpersonal distance). To test this hypothesis, the effects of three nonverbalcues were examined: interpersonal distance, eye contact, and touch. Males rated female targets as more seductive, sexy, and promiscuous, and expressed more sexual attraction to the opposite-sexed target, than females did for both ambiguous and nonambiguous nonverbal cues. Males' ratings of the male targets' sexuality were higher than females' ratings in two of the three studies. Also, across the three studies both female and male subjects rated the female target higher than the male target on the sexual traits. The implications of these findings for future research are discussed.
Two experiments investigating gender differences in perception of nonverbal seductive and friendly cues were conducted using standardized videotaped interactions. Results of the first experiment indicated no gender differences in perceptions, contradicting previous results obtained by Abbey (Sex Differences in Attributions for Friendly Behavior: Do Males Misperceive Females' Friendliness? Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 1982, 42, 830–838), who used a nonstandardized interaction. Results of the second experiment indicated that exposure to romantic and nonromantic scenarios in the media may produce contrast effects primarily affecting male interpretation of female nonverbal cues.
In this work, we provide evidence based on direct observation of behavior in encounters of opposite-sexed strangers, that women initiate and "control" the outcome. In the first minute of these videotaped 10-min interactions, neither female "solicitation" behavior nor "negative" behavior is strongly related to professed interest in the man, while female "affirmative" behavior at this stage modulates male verbal output in later stages (4-10 min). Although the rate of female courtship-like behavior is significantly higher in the first minute, it is only in the fourth to tenth minute that the rate of female courtship-like behavior is correlated with professed female interest. We hypothesize that this serves as a strategic dynamic reflecting sexual asymmetry in parental investment and the potential cost of male deception to women. Ambiguous protean behavioral strategies veil individuals' intentions and make their future actions unpredictable. These behavioral strategies may result in men's overestimation of female sexual interest.
This investigation examined the relationships between personality and nonverbal behavior displayed during heterosexual relationship initiation. Individuals were videotaped as they answered questions posed by an attractive opposite-sex "interviewer." Raters then coded each individual's nonverbal behavior on 11 behaviors and 34 global attributes. Men who were unrestricted in sociosexuality smiled more, laughed more, gazed downward less often, and displayed more frequent flirtatious glances than did restricted men. Unrestricted women were more likely to lean forward and cant their heads than were restricted women. Men who were extraverted, high self-monitors, and unrestricted in sociosexuality were rated as more socially engaging/dominant and phony. Extraverted women were rated as more engaging/dominant and phony, and high self-monitoring women were rated as more phony. Results are discussed from a human ethological perspective.
According to a familiar phrase, the "language" of love is universal. Recent ethological studies of nonlinguistic communication in courtship using facial expression, gesture, posture, distance, paralanguage, and gaze have begun to establish that a universal, culture-free, nonverbal sign system may exist (Eibl-Eibesfeldt, 1975), which is available to all persons for negotiating sexual relationships. The nonverbal mode, more powerful than the verbal for expressing such fundamental contingencies in social relationships as liking, disliking, superiority, timidity, fear and so on, appears to be rooted firmly in man's zoological heritage (Bateson, 1966, 1968). Paralleling a vertebrate-wide plan, human courtship expressivity often relies on nonverbal signs of submissiveness (meekness, harmlessness) and affiliation (willingness to form a social bond). Adoption of a submissive-affiliative social pose enables a person to convey an engaging, nonthreatening image that tends to attract potential mates. This report explores several conspicuous nonlinguistic cues that appear to be used widely in contexts of flirtation, courtship, and seduction. The expressive units are discussed from the standpoint of their occurence in five phases of courtship, and are illustrated by four cases.
In this work, we provide evidence based on direct observation of behavior in encounters of opposite-sexed strangers, that women initiate and "control" the outcome. In the first minute of these videotaped 10-min interactions, neither female "solicitation" behavior nor "negative" behavior is strongly related to professed interest in the man, while female "affirmative" behavior at this stage modulates male verbal output in later stages (4-10 min). Although the rate of female courtship-like behavior is significantly higher in the first minute, it is only in the fourth to tenth minute that the rate of female courtship-like behavior is correlated with professed female interest. We hypothesize that this serves as a strategic dynamic reflecting sexual asymmetry in parental investment and the potential cost of male deception to women. Ambiguous protean behavioral strategies veil individuals' intentions and make their future actions unpredictable. These behavioral strategies may result in men's overestimation of female sexual interest.
Friendly? Flirting? Wrong?
- L B Koeppel
- Y Montagne-Miller
- D Hair
- M J Cody
An evolutionary view on understanding sex effects in communicating attraction Sex differences and similarities in communication: Critical essays and empirical investigations of sex and gender in interaction
- M R Trost
- J K Alberts