Compared to heterosexual women, gay men appeared to prefer higher muscularity in potential romantic partners, which was also associated with increased drive for thinness & muscularity and increased eating pathology

Appearance-Related Partner Preferences and Body Image in a German Sample of Homosexual and Heterosexual Women and Men. Martin Cordes, Silja Vocks & Andrea S. Hartmann. Archives of Sexual Behavior, Oct 28 2021. https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007%2Fs10508-021-02087-5

Abstract: There is evidence that gender as well as sexual orientation can affect body image. In particular, heterosexual women and homosexual men seem to be more vulnerable to a negative body image compared to homosexual women and heterosexual men. One reason for this may be derived from the fact that heterosexual women and homosexual men try to attract male romantic partners: As men place more importance on physical attractiveness than do women, the pressure to fulfill the sociocultural beauty ideal is thus increased. The present online study investigated differences in appearance-related partner preferences and their associations with measures of body image and eating pathology in homosexual and heterosexual women and men. The non-representative sample consisted of 893 participants (n = 201 lesbian women, n = 192 gay men, n = 349 heterosexual women, and n = 151 heterosexual men), who completed silhouette measures assessing their perception and expectations regarding body fat and muscularity of their own body and the body of a potential romantic partner, as well as questionnaires on drive for thinness, drive for muscularity, and eating pathology. Overall, few differences in appearance-related partner preferences emerged between the four groups. However, compared to heterosexual women, homosexual men appeared to prefer higher muscularity in potential romantic partners, which was also associated with increased drive for thinness and muscularity and increased eating pathology. The present findings indicate that, irrespective of sexual orientation, women and men tend to share similar standards regarding their own and a potential partner’s physical appearance, potentially suggesting an increased hegemony of heteronormative beauty ideals in women and men in general.

Discussion

The main aim of the present online study was to investigate differences in appearance-related partner preferences between homosexual and heterosexual women and men and their associations with body image and eating pathology. The partner preferences were examined from two complementary perspectives, incorporating one’s own appearance-related ideals of the body of a potential romantic partner and the expectations of one’s own appearance in order to attract a potential romantic partner. Both aspects of partner preferences were measured using a newly designed silhouette measure that differentiates between the body fat and muscularity dimension. Based on previous research, it was assumed that appearance-related partner preferences would be more crucial for heterosexual women and homosexual men, as both groups try to attract male romantic partners, and men appear to place more importance on physical appearance than do women (e.g., Legenbauer et al., 2009).

With regard to the self-reported body image and eating pathology, the present findings revealed a rather gender-specific pattern, with women displaying a higher drive for thinness and men scoring higher on drive for muscularity. This is in line with the existing literature on general gender differences in body image (e.g., Karazsia et al., 2017; Kelley et al., 2010). In the same vein, both female groups reported more eating pathology than did heterosexual men, but did not differ among each other (see Yean et al., 2013) or from gay men. In accordance with previous findings (e.g., Peplau et al., 2009), gay men in the present sample reported a higher drive for thinness than did heterosexual men, and thus appeared to be slightly more vulnerable to a negative body image, whereas a lesbian orientation did not appear to have a protective effect on body image, as homosexual women did not differ from heterosexual women.

In support of the first hypothesis, no differences in perceptual body image in terms of the estimation of one’s own actual and ideal body were found between gay and heterosexual men, which mirrors the findings of Fussner and Smith (2015). However, contrary to our expectation, lesbian women’s own ideal body was not more corpulent (i.e., with more body fat) compared to that of heterosexual women. Even though this non-significant finding was due to alpha correction, the size of the effect was extremely small and therefore negligible. However, the finding does fit with data from qualitative research revealing that lesbian women also experience considerable sociocultural pressure to meet the thin body ideal (Smith et al., 2019). One reason for this may be found in the observable trend of increased acceptance of homosexuality in Western societies and media (e.g., Twenge et al., 2015), which may in turn also lead to increased acceptance of heteronormative beauty ideals within sexual minorities (Ahmad, & Bhugra, 2010; Smith et al., 2019).

The correlation analysis also revealed that only higher estimations of one's actual body fat, and not lower estimations of one’s actual muscularity, were consistently associated with at least increased drive for thinness and eating pathology across all groups. As there were no differences in BMI within the two female and the two male groups, this finding indicates that, irrespective of sex and sexual orientation, feeling fat seems to be more negative for one’s body image than feeling not muscular enough (see Cordes et al., 2016). This seems to be especially true for younger participants of the present study, as the correlation analysis showed that across all subgroups, a younger age was related to lower body fat estimations with respect to one’s ideal body.

