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Surprise your sweetie with an extra-charming Valentine’s Day - at home! Our PC® Dine-In Tonight™ soups, pastas, entrees and desserts are quick and easy, so you can spend less time prepping and more time with your dearest!We would love to hear from any men who followed this advice. Please give us details of how well it went over.
I haven't posted much lately on the quest for a Revolutionary New Dating Paradigm because while I continued to monitor the internets for new developments, everything I've found merely echoes what we already know:
But now the quest is over.
In today's Dinosaur Comics, T-Rex gives us a revolutionary new dating paradigm.
You'll have to click through and read all the way to the last frame. Make sure you also read the mouseover text.
I'd like to thank you all for your patience during the years it has taken us to come to this conclusion. Especially those of you who held off on dating until we had this answer.
No need for me to write anything this week. Ryan Dube at Makeuseof.com has written an excellent guide for men who want to use Facebook to find women.
3 Coolest Ways A Geek Can Get Girls To Notice Him On Facebook.
There's no indication on whether anyone at Makeuseof intends to write a companion piece for how girls can get geeks to notice them on Facebook, so I'll do it for them:
Here is the latest roundup of research towards the revolutionary new dating paradigm.
Rating attractiveness: Study finds consensus among men, not women
From a press release about an article in the June issue of the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology:
Men's judgments of women's attractiveness were based primarily around physical features and they rated highly those who looked thin and seductive. Most of the men in the study also rated photographs of women who looked confident as more attractive.
As a group, the women rating men showed some preference for thin, muscular subjects, but disagreed on how attractive many men in the study were. Some women gave high attractiveness ratings to the men other women said were not attractive at all.
The age of the participants also played a role in attractiveness ratings. Older participants were more likely to find people attractive if they were smiling.
But an abstract for the same paper says:
Participants of both genders showed substantial consensus in judgments of whom they found attractive and unattractive, although men showed higher consensus than women.What does this mean for the RNDP: If you're a man and a male friend tells you should meet someone because they are hot, you should. If you are a woman and a female friend tells you to meet someone because they are hot, probably you should. But maybe not.
Talk to the Right Ear
In 3 different studies, researchers from the University "Gabriele d'Annunzio" in Chieti, Italy determined a marked preference to listen with the right ear by young people in noisy nightclubs. Perhaps their most significant finding:
...the researchers intentionally addressed 176 clubbers in either their right or their left ear when asking for a cigarette. They obtained significantly more cigarettes when they spoke to the clubbers' right ear compared with their left.
What does this mean for the RNDP:
Single women gaze longer
A study by Indiana University neuroscientist Heather Rupp found that a woman's partner status influenced her interest in the opposite sex.
...women both with and without sexual partners showed little difference in their subjective ratings of photos of men when considering such measures as masculinity and attractiveness. However, the women who did not have sexual partners spent more time evaluating photos of men, demonstrating a greater interest in the photos. No such difference was found between men who had sexual partners and those who did not.
What does this mean for the RNDP: Guys: the length of time a woman spends looking at you might tell you that she is available, but not necessarily available to you. She might only be taking the time to decide what she thinks about you. Gals: you're still stuck with no useful way to tell if that guy looking at you is married or not.
Daily sex helps to reduce sperm DNA damage and improve fertility
New research suggests that in couples trying to have babies, in order to improve sperm quality, men should not hold off until ovulation day, but should ejaculate at least daily for the prior week. Dr David Greening, an obstetrician and gynaecologist in Wollongong, Australia, says:
The optimal number of days of ejaculation might be more or less than seven days, but a week appears manageable and favourable. It seems safe to conclude that couples with relatively normal semen parameters should have sex daily for up to a week before the ovulation date. In the context of assisted reproduction, this simple treatment may assist in improving sperm quality and ultimately achieving a pregnancy.
What does this mean for the RNDP: Okay, this isn't about dating. But it does illustrate that the research community has scientists conducting research and reporting findings that may not please everyone, but will make the world a better place.
I was beginning to to think that the quest for a revolutionary new dating paradigm (RNDP) should be shelved because other pursuits, like wealth or fame, are more important. But three researchers from the University of Rochester have just confirmed that the pursuits of wealth and fame do not lead to happiness.
