So, my accuracy at predicting male interest is 60% and my accuracy at predicting female interest is 30%. Oi.

60% on male interest and 50% on female interest.

Although my male interest would have been more accurate if I could see the photo of the woman BEFORE, not after. The blurry camera makes some of the women look acceptable, until we see the photo.

As for female interest, everyone had closed off body language -- but that's probably because the chairs are set up so that the people are facing each other which is highly confrontational and not conducive to persuasion or seduction. The main cues I had to be by with female interest were laughing/smiling and leaning towards the man. Finally, if I could know the height of each man, my accuracy would have been greater as well.

In real social situations, I do well to know which people are interested or NOT interested in each other by nonverbal cues. Of course, whenever I meet a group of new people, I ALWAYS ask "How do you guys know each other?" There is so much information given from the answers that the conversation continues to flow flawlessly and I know my boundaries (such as when they say "we're married")

I somehow got 70% correct of predicting female interest, and 30% on male interest. I'm a straight male.

60% at predicting male
40% at predicting female

Of course a good number of them were relaxed and exhibited closed body language. And the best they could do was lean-in... and I'm not sure that is effective enough to gauge comfort, versus interest -- which is the crap that gets me in trouble all the time. Just because I make someone comfortable (which I'm good at), or can exhibit those qualities (hospitality, open body language, real or feigned interest), doesn't mean I want to have their babies (metaphorically) or even talk to them again.

Though I find the "Ring finger" cue interesting, as I'm prone to wearing jewelry on 'just that finger' because that's the corner of the traditional human condition that I *don't* pay attention to, being a rampant non-traditionalist) and it has caused me to wonder, if that's a cue I was sending, and how it may have affected my date-life?

I got as far as the fourth or fifth video, but I'm sorry to say this strikes me as a waste of time and of no scientific validity whatsoever. In fact, this study is illustrative of the poverty of much psychological research these days.

For example:

We're shown a photo of a woman's face and asked how interested we'd be in a long-term monogamous relationship with her. Say what? It's one photo (and blurry, at that). Long-term and monogamous implies friendship, spiritual connection, introducing her to Mom, etc. None of that is visible in one blurred photo.

Just as bad is the next question: What about a one-night stand? Well, that tends to depend on two major factors. How many beers has our subject had and what kind of body does the woman have? Again, not discernible in the head-shot provided.

I know, the researchers will try to claim that even with these limitations, important information is being gathered. I just don't buy it. In fact, I suspect that any information gathered is either meaningless or misleading. This study simply has no relation whatsoever to how real people make real decisions about these things.

CPR

Hey Matt,

I took the quiz-- my accuracy at predicting male interest is 70%, and my accuracy at predicting female interest is 40%. Women are probably more difficult to read than men -- or so I hear -- but I think I also projected onto a lot of them (like, "she's got to be smiling out of politeness or the world has no rules that govern it; his hair looks like seaweed"). I wonder how the test accounts for that? Surely, there are other shallow people like me out there?

Kim

I got 60% predicting male and 40% predicting female. I'm a straight woman.