研究表明:男人愛看美女是基因使然

Men weigh up potential partners almost instantaneously based on their appearance because their "ancient" genetic preference for attractive mates leads them to, experts claim.

據專家介紹，男性在擇偶時之所以會以貌取人，是因爲他們天生愛美女的“原始基因”使然。

According to research, a woman with an attractive face is taken by men to be fertile and able to continue the family line, appealing to the man's survival instinct.

研究表明，有着漂亮臉蛋的女子符合男性的生存本能需要，在他們看來，這樣的女子生育能力強，能爲他們傳宗接代。

In contrast women take longer to decide their feelings for a man because they need to weigh up whether he will be a committed partner who will provide for them well – part of their survival programming.

相比之下，女性則需要更長的時間來做出判斷，因爲她們需要考察對方是否忠誠，會養家。這也是她們的一種生存本能。

Professor Mark van Vugt and Dr Johanna van Hooff, from the University of Amsterdam, and postgraduate student Helen Crawford, from the University of Kent, were behind the study which is to be published by the Oxford Journal Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience.

該研究由阿姆斯特丹大學的馬克·凡·福特教授和約漢娜·凡·胡夫博士以及肯特大學的研究生海倫·克勞馥共同開展。研究報告將在牛津大學的《社會認知與情感神經學》期刊上發表。

They tested men and women's bias towards looks by conducting a series of tests on 20 women and 20 men, making them perform tasks while recording their brain activity.

爲了解男性和女性對於長相問題的不同態度，研究人員對20名女性和20名男性進行了一系列測試，讓他們執行特定的任務，同時記錄他們的腦部活動。

While the subjects were doing the task they were shown a series of photographs of faces of the opposite sex, ranging from attractive to ugly.

在研究對象執行任務的同時，研究人員還讓他們看一組異性的照片，其中有漂亮的，也有醜的。

Men were easily distracted when they saw a pretty face but women stuck to the task.

結果發現，當男性看到漂亮的臉蛋時，他們很容易分神，但女性卻能繼續專心做手中的事。

Prof van Vugt said: "Men definitely have the most wandering eye but it is because they have evolved to pay attention to cues of fertility and one of those cues is facial beauty – it's not that men are shallow.

凡·福特教授說：“男性愛看美女是他們進化的結果，是他們在進化過程中形成了會特別注意異性生育方面線索的特徵，其中一個就是漂亮臉蛋，所以這並不是因爲男性膚淺。”

"But we found they do make snap judgments about women, much earlier than was previously thought. They make that decision on whether a woman would be a good mating partner in milliseconds.

“但我們發現男性做出判斷所用的時間的確很短，比我們之前預想的快。他們往往在幾毫秒之內就能決定一個女性是否是一個合適的求偶對象。

"This is something very ancient and a way of helping men find the best mate to produce children.

“這是一種十分原始的行爲，也是幫助男性找到最佳交配對象的一種方法。

"Women were not distracted by attractive male faces because women need more proof of whether a man is a good mate.

“而女性不會因爲看到英俊的男性面孔而分神，因爲女性需要更多的證據來判斷一個男性是否是一個好的伴侶。

"Women make that decision on behaviour, whether a man is trustworthy and committed. They make their decision much later than men."

“女性根據行爲來判斷男性是否忠誠可靠。她們做決定所需要的時間要比男性長得多。”