Edward Deci, professor of psychology and the Gowen Professor in the Social Sciences at the University says:
Even though our culture puts a strong emphasis on attaining wealth and fame, pursuing these goals does not contribute to having a satisfying life. The things that make your life happy are growing as an individual, having loving relationships, and contributing to your community. [Press Release 14-May-2009]
And so I am spurred to contribute to the community and help you folks find loving relationships. Because I got too worn out at the garage sale yesterday, I am going to give you more bulletins on recent research instead of doing the hard work of syncretising everything we've learned already in the quest for an RNDP.
Sick of the same old thing? U of Minnesota Researchers finds satiation solution
Joseph Redden, professor of marketing at the University of Minnesota's Carlson School of Management, recently conducted a study on satiation, the process of consuming products and experiences to the point where they are less enjoyable, as it applies to music.
In one of the three studies conducted for this research, Redden and his co-authors asked participants to listen to the chorus of a favorite song 20 times in a row. Then they were asked to rate the clip. Not surprisingly, after 20 repetitions their enjoyment of the song dropped a great deal. Three weeks later, the participants came back and half were asked to recall any television shows they'd seen since the study, while the other half listed all of the musicians they'd listened to since the first session. The group that listed the TV shows was still just as satiated – they didn't like the song. However, those recalling variety in the music category almost totally recovered. "The participants' comments were the most revealing," said Redden. "Those who recalled the TV shows were actually angry to have a song they like 'ruined,' but the ones who recalled musicians enjoyed taking a study with music, etc. If something seems like 'more of the same,' people are just less interested." [Press Release: 19-May-2009]Redden thinks this method can also work for things like beverages: "... next time you get sick of healthy smoothies and think about grabbing a burger instead, try to recall all of the other drinks you have had since your last smoothie. Our findings suggest this will make your smoothie taste just a little bit better."
If it works for songs and smoothies, maybe it'll also work for that person you've seen a bunch of times who is beginning to seem a little dull. Just think of all other people you've encountered since the last date or all the people you've been involved with before.
New contraceptive device is designed to prevent sexual transmission of HIV
Remember those free-wheeling days before AIDS?
Researchers from Weill Cornell Medical College have published results showing that a new contraceptive device may also effectively block the transmission of the HIV virus. [Press Release: 19-May-2009]
Dominance in domestic dogs – useful construct or bad habit?
Researchers at Bristol's Department of Clinical Veterinary Sciences say that using "dominance" to explain dog behaviour and to train dogs is misguided and potentially dangerous.
Dr Rachel Casey, Senior Lecturer in Companion Animal Behaviour and Welfare at Bristol University, says:
The blanket assumption that every dog is motivated by some innate desire to control people and other dogs is frankly ridiculous. It hugely underestimates the complex communicative and learning abilities of dogs. It also leads to the use of coercive training techniques, which compromise welfare, and actually cause problem behaviours. [Press Release: 21-May-2009]
I know some of you women out there are using dog training methods on your men. If you've been using "dominance" methods, you may want to rethink your strategy. Or not. After all, this research was on dogs. Not men.
Another study confirms that opposite histocompatibility attracts
Scientists at the Immunogenetics and Histocompatibility Laboratory at the University of Parana, Brazil studied major histocompatibility complex (MHC) data from 90 married couples, and compared them with 152 randomly-generated control couples and found that people with diverse MHCs were more likely to choose each other as mates than those whose MHCs were similar.
"Although it may be tempting to think that humans choose their partners because of their similarities", says Professor Bicalho, "our research has shown clearly that it is differences that make for successful reproduction, and that the subconscious drive to have healthy children is important when choosing a mate." [Press Release: 24-May-2009]
Warriors do not always get the girl
Can it be that nice guys may not finish last?
Aggressive, vengeful behavior of individuals in some South American groups has been considered the means for men to obtain more wives and more children, but an international team of anthropologists working in Ecuador among the Waorani show that sometimes the macho guy does not do better.
"In 1988, Napoleon Chagnon published evidence that among the famously warlike Yanomamo of Venezuela, men who had participated in a homicide had significantly more wives and children than their less warlike brethren," said Stephen Beckerman, associate professor of anthropology, Penn State. "Our research among the Waorani indicates that more aggressive warriors have lower indices of reproductive success than less warlike men."
...