Regarding the hypotheses concerning the differences in the appearance-related partner preferences between homosexual and heterosexual women and men, there was little evidence to support our assumptions. In accordance with our hypothesis, gay men preferred a more muscular build in their potential male partners compared to heterosexual women in their potential male partners, which underpins the relevance of physical attractiveness for homosexual men’s partner choices (see Legenbauer et al., 2009; Murnen et al., 2015). In line with this, the correlation data revealed that only for the group of gay men was preference for a more muscular build in a partner associated with increased drive for thinness, drive for muscularity, and eating pathology. Whether high demands on the physical appearance of a potential romantic partner negatively influence one's own body image, or whether the opposite is the case, cannot be answered by the present findings. However, it seems quite conceivable that gay men who place high demands on the muscularity of a potential romantic partner may be attracted to gay men who have similar demands on their partner’s appearance. This could open up a vicious circle of mutually reinforcing partner pressure that may lead to increased internalization of the mesomorphic body ideal (e.g., Tylka & Andorka, 2012) as well as to increased self-objectification (e.g., Engeln-Maddox et al., 2011).

However, contrary to our expectations, gay and heterosexual men did not differ in terms of the body they believe they should have in order to attract potential romantic partners. This may reflect the increasing relevance of physical appearance and body image for men in general (e.g., Fiske et al., 2014): particularly in times when the representation of one's own body and the social comparisons with others via social media is becoming increasingly ubiquitous (e.g., Fardouly & Vartanian, 2016). Moreover, the present finding also fits with findings by Pope et al. (2000), who reported that men tend to overestimate the degree of muscularity that women supposedly find attractive. This may also explain why, in the present study, heterosexual men’s expectations of how they should look in order to attract a potential romantic partner resemble the expectations of gay men, even though women place less importance on the physical appearance of their partners than do men (Legenbauer et al., 2009).

Furthermore, also contrary to our expectations, lesbian women did not choose silhouettes of a potential female romantic partner with more body fat compared to the silhouettes chosen by heterosexual men. Moreover, lesbian women displayed expectations regarding how they should look in order to attract a potential romantic partner that were comparable to the expectations of heterosexual women. However, these non-significant results were due to alpha correction. Again, the present findings may reflect the above-mentioned increased adoption of heteronormative standards of beauty within the lesbian community (Smith et al., 2019). Beyond this, the present findings are also in line with a qualitative study in lesbian and bisexual women by Huxley et al. (2011), who concluded that same-sex relationships did not serve as a protective factor for women’s body image per se, but have the potential to do so if past experiences of appearance pressure in relationships were more positive than negative. However, with respect to correlation data in the present study, it is striking that the total number of significant correlations between the four partner preferences items and the measures of body image and eating pathology was the smallest in lesbian women compared to all other groups, which may indicate a lower relevance of appearance-related partner preferences for lesbian women’s body image.

This assumption is further supported by the current finding, in line with our hypothesis, that lesbian women reported higher body-related beauty ideals with regard to body fat and muscularity for themselves than for a potential romantic partner, which could be interpreted as some sort of appearance-related double standard (Voges et al., 2019). This double standard may indicate that lesbian women: while adopting socio-cultural or heteronormative beauty ideals for themselves: are less likely to apply those ideals to their partners, at least compared to homosexual men, which may culminate in less body image-related partner pressure (see Huxley et al., 2015). In contrast, gay men apply the same beauty ideal standards to themselves as they do to a potential romantic partner.

Several limitations of the present study should be mentioned. First, the groups differed slightly in age, with homosexual men being older than both female groups, and heterosexual men being older than heterosexual women. As the literature shows that body image in men varies across different age groups, with younger men reporting a greater desire for a lean and muscular body than older men (e.g., McNeil & Firman, 2014), it is conceivable that the differences found in the present study between homosexual men and heterosexual women regarding the ideal body of a potential romantic partner might have been even more pronounced if the gay men in the present study had been somewhat younger. This assumption is further supported by the correlation analysis, which revealed that only for gay men was age negatively correlated with the muscularity dimension of the BIMTM variable partner ideal: Younger gay men preferred a more muscular partner. Second, in the same vein, the groups also differed in their educational level, with homosexual participants reporting fewer years of education compared to heterosexual participants. Again, only for gay men was a lower educational level associated with higher body fat estimations of one’s actual and ideal body. Thus, it is possible that the lower educational level in gay men may have affected the comparison with heterosexual men. Third, especially in comparison to lesbian women, heterosexual women in the present sample were more likely to be in a committed relationship. Although the investigation of partner preferences referred to a potential romantic partner, it cannot be completely ruled out that the results of the present study were affected by the mental representation of one's own current partner, whose physical appearance does not necessarily have to match the physical partner ideal. However, a restriction to non-partnered participants would have lowered the generalizability of the study, which is already limited as the present findings were obtained from a non-representative sample. Fourth, the sample size of the present study was too small to detect possibly existing small differences. Therefore, it is quite conceivable that some of the results that fell prey to alpha adjustment would have remained if the sample size had been larger. Finally, future research in this field may also benefit from investigating partner preferences in women and men with a bisexual orientation in order to test whether appearance-related partner preferences vary as a function of one’s own gender and the gender of a female and male partner, respectively.