Science Proves Women Look More Attractive In Groups

The phenomenon called “The Cheerleader Effect” has been around since the dawn of time, but most people didn’t have a name for it until it was discussed on the TV show How I Met Your Mother. The theory of “The Cheerleader Effect” was proposed by Barney Stinson and it suggests that the sum of the hotness of a group of women is greater than the individual parts. Have you ever seen a group of woman and thought “dayyyum” but then gotten a little closer, looked at them indivudually and thought “damn.” That’s The Cheerleader Effect in action.

This isn’t just the case for women, however, it’s true for men as well. Let’s take a look at a study that shows how The Cheerleader Effect applies to both genders, and how you can use it to your advantage.

The good folks at the University of California took it upon themselves to test this theory, and the results are in: The Cheerleader Effect is real. Here are 3 findings from the abstract of this study.

(a) The visual system automatically computes ensemble representations of faces presented in a group

(b) individual members of the group are biased toward this ensemble average

(c) average faces are attractive.

So when you’re looking at a group of people, your brain is quickly scanning their faces and showing you an average of all of their looks combined. This study consisted of 5 experiments. They showed photos of women alone and in groups and asked men to rate their attractiveness, and they did the same with photos of men alone and men in groups. In all of the experiments, the images of people in a group received higher scores than when they were alone.

When you’re out with a group of friends, you look better than when you’re walking around alone. When you see a group of attractive women, think twice – your brain may be playing tricks on you.

The greatest boost comes from people with odd features that complement one another. If you have a facial feature that you’re insecure about, find a friend with the opposite and you’ll average each other out. If you have a tiny nose, find a friend with a large nose. If you have very narrow eyes, find a friend with large wide eyes and so on and so forth. Skipping leg day lately? Find a friend with huge calves. You get the picture.

Study: Hierarchical Encoding Makes Individuals in a Group Seem More Attractive

Drew Walker
Edward Vul
University of California, San Diego

5:44 PM