Synonyms
Definition
Women’s mating behavior includes human female sexual development, mate preferences, and strategies to optimize reproduction and long-term mating. Each of these components of mating behavior has been shaped by selection to produce adaptive outcomes.
Introduction
A life history approach to evaluating human behavior can be fruitful for understanding the fundamentally unique nature of women’s mating behavior (Luoto et al. 2018; Motta-Mena and Puts 2017). For example, early in development, puberty in humans marks a formative time during which changes in the visuoperceptual system can influence the ability to detect facial cues related to mating behavior and sexual relationships (e.g., sexual interest; Garcia and Scherf 2015; Motta-Mena and Scherf 2017), a crucial developmental transition that, thus far, appears to be exclusive to humans. As young women undergo puberty and begin menstruation, they begin to exhibit...
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References
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Motta-Mena, N.V. (2019). Observed Mating Behavior and Women’s Long-Term Mating. In: Shackelford, T., Weekes-Shackelford, V. (eds) Encyclopedia of Evolutionary Psychological Science. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-16999-6_3657-1
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-16999-6_3657-1
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