The Upside of Irrationality: The Unexpected Benefits of Defying Logic at Work and at Home

by Dan Ariely

  In addition to these two paths of adaptation, and despite the incredible capacity of humans to adapt to all sorts of things (see chapter 6, “On Adaptation”), we must also consider the possibility that adaptation does not work in this particular case. That would mean that aesthetically challenged individuals never really acclimate to the limitations that their looks impose on them in the social hierarchy. (If you are a male over fifty and you still think that every twentysomething woman would love to date you, you are exactly who I am talking about.) Such a failure to adapt is a path to continuous disappointment because, in its absence, less attractive individuals will repeatedly be disappointed when they fail to get the gorgeous mate they think they deserve. And if they settle and marry another aesthetically challenged person, they will always feel that they deserve better—hardly a recipe for a fine romance, let alone a happy relationship.

  Which one of the three approaches illustrated in the figure below do you think best describes how aesthetically challenged individuals deal with their constraints?

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  The three possible ways to deal with our own physical limitations

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  My money was on the ability to reprioritize what we look for in a mate, but the process of finding out was interesting in its own right.

  Hot or Not?

  To learn more about how people adapt to their own less-than-perfect looks, Leonard, George, and I approached two ingenious young men, James Hong and Jim Young, and asked for permission to run a study using their Web site, HOT or NOT.* Upon entering the site, you’re greeted with the photo of a man or woman of almost any age (eighteen years of age or older only). Above the photo floats a box with a scale from 1 (NOT) to 10 (HOT). Once you’ve rated the picture, a new photo of a different person appears as well as the average rating of the person you just rated.

  Not only can you rate pictures of other people, but you can also post your own picture on the site to be judged by others.* Leonard, George, and I particularly appreciated this feature because it told us how attractive the people doing the rating were. (Last time I checked, my official rating on HOT or NOT was 6.4. Must be a bad picture.) With this data we could, for example, see how a person who is rated as unattractive by users of HOT or NOT (let’s say a 2) rates the hotness of others, compared with someone who is rated as very attractive (let’s say a 9).

  Why would this feature help us? We figured that if people who are aesthetically challenged have not adapted, their view of the attractiveness of others would be the same as those of highly attractive people. For example, if adaptation did not take place, a person who is a 2 and a person who is an 8 would both see 9s as 9s and 4s as 4s. On the other hand, if people who are aesthetically challenged have adapted by changing their perspective about the attractiveness of others, their view of hotness would differ from those of highly attractive people. For example, if adaptation had taken place, a person who is a 2 could see a 9 as a 6 and a 4 as a 7, while a person who is an 8 would see a 9 as a 9 and a 4 as a 4. The best news for us was that we could measure it! In short, by examining how one’s own attractiveness influences the hotness rating that one gives others, we thought we might discover something about the extent of adaptation. Intrigued by our project, James and Jim provided us with the ratings and dating information of 16,550 HOT or NOT members during a ten-day period. All members of the sample were heterosexual, and the majority (75 percent) were male.*

  The first analysis revealed that almost everyone has a common sense of what is beautiful and what isn’t. We all find people like Halle Berry and Orlando Bloom “hot,” regardless of how we ourselves look; uneven features and buckteeth do not become the new standard of beauty for the aesthetically challenged.

  The general agreement on the standard of beauty weighed against the sour grapes theory, but it left two possibilities open. The first was that people adapt by learning to place greater importance on other attributes, and the second was that there is no adaptation to our own aesthetic level.

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  The three possible ways to deal with our own physical limitations (following the first HOT or NOT study)

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  Next, we set about testing the possibility that aesthetically challenged individuals are simply unaware of the limitations placed on us by our lack of beauty (or at least, that this is how we behave online). To do this, we used a second interesting feature of HOT or NOT called “Meet Me.” Assuming you are a man who sees a picture of a woman you’d like to meet, you can click the Meet Me button above the woman’s picture. She will then receive a notification saying that you are interested in meeting, accompanied by a bit of information about you. The key is that when using the Meet Me feature, you would not be reacting to the other person only on the basis of aesthetic judgment; you would also gauge whether the invitee would be likely to accept your invitation. (Though an anonymous rejection is much less painful than being turned down face-to-face, it still stings.)

  To better understand the usefulness of the Meet Me feature, imagine that you are a somewhat bald, overweight, hairy fellow, albeit with a great sense of humor. As we learned from the ratings of hotness, the way you view the attractiveness of others is uninfluenced by what you see in your mirror. But how would your unfortunate belly and your low level of hotness influence your decisions about whom to pursue? If you were just as likely to try to pursue gorgeous women, it would mean that you are truly unaware of (or at least uninfluenced by) your own physical shortcomings. On the other hand, if you aim a bit lower and try to meet someone closer to your range—despite the fact that you think Halle Berry or Orlando Bloom is a 10—this would mean that you are influenced by your own unattractiveness.

