A wobbly suspension bridge showed how easily people misread their own pounding hearts
In the 1970s an attractive woman approached 85 men, some standing on a frightening suspension bridge and some on an ordinary one. Those on the scary crossing wrote more sexual stories for her and tried harder to reach her afterwards, apparently crediting her with a thrill that the drop below had caused.
Donald G. Dutton and Arthur P. Aron ran that study to probe how anxiety feeds desire. Each man was asked to complete a thematic apperception test, inventing stories about ambiguous pictures, and the bridge group loaded theirs with more sexual content. A second experiment drew one man from a pool of 80 and paired him with an attractive female confederate while shocks were expected. His stories grew more sexual when he anticipated being shocked himself, but not when only she was due for one.
Psychologists call the effect misattribution of arousal. A racing pulse, a surge of adrenaline, or plain fear gets pinned on the nearest person rather than on the situation, especially when the true cause is unclear. The trick cuts both ways: heightened arousal tends to make an appealing person seem more appealing and an unappealing one less so.
Ordinary attraction draws on every sense, most strongly early in a relationship. Sight takes in facial symmetry, apparent health and the way someone moves or dances; hearing picks up voice; smell can charm or repel; touch and warmth matter too. Pheromones do influence hormone output, for instance ovarian follicle maturation and testosterone levels, yet their role in human relationships is probably small and hotly disputed. Some researchers have tried to treat attractiveness as a measurable asset, a kind of erotic capital, but it depends heavily on the viewer's perceptions and orientation.
People also work to raise their own appeal, a process researchers label enhancement. The deliberate kind covers grooming, clothes, jewellery, showing off talents, stressing shared interests and hiding weak points. The unconscious kind includes body language that signals confidence and small moments of skin contact. Flirting, with its jokes, conversation and brief touches, is one way such efforts speed up courtship.
Source: Sexual attraction
