Those who have ever fallen in love know perfectly well how difficult it is to explain why we like a particular person. Yet psychologists are constantly conducting research trying to understand the nature of this feeling. While studying the phenomenon of falling in love, the experts found out several interesting facts. Some common myths about what attracts us to other people have been debunked, while others, on the contrary, turned out to be pure truth. Let’s talk about the most interesting reasons why men fall in love with women.

You seem hard to reach

In 2014, an experiment was conducted that confirmed the widespread belief that men are attracted to “hard-to-reach” women. On a series of quick dates, the stronger sex showed much more interest in those who showed absolute indifference in answering their questions. However, these conclusions are not universal and have their own peculiarities.

In particular, men want to feel connected with a woman. In the context of the experiment, this meant that they themselves chose such a woman as their partner, and this choice was not imposed by someone else.

However, the research led to another unexpected conclusion: despite the fact that detached and cold women were the most attractive for men, they were the ones that men liked the least. Love is truly a very confusing and strange thing.

You have the “correct” facial expression

Men like it when a woman radiates happiness and smiles. In the opposite case, such a scheme does not work.

In 2011, scientists decided to conduct a large-scale study, in which more than a thousand people took part. All the subjects were shown photographs of members of the opposite sex and were asked to rate the degree of attractiveness of these people.

As a result, men gave the highest ratings to those women who looked happy, and the lowest to those who seemed arrogant. The opinion of women regarding the attractiveness of partners turned out to be completely opposite: proud men won their hearts, but happy men were not at all impressive.

You gesture a lot

Fill in the physical space around you: use vivid gestures and expressive body posture. The researchers observed how people behaved on quick dates and concluded that those who were actively gesticulating were twice as successful as those who sat motionless.

This was confirmed by another experiment. The same people were photographed twice: in the first picture, each took a reserved position, and in the second one, they were asked to relax and be open as much as possible. These photos were then uploaded to the quick date app.

It is curious that the perception of a person, even from a photo, changed depending on their posture. Photos in which people were in confident and open positions received more responses than those in which they looked reserved.

You resemble his ex-girlfriend by appearance

Some people think that each of us has “our own type” of partner. It is women who tend to rely on this theory. However, there are some nuances.

For example, according to the results of the same 2011 study, which we described above, women and men agreed that the faces of people of the opposite sex, who in some way resembled their previous partners, seemed more attractive to them than others. However, men gave lower ratings to those women who resembled partners with whom they were in a relationship at the time of participation in the study.

You are very much like him

Dozens of years of research have absolutely proven that the already ingrained “opposites attract” stereotype is complete nonsense. Partners who are similar in many ways, such as personality type, are more likely to get along together. This facilitates mutual understanding in life together.

You look into his eyes for a long time

Joan Kellerman, a psychologist at the University of Massachusetts, conducted this experiment: 72 undergraduate students who did not know each other were paired up and stared into each other’s eyes for two minutes. They later said that during this time they grew more attracted to the person standing opposite. This suggests that prolonged eye contact can connect you to someone and rekindle feelings for the person you are seeing for the first time in your life.

You have the right smell

A University of California study found that ovulating women are impressed by the smell of T-shirts worn by men with high testosterone levels. This is fully explained by the instincts of procreation: such a smell attracts us because if a large amount of the male hormone is produced in the stronger sex, this indicates good genetics.

It is also important for men how their partner smells, only they prefer those smells that are in harmony with the woman. Body odor after a shower is considered ideal, and a perfume should only mildly complement this pleasant, pure and natural scent.

You look the same or slightly less attractive than him

In 1996, there was an experiment, in which all the participants were given an assessment of their physical attractiveness, and then each participant was randomly selected a partner. All the participants were asked how satisfied they were with their dates. The people whose attractiveness was assessed as high were harsher in their judgments (even if their partner had the same attractiveness). The better their interlocutor looked, the less satisfied they were with how the date went.

But that only applied to very attractive people. For most of us, it is still more important that we and our partner are equally beautiful.