  Our data showed that the less hot individuals in our sample were, in fact, very aware of their own level of (un)attractiveness. Though this awareness did not influence how they perceived or judged the attractiveness of others (as shown by their hotness ratings), it did affect the choices they made about whom they asked to meet.

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  The three possible ways to deal with our own physical limitations (following the first HOT or NOT study and the Meet Me study)

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  Adaptation and the Art of the Speed Date

  The data from HOT or NOT eliminated two of our three hypotheses for the process of adaptation to one’s own physical attractiveness. One alternative remained: like my middle-aged friend, people do adapt by putting less emphasis on their partner’s looks and learn to love other attributes.

  However, eliminating two of the alternatives is not equivalent to providing support for the remaining theory. We needed evidence showing that people learn to appreciate compensatory attractions (“Darling, you are so smart / funny / kind / attentive / horoscopically compatible / ____________________ [fill in the blank]”). Unfortunately, the data from HOT or NOT couldn’t help us with this, since it allowed us to measure only one thing (photographic hotness). Searching for another setup that would let us measure that ineffable je ne sais quoi, we turned to the world of speed dating.

  Before I tell you about our version of speed dating, allow me to offer the uninitiated a short primer in this contemporary dating ritual (if you are a social science hobbyist, I highly recommend the experience).

  In case you haven’t noticed, speed dating is everywhere: from posh bars at five-star hotels to vacant classrooms in local elementary schools; from late-afternoon gatherings for the after-work crowd to brunch events for weekend warriors. It makes the quest for everlasting love feel like bargain shopping in a Turkish bazaar. Yet, for all its detractors, speed dating is safer and less potentially humiliating than clubbing, blind dating, being set up by your friends, and other less structured dating arrangements.

  The generic speed-dating process is like something designed by a time-and-motion expert of the early twentieth century. A small number of people, generally between the ages of twenty and fifty (in heterosexual events, half of each gender) go to a room set up with two-person table
s. Each person registers with the organizers and receives an identification number and a scoring sheet. Half the prospective daters—usually the women—stay at the tables. At the ring of a bell that sounds every four to eight minutes, the men move to the next table in merry-go-round fashion.

  While at the table, the daters can talk about anything. Not surprisingly, many initially sheepishly express their amazement at the whole speed-dating process, then make small talk in an effort to fish for useful information without being too blatant. When the bell rings and as the pairings shift, they make decisions: if Bob wants to date Nina, he writes “yes” next to Nina’s number on his scoring sheet, and if Nina wants to date Bob, she writes “yes” next to Bob’s number on her scoring sheet.

  At the end of the event, the organizers collect the scoring sheets and look for mutual matches. If Bob gave both Lonnie and Nina a “yes” and Lonnie gave Bob a “no” but Nina gave Bob a “yes,” only Nina and Bob would be given each other’s contact information so that they can talk more and maybe even go on a conventional date.

  Our version of speed dating was designed to include a few special features. First, before the start of the event, we surveyed each of the participants. We asked them to rate the importance of different criteria—physical attractiveness, intelligence, sense of humor, kindness, confidence, and extroversion—when considering a potential date. We also changed a bit of the speed-dating process itself. At the end of each “date,” participants did not move immediately to the next one. Instead, we asked them to pause and record their ratings for the person they’d just met, using the same attributes (physical attractiveness, intelligence, sense of humor, kindness, confidence, and extroversion). We also asked them to tell us if they wanted to see this person again.

  These measures gave us three types of data. The pre-speed-dating survey told us which attributes each person was generally looking for in a romantic partner. From the postdate responses, we discovered how they rated each person they had met on these attributes. We also knew whether they wanted to meet each person for a real date in the near future.

  So, on to our main question: Would the aesthetically challenged individuals place as high a premium on looks as the beautiful people did, showing that they did not adapt? Or would they place more importance on other attributes such as sense of humor, showing that they adapted by changing what they were looking for in a partner?

  First, we examined participants’ responses regarding their general preferences—the ones they provided before the event started. In terms of what they were looking for in a romantic partner, those who were more attractive cared more about attractiveness, while the less attractive people cared more about other characteristics (intelligence, sense of humor, and kindness). This finding was our first evidence that aesthetically challenged people reprioritize their requirements in dating. Next, we examined how each speed dater evaluated each of their partners during the event itself and how this evaluation translated to a desire to meet for a real date. Here, too, we saw the same pattern: the aesthetically challenged people were much more interested in going on another date with those they thought had a sense of humor or some other nonphysical characteristic, while the attractive people were much more likely to want to go on a date with someone they evaluated as good-looking.

  If we take the findings from the HOT or NOT, the Meet Me, and the speed-dating experiments, the data suggest that while our own level of attractiveness does not change our aesthetic tastes, it does have a large effect on our priorities. Simply put, less attractive people learn to view nonphysical attributes as more important.

