The effects of attitude similarity and physical attractiveness on romantic attraction and time perception

Includes bibliographical references (pages 65-68)To determine the relative potency of physical attractiveness\ud and attitude similarity on degree of liking and\ud desire to date, and secondly, to find support for time\ud estimation as an alternative method of measuring romantic\ud attraction, forty male subjects met two female confederates\ud in what was ostensibly a computer dating program. One\ud confederate, average in physical attractiveness and moderate in attitude similarity, served as a reference point for the second, experimental confederate whose looks and attitude\ud were manipulated to appear highly attractive or\ud unattractive and/or highly similar or dissimilar in attitudes. Each subject spent a period of eight minutes with each confederate discussing their answers to an attitude scale\ud in order to equate the salience of the physical attraetive-??\ud ness and attitude similarity manipulations. This procedure\ud also allowed the use of' Ornstein's (1969) comparison\ud method of' time estimation which controls for individual\ud variance. Subjects were asked to estimate the passage of\ud time with the neutral date relative to the passage of time\ud with the experimental date. \ud A 2 x 2 Analysis of Variance (physical attractiveness\ud by attitude similarity) supported the predicted main effects\ud of physical attractiveness and attitude similarity on\ud degree of liking and desire to date. Contrary to the hypothesis, however, physical attractiveness and attitude\ud similarity did not interact, nor did physical. attractiveness\ud account for a greater amount of the variance in degree\ud of liking or desire to date. Time estimation did not\ud correlate with liking or desire to date nor was it differentially\ud affected by physical attractiveness and attitude\ud similarity as determined by two-way Analysis of Variance.\ud Post-hoc regression analysis was unable to reveal any\ud adequate predictors of time estimation. Possible explanations for the lack of' significance of these hypotheses are\ud suggested, as well as suggestions for future rezsearch