The Impact of Weather on Women’s Tendency to Wear Red or Pink when at High Risk for Conception

Abstract

Women are particularly motivated to enhance their sexual attractiveness during their most fertile period, and men perceive shades of red, when associated with women, as sexually attractive. Building on this research, we recently found that women are more likely to wear reddish clothing when at peak fertility (Beall & Tracy, 2013), presumably as a way of increasing their attractiveness. Here, we first report results from a methodological replication, conducted during warmer weather, which produced a null effect. Investigating this discrepancy, we considered the impact of a potentially relevant contextual difference between previous research and the replication: current weather. If the red-dress effect is driven by a desire to increase one’s sexual appeal, then it should emerge most reliably when peak-fertility women have few alternative options for accomplishing this goal (e.g., wearing minimal clothing). Results from re-analyses of our previously collected data and a new experiment support this account, by demonstrating that the link between fertility and red/pink dress emerges robustly in cold, but not warm, weather. Together, these findings suggest that the previously documented red-dress effect is moderated by current climate concerns, and provide further evidence that under certain circumstances red/pink dress is reliably associated with female fertility.

No compelling positive association between ovarian hormones and wearing red clothing when using multinomial analyses

“…Several studies report that wearing the color red increases women's attractiveness to men (Elliot & Niesta, 2008;Elliot, Tracy, Pazda, & Beall, 2013;Guéguen, 2012;Young, 2015) and is preferred by women in courtship situations (Elliot, Greitemeyer, & Pazda, 2013;Prokop & Hromada, 2013). Some studies further report that wearing red increases alongside women's likelihood of conception throughout the menstrual cycle (Beall & Tracy, 2013;Beall & Tracy, 2014; but c.f. Prokop & Hromada, 2013).…”

“…Replication in a sample of varying ages is warranted because red may increase attractiveness 102 only for younger women (Schwartz & Singer, 2013). If red is truly a universal cue of human 103 ovulation (Beall & Tracy, 2014), then the effect of the E:P ratio on wearing red should be evident 104 in women older than 22 years, but may also be moderated by age. We investigated this hypothesis using one within-and one between-subjects dataset containing photographs of women and repeated hormone measurements.…”

The effect of red on male perceptions of female attractiveness: Moderation by baseline attractiveness of female faces

“…Recent evidence suggests that coloration may serve a similar purpose in human mating, as female sexual excitement is associated with reddening of the cheeks, neck, and chest (e.g., Changizi, ). Beyond physiological changes in skin coloration, women are more likely to wear red than other colors when they anticipate meeting attractive, but not unattractive, men (Elliot, Greitemeyer, & Pazda, ), implying the use of non‐bodily displays of red to signal sexual interest (Elliot & Pazda, ; Prokop & Hromada, ; Tracy & Beall, ).…”

If we accept that poor replication rates are mainstream

“…The difficulty here is that theories are often so flexible that all these sorts of differences can be cited as reasons for a replication failure. For example, Michigan is colder than Florida, and outdoor air temperature was used as an alibi for a replication failure of a well-publicized finding in evolutionary psychology (Tracy & Beall 2014). Also there is no end to the differences between the United Kingdom and Japan that could be used to explain away a disappointing replication result in social psychology.…”