The researchers found that more aggressive men do not acquire more wives than milder men. They do not have more children and their wives and children do not survive longer. In fact, warlike men have fewer children who survive to reproductive age. [Press Release: 11-May-2009]
Swiss researchers Beate Ditzen, Marcel Schaer, Barbara Gabriel, Guy Bodenmann, Ulrike Ehlert, and Markus Heinrichs report that a nasal spray of oxytocin helped couples discussing stressful topics have more positive communication. "Oxytocin increased positive communication behavior in relation to negative behavior and reduced salivary cortisol, i.e., their stress levels, compared to placebo." [EurekAlert]
The researchers say they're a long way from using oxytocin spray in a treatment context, so I doubt they've turned their mind to its use in the dating context. Still, if you've been dating a while and you hear the words "we need to talk" a quick sniff on an oxytoxin nozzle might be a great idea.
A survey of more than 10,000 individuals in 18 "human populations" has concluded that the stereotype of men being more promiscuous than women may be wrong. Dr Gillian Brown, of the University of St Andrews, said: "The study shows that women are just as likely to seek out just as many partners as men." [EurekAlert; Telegraph; PhysOrg]
This is interesting news for anyone involved in the dating game, but Dr Brown and her team are ready to take their research much further than these initial findings and apply evolutionary theory to understanding human mating strategies.
Recent advances in evolutionary theory suggest that factors such as sex-biased mortality, sex-ratio, population density and variation in mate quality, are likely to impact mating behaviour in humans...
Taking a new perspective on what evolutionary theory predicts about mating strategies will have important implications for how we think about male and female sex roles. We're entering an exciting new era in which evolutionary theory can help us to understand the diversity of human mating strategies.
It could be that further analysis of this data will let us build a data model where we plug in Ottawa's figures for sex-biased mortality, sex-ratio, population density and variation in mate quality and as output we'll get an optimal mating strategy - a critical component of a Revolutionary New Dating Paradigm!
Q: What's the difference between the Never-Ending Story and my quest for a Revolutionary New Dating Paradigm (RNDP)?
A: The Never-Ending Story actually ended.
New Research Results relevant to daters:
"Dating culture is dead - instead, young New Zealand women are regularly getting drunk and cruising around in packs looking for men to have sex with. " [4D: This must be true because it was on TV.]
Fidelity is all about chemistry? "Males in some species of pair-bonding mammals have their lifelong attachment triggered by vasopressin release, and studies of men in monogamous relationships find a correlation between low vasopressin levels and high levels of marital strife." [4D: Only on the radio. Best to take this with a grain of salt-peter.]
New Resources for Daters:
Cosmopolitan's Experts say you can learn 55 things about a man in 10 minutes. The only hitch is that it will be a very busy 10 minutes. To learn the 55 things, along with observing his speaking patterns and hair style, you'll have to:
Red Flag Deals provides a useful grid to help you choose a dating site.
A Dinosaur Shows the Way?
It might not be what I've been looking for, but T-Rex has an honest-to-goodness new dating paradigm that may well be revolutionary.
p.s. A big shout-out to JE. Thanks for the support!
The Globe and Mail says people's financial troubles make online dating more appealing. Interestingly, back before the financial troubles, online dating was more appealing because hardworking people didn't have time for real life dating. What does this mean? It means that every time a journalist puts a profile on a dating site we can expect to get a story about how these services are growing.
SomeCards.com has line of e-cards tailored to online dating and ready for you to send to people you can't be bothered to buy a postage stamp for.
Their findings must be legitimate because they were expecting to find the opposite result.
On the eve of St. Valentine's Day, I am pleased that our inimitable Audrey continues her endless honeymoon. Her Top Ten Romantic Things list now stands at thirty items, and counting. She floats on a pink chiffon cloud wherever she goes, stylishly pink-clad feet barely touching the ground. I rather picture her wearing heart-shaped pink sunglasses on her (yes...) romantic trip to Jamaica. It suits her.
If it weren't for the mountains of chocolate that would go begging, I'd wonder if the whole day was worth... huh. 