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  The three possible ways to deal with our own physical limitations (after the first HOT or NOT study, the Meet Me study, and the speed-dating study)

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  Of course, this leads to the question of whether aesthetically challenged individuals are “deeper” because they care less about beauty and more about other characteristics. Frankly, that is a debate I’d rather avoid. After all, if the teenage frog becomes an adult prince, he might become just as eager to use beauty as his main criterion for dating as the other princes are. Regardless of our value judgments about the real importance of beauty, it is clear that the process of reprioritization helps us adapt. In the end, we all have to make peace with who we are and what we have to offer, and ultimately, adapting and adjusting well are key to being happier.

  THE HIS AND HERS PERSPECTIVE

  No investigation into the dating world would be complete without some examination of gender differences. The results I’ve described so far were combined across males and females, and you probably suspect that men and women differ in their responses to attractiveness. Right?

  Right. As it turns out, most of the gender differences in our HOT or NOT study fell into line with common stereotypes about dating and gender. Take, for instance, the commonly held belief that men are less selective in dating than women. It turns out that this is not just a stereotype: men were 240 percent more likely to send Meet Me invitations to potential females than vice versa.

  The data also confirmed the casual observation that men care more about the hotness of women than the other way around, which also relates to the finding that men are less concerned with their own level of attractiveness. On top of that, men were also more hopeful than women—they looked very carefully at the hotness of the women they were “checking out,” and they were more likely to aim for women who were “out of their league,” meaning several numerals higher on the HOT or NOT scale. Incidentally, the male tendency to ask many women on dates, and to aim higher (which some may see as negative), can euphemistically be called “men’s open-mindedness in dating.”

  Against All Assortative Mating Odds

  We all have some wonderful features and some undesirable flaws. We usually learn to live with them from a young age and end up being generally pleased with our place in society and in the social hierarchy. The difference for someone like me was that I grew up with a certain set of beliefs about myself, and suddenly I had to face a new reality without the opportunity to adjust slowly over a long period of time. I suspect that this instant change made my romantic challenges more apparent, and it also made me look at the dating market in a slightly colder and more distant way.

  For years after my injury, I agonized over the effects that my injury would have on my romantic future. I was certain that my scars would dramatically change my position in the assortative mating hierarchy, but I couldn’t help feeling that this was wrong in some ways. On one hand, I realized that the dating market operates in many ways much like other markets and that my market value had plummeted overnight. At the same time, I could not shake the deep feeling that I hadn’t really changed that much and that my value reduction was unfounded.

  In one attempt to understand my feelings about this, I asked myself how I would respond if I had been perfectly healthy and someone who had suffered an injury similar to mine asked me out on a date. Would I care? Would I be less likely to date that person because of her injury? I must admit that I didn’t like my answer to this question, and it made me wonder what I could possibly expect from women. I came to the conclusion that I would have to settle, and this deeply depressed me. I hated the idea that women who had been willing to date me before my injury would no longer see me as a potential romantic partner. And I dreaded the thought of settling, both on my account and for the settlee. It just didn’t seem like a recipe for happiness.

  ALL THESE ISSUES were resolved while I was in graduate school at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. One fine day, the chair of the psychology department appointed me to the colloquium committee. I can’t really remember anything I did during the committee’s meetings other than create the logo for the announcements, but I do remember sitting across the table from one of the most amazing people I have ever met: Sumi. By any stretch of assortative mating imaginable, she should have had nothing to do with me. We started spending more and more time together. We bec
ame friends. She appreciated my sense of humor and, in what I can only call a magical transition, at some point somehow agreed to look at me as a potential romantic partner.

  Fifteen years and two children later, and with the help of the HOT or NOT data, I now realize how lucky I am that women pay less attention to physical appearance than men do (thank you, my fair readers). I also came to believe that, as unsentimental as it sounds, Stephen Stills’s song has a lot of truth to it. Far from advocating infidelity, “Love the One You’re With” suggests that we have the ability to discover and love the characteristics of our partner. Instead of merely settling for someone with scars, a few extra pounds, buckteeth, or bad hair, we really do end up changing our perspectives, and in the process increasing our love of the person who is behind the mask of their face and body. Another victory for the human ability to adapt!

  Chapter 8

  When a Market Fails

  An Example from Online Dating

  In centuries past, a yenta, or matchmaker, performed a very important task in traditional society. A man or woman (and their parents) would tell the yenta to “find me a find, catch me a catch,” as the song in Fiddler on the Roof put it. To narrow the playing field for her clients, the yenta made sure she knew everything possible about the young people and their families (which is why the word “yenta” eventually became synonymous with “gossip” or “blabbermouth”). Once she found a few likely fits, she introduced the prospective husbands and wives and their families to each other. The yenta ran an efficient, viable business, and she was paid for her services as a matchmaker (or “market maker” in economics-speak) who brought people together.