Evolution and beauty

[Travelmate]

Hello,

I'm going to write a term paper about beauty and evloution. To give you an idea about what exactly I want to lecture I will describe my intentions more precisely:

There is a convition of beauty that all human beings have in common. They all prefer certain qualities. I want to know why people find certain persons more attractive than others.
Of course I only refer to the external appearance. There must be some reasons why people we usually judge to be beautiful or nice attract us more than others. I think this must be rooted in our evolution.
Did attractive persons have better chances to profilerate than others and how do those traits show?

When choosing a partner individuals should recognize if their relationsship is going to be successfull that is to produce a lot of offspring or not.

I've read some paperworkon that issue so far but as you have surely noticed I'm not able to get the full idea how this is all related.

I would be thankful if you could provide me some easy explanations and probably further sources I could use to expand my knowledge.

I ask you to consider that I'm just a student (12th grade) and my occupation with psychology has only been voluntarily so far. Nevertheless I beg that you appreciate my personal interest in this subject and help me to study further.
Our school doesn't offer any possibilities to learn anything about evolution and psychology and our teachers are really bad informed.

I want to involve more deeply into this issue but I'm afraid that if I'm advancing without control I will probably misunderstand important points and draw wrong conculsions

[James Brody]

Evolution of Desire, David Buss, paperback, about $15, details mate attraction between humans. It's all about getting the best sperm and the best egg.

Other introduction to environmentl beauty: Ed Wilson's "Consilience" has some good chapters. Also in paper.

Get from the library, "The Adapted Mind," several chapters on landscape beauty as a replication of African scenes.

JB

[alexandra_k]

> There is a convition of beauty that all human beings have in common. They all prefer certain qualities. I want to know why people find certain persons more attractive than others.

Is there really a notion of beauty that all human beings have in common? You might be surprised at the cultural differences in what is considered attractive vs unattractive. If you want to abstractly specify beauty (which you would have to do to find across cultural similarity) then you might find it has something to do with... health. People tend to find healthy people attractive and sickly people unattractive. Also... There are differences in the traits that males and females find attractive.

> Of course I only refer to the external appearance.

That tends to be more important to males than to females. Why? One explanation is that males are more interested in acquiring a wife with many child bearing years ahead of her (so that she is younger). Broad hips and ample breasts etc (child bearing hips - easier to pop 'em out) and so on... Also... nurturing qualities (less to do with appearance) such as being soothing and social and caring and friendly etc. So as to better raise an infant to be well adjusted etc.

The age of a guy tends to be less important to females. Guys are capable of siring offspring till a ripe old age... And the notion is that being a good provider is more important. So... Social status (a good job a good money earner and so on). Not really physical characteristics.