Audrey writes:My boyfriend and I were on vacation in Jamaica earlier this month. One evening at the outdoor nightclub, the host began to select couples to appear onstage for a silly game. When he motioned to us, my boyfriend waved his hand to indicate “no”. At the same moment, I jumped up and said “yes”. It turned out that we four couples had two minutes to exchange clothing with our partners!Previously:
I raced inside the hotel, dragging my boyfriend behind me. I pulled off my top and he quickly unbuttoned his and took it off. He draped my little top around his neck while I buttoned up his big shirt. Then, I motioned to him to take off his pants. He laughed and asked me if I was serious! I insisted and we were both shocked to discover that he fit into my capris!
We didn’t win the contest but my boyfriend later told me that, when I rushed into the building to change, he thought we were making our getaway!Once again, I thought I would share some of my boyfriend’s romantic gestures, in the hope that my list will improve someone else’s search for true love.
- Surprise her by bringing 1 kg (!) of her favourite milk chocolate in your luggage when going away on vacation.
- One evening at your vacation resort, sing karaoke with her, even though you have never done this before.
- Stand outside in the bitter cold (-25C) making Jamaican jerk chicken on the BBQ for a romantic dinner, and insist that she stay indoors.
- Give her your old laptop, which is still in perfect condition. Surprise her by loading the photos you have gathered of the two of you.
- Add her family members to your Skype contacts list and call them even when she is not with you.
- Eat her Christmas shortbread so slowly that she realizes that you really do love it. (Note: I secretly baked him more shortbread.)
- Visit the doctor for a full physical at her suggestion.
- Buy her vitamin D.
- Express intelligent opinions about her work.
- When you discover the long line-up to see Slumdog Millionaire at the World Exchange Cinema, act like it is an adventure and drive to the SilverCity Gloucester Cinema. Do not give up hope, even when, as you approach the cashier, the cinema posts a “limited seating” notice for the movie.
I'm just too tired for a proper post this week. I've got most of the cleaning up done from yesterday's shit shower but still some to go. Yes, if you've gone through something challenging, you call it a shitstorm, but if you've actually been sprayed by raw sewage, no need to exaggerate.
So here's a picture of Elgin Street. Police cars and ambulance down near whatever they're calling the Penguin Café these days, just after midnight on Saturday. Nothing to do with my troubles. Just a picture.
While I'm about as out of it as the little boy who went to the dentist and so can't help those of you looking for a revolutionary new dating paradigm, there are still plenty of others with creativity, energy and insights to help you along the way. Here is a roundup of this week's scholarship in the field:
* best way to get laid is put her on her stomach, take down that panty shield, and poke until she makes sounds
* Perhaps the best way to get laid is to lead a life worth living.
* Fastest way to get laid is to know what artist your gurl likes most and buy all their albums! You have no idea how many times I have to listen to Chris Brown or Justin Timberlake!
* The best way to get laid is to put on some slow jazz music.
* The best way to get laid is without having to use a pickup line; weed out the sober ones who still have their morals intact!
* I am thinking that the easist way to get laid is to hit the club
* It's a truism worthy of Yogi Berra to say that the best way to get laid is to lose your virginity.
* many neanderthals believe that the best way to get laid is to just get her drunk. Don’t get me wrong; that is a fantastic idea if you’ve been married or in a long-term relationship and she is just not in the mood very often
* an easy way to get laid is baking tasty shit for people who think that stuff is hard. ...
* And the best way to get laid is to pretend to be someone else who is cooler than yourself.
* the only way to get laid is… to be rich!
* I was obviously wrong, and the only way to get laid is by emotional manipulation. I have found, from personal experience, that virginity leads to feelings of shame, rage, frustration, inadequacy, isolation, alienation, ...
* a dude in his underwear sitting in his mom's and dad's basement decides the best way to get laid is to lie (this is actually true) so he puts up an improbable Craigslist post trolling for some 15 year old choke job chicken head
* Look at the 40 Year Old Virgin and similar movies, where the sexually-inexperienced male is advised by his “wiser”, more experienced friend(s) that the best way to get laid is to look for the drunkest girl at the party ...
* Seems to me that the way to get laid is to dress up in a hilarious Disney character costume. This also means that you will get to handle celebrity tits.
* Û² So a kid is ~Censored~ and the only way to get laid is to go to ²Û. Û² this ultra school of ~Censored~ kids and here the first thing that ²Û. Û² happens to him is getting rapped by the principal who is g3y and has ²Û ...
* Arabs want sex just as much as Westerners but they are taught that it is dirty and the only “respectable” way to get laid is to get married.
