Men can be trained to exhibit confidence, which makes them more attractive to women. But women might not choose to marry such men
“No matter what, no matter when, no matter who, any man has a chance to sweep any woman off her feet. Just needs the right broom,” said Will Smith’s eponymous ‘date doctor’ character in the movie, Hitch. One might add, “All you need is a little confidence.”
In his latest research titled “Confidence is sexy and it can be trained: Examining male social confidence in initial, opposite‐sex interactions”, SMU Associate Professor of Psychology Norman Li found that men’s social confidence in chatting with women can be trained to improve, thus making them more romantically desirable.
“Male participants either attended a live workshop or watched a video, conducted or recorded by a life skills coach/dating guru,” explains Li. “They were taught basic guidelines for approaching speed-dating chats and to view such chats as a fun opportunity.”
The research and findings
Despite the proliferation of books, videos, and seminars on the topic, little scientific research has been conducted on social confidence. In his project, Li studied the reactions of 235 women who chatted with men who had attended or not attended the aforementioned workshops.
The tutorial-trained men were perceived to be higher in confidence, status and dominance. The trained men, and self-proclaimed socially confident men who took part in the study but were not trained, were more likely to be chosen as a short-term mate.
But, as in the movie when Kevin James’s character got dumped when he was exposed as a client of Hitch, knowledge of men having received training led to lower perceptions of trustworthiness by women.
Such knowledge also lowered the likelihood of women choosing these men as a long-term partner, although it made no difference to their short-term attractiveness.
“Physical attractiveness and, at least in men, confidence are especially important (sexy) for short-term relationships,” Li tells Perspectives@SMU. “But a host of other traits, including trustworthiness, social status, agreeableness, etc., have been shown to be important for long-term relationships.
“Staying mum seems to be the implication here. That said, some people might nevertheless feel like they’ll somehow be found out.”
While the study examines the effect of male self-confidence in attracting females, how would the findings change if the roles were switched? What about homosexual relationships?
“Women likely value confidence in men more than men value it in women, but female confidence might also signal a greater possibility of a short-term relationship, which would be desirable to men looking for such relationships,” Li notes. “Homosexual men tend to have similar mate preferences as heterosexual men, so they probably place relatively low value on confidence.
“Femme (but not butch) lesbians likely value confidence as they value status in their partners. Further research is needed to examine the dynamics for these other groups.”
CON-fidence on the job?
As for confidence in the professional sphere, Li acknowledges the human tendency to “lend faith to individuals who appear confident [as it would] in just about every context”.
That raises the question: Would a company feel cheated if a successful job candidate revealed later on that he had been trained to project confidence even if he genuinely had the requisite skills?
Says Li, “The company might feel a bit duped, but then again, social confidence means better social skills, which are important in most work contexts. Also, just like flattery where people like it even if it’s obviously fake, people probably can’t help but fall for the charm of a confident employee.
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