* This brought upon me an epiphany: The easiest way to get laid is to feed off a woman’s jealousy.
* The best way to get laid is to fake confidence and don't listen too much.
Pearl Jam fan, Raino, blogged a list of pick-up lines this week. The lines do not yet appear to have been field-tested, but they show promise. Here are several:
5) Is there a mirror in yer pants? cuz I can see myself in em.
6) If you was a tree & I was a Squirrel, I'd store my nuts in yer hole.
7) You might not be the best lookin girl here, but beauty's only a light switch away.
8) I know I'm not no Fred Flintstone, but I bet I can make yer bed-rock.
Like I said, they show promise. But, at more than 2 years old, they're not new, and no matter how effective, potentially offensive pickup lines are not revolutionary. So while they could be a component of the Revolutionary New Dating Paradigm (RNDP), they're not going to be the foundation.
This may not be the case for the recommendations coming from two young university researchers, Magpie and Jake. While they probably consider themselves to be more scholars of hooking up than of dating, I believe they have stumbled on something significant. As Magpie reports, the secret is: Television.
In What to Take to University (to Get Laid at University), Jake tells students going off to live in a university residence, "All you need is downloaded TV, a heavy duvet and a mattress topper."
It is of course assumed that all university students have laptops that will play the downloaded TV shows. The mattress topper makes the standard dormitory bed soft and comfortable, the duvet makes for a cozy bed that a person wouldn't want to leave.
In What to Take to University (to Get Laid at University) II, Jake suggests an Ikea mood-setting lamp, but I suspect that's just icing on the cake.
I don't believe Magpie and Jake are even on the same continent, but Magpie is completely on board with the television paradigm. In How to Get Laid (an Introduction), she takes Jake's work further and advises on what to expect from a man based on the show he invites his prospects to see.
Battlestar Galactica Guy: If he likes BSG, he's a keeper. I can't imagine hooking up to BSG (okay, I've done it) because it's just so fuckingintenseandgoodzomfg!!!!! that I'd get distracted. But I supposed a guy who likes BSG is Godly, so do him, do him fast.Kudoes to both of these young scholars. They are out there researching these important topics and doing their own fieldwork. Magpie has even developed a set of instructions for women who would like to watch television shows with a man without sex taking place. ("1. Do NOT go under the blankets.")
Here is Jake's summary:
So to recap, have a comfy bed, and invite people over to watch TV/movies. At the very least how she behaves, whether she agrees to get under the covers/lie next to you etc, is a litmus test for what chances there are of anything else happening, and at the luckiest the spooning will lead to much more and you'll end up having to wash those sheets even sooner than you expected!
Game theorists at University College London, University of Warwick and the London School of Economics and Political Science have found an explanation for why dating can take so long. Their conclusion? "Courtship enables a male to signal his suitability to a female and enables the female to screen out the male if he is unsuitable as a mate."
These researchers raise an interesting question. Why do humans spend as long as they do choosing mates?
One partner - often the male - may pay the greater part of the financial cost, but to both sexes there is a significant cost of time which could be spent on other productive activities. Why don't people and other animals speed things up to reduce these costs?How did they answer this question? They built a mathematical model based on a number of assumptions that include:- Mathematician Robert Seymour
From a female's point of view, males are not all equal. A female would like to mate with a good male, but cannot tell a male's type from his appearance alone. The strategic problem the female faces is how to screen out bad males, and this is where long courtship comes into play. A male is assumed to always want to mate with a female, but a good male is more willing to pay the cost of a long courtship in order to claim the prize of mating. This leads to an outcome in which the female is not willing to mate immediately, but instead requires the male to wait for an indeterminate time before she agrees to mate with him. During this time, the male may give up on courting the female.- Dr Peter Sozou
This is one of those studies that makes me want to play with the software and modify the assumptions. For example, if "bad" men knew that giving up signaled they were bad, and "good" men knew they were hot properties and could get action elsewhere, and maybe also cared whether they were with a "good" or "bad" partner, could we still wind up with long courtships? Even though it meant that the women were likely to wind up with bad partners?
In other news, social neurobiologist Dr Larry Young at the Yerkes National Primate Center reports that there is still no workable love potion.
Dating scholars continue to expand our knowledge of the dynamics involved in two humans hooking up. This week, Jeffrey K. Snyder, Lee A. Kirkpatrick, and H. Clark Barrett learned that young women at two universities expressed preferences for men described as prestigious over men described as acting in a dominating way off a sports field.
Women prefer prestige over dominance in matesI expect Snyder, Kirkpatrick and Barrett have requested further funding to find out who the women actually go out with. Unless they plan to first investigate whether women express a preference for prestigious men over funny guys.Dominance preferred only among male-male competitions
Los Angeles, CA – December 17, 2008 – A new study in the journal Personal Relationships reveals that women prefer mates who are recognized by their peers for their skills, abilities, and achievements, while not preferring men who use coercive tactics to subordinate their rivals. Indeed, women found dominance strategies of the latter type to be attractive primarily when men used them in the context of male-male athletic competitions.
Jeffrey K. Snyder, Lee A. Kirkpatrick, and H. Clark Barrett conducted three studies with college women at two U.S. universities. Participants evaluated hypothetical potential mates described in written vignettes. The studies were designed to examine the respective effects of men's dominance and prestige on women's assessments of men.
Women are sensitive to the context in which men display domineering behaviors when they evaluate men as potential mates. For example, the traits and behaviors that women found attractive in athletic competitions were unattractive to women when men displayed the same traits and behaviors in interpersonal contexts. Notably, when considering prospective partners for long-term relationships, women's preferences for dominance decrease, and their preferences for prestige increase.
"These findings directly contradict the dating advice of some pop psychologists who advise men to be aggressive in their social interactions. Women most likely avoid dominant men as long-term romantic partners because a dominant man may also be domineering in the household." the authors conclude. [EurekAlert]
In my quest for the RNDP, I not only googled the search phrase "dating paradigm", I also googled "dating schema".
If you are unfamiliar with the academic term "schema", you are in luck because the first hit for "dating schema" is an article titled "Schema Theory (drawn from D’Andrade 1995)" that expains the term and includes an excerpt on dating to help explain it.
Dorothy Holland and Debra Skinner (1987) studied the US undergraduate dating schema. They describe the "taken-for-granted world of male/female relations" from the perspective of a female undergraduate as follows:
"… a male earns the admiration and affection of a female by treating her well. Intimacy is a result of this process. The female allows herself to become emotionally closer, perhaps as a friend, perhaps as a lover, perhaps as a fiancee, to those attractive males who make a sufficient effort to win her affection. Besides closeness and intimacy, the process of forming a relationship also has to do with prestige. When a male is attracted to a female and tries to earn her affection by good treatment, her attractiveness is validated and she gains prestige in her social group. For his part, the male gains prestige among his peers when he receives admiration and affection from and gains intimacy with females.
Normally, prestigious males are attracted to and establish close relations with prestigious females, and vice versa. Sometimes, however, a male can succeed in winning the affection of a female whose prestige is higher than his own. However, the more attractive she is, the more he must compensate for his lack of prestige by spectacular efforts to treat her well. Correspondingly, females sometimes do form close relationships with males who have higher prestige than they do. When the male is more attractive or has higher prestige than the female, she often must compensate by giving her affection to him without his doing anything to earn it." (1987:101-102)
Within this simplified and idealized world, one set of problematic males is termed jerks, nerds, turkeys, and asses. These are men who are undesirable and don’t know it. They are unattractive (physically or otherwise) and don’t or can’t make up for it with higher cost gifts and other exchange items. Furthermore, they are too dumb to "take a hint," and therefore have to be rejected in such direct ways that the women have to be repeatedly unpleasant, which is stressful for the women. To understand what one of these college women means when she calls a man a jerk we need to understand the (women’s) dating schema.
It looks like Audrey's beau is raising the bar ever higher for the rest of us fellows. She wrote this weekend to say:
My boyfriend and I met up with some of my friends for dinner at a trendy restaurant in Toronto on Saturday night. When I introduced my beau to one friend, I said, “and this is my boyfriend {Redacted} – I’m madly in love with him!” My friend was startled and said, “How wonderful that you can say that out loud and he doesn’t mind!” I looked over at my beau and he nodded and smiled.
My boyfriend really is the most romantic man I’ve ever met.
Previously: RNDP 12: Romantic Gestures that Score with Audrey
