兩性新發現 壓力讓男性更鐘愛豐腴體型

Most men prefer leggy and lean women, Gisele Bündchen lookalikes, right? Not necessarily.

大部分男性的夢中情人應該像名模吉賽爾·邦辰一樣高挑纖細。但也有例外。

In fact, the body type that a man finds attractive can change depending on his environment and circumstances, a new study finds: when under stress, for instance, men prefer heavier women.

有新的研究結果發現，當男性的環境和心境改變時，他們評判體形性感的標準也會隨之變化。例如，在身處壓力下，男性更偏愛豐腴的女性。

The study, published in the journal PLoS ONE, reports that when men were placed in stressful situations, then asked to rate the attractiveness of women of varying body sizes, they tended to prefer beefier frames, compared with unstressed men whose tastes skewed thinner.

這項研究發表在PLos ONE上。研究人員讓被測試男性給各異的體形打分，受到壓力的測試者偏向喜歡飽滿的身材，而心情輕鬆的測試者偏愛苗條的體形。

“This suggests that our body size preferences are not innate, but are flexible, ” said study co-author Martin Tovée of Newcastle University in the U.K., in an email, noting that they may be influenced by our particular environment and resources.

文章的作者之一，英國紐卡索大學的Martin Tovée提到，這個結果說明我們對體形的喜惡不是天生的，而是會改變的，可能是受到當下外部環境和物質條件(resources)的影響。

The findings fall in line with evolutionary theories that suggest when resources are scarce or unpredictable, a woman’s thin physique may signal illness, frailty and the inability to reproduce. Indeed, Tovée and colleague Viren Swami of the University of Westminster in London have previously found that men under trying conditions — like extreme hunger — tend to rate heavier women as more attractive. The researchers suggest also that underlying biological mechanisms, such as blood sugar and hormone levels, are major players in how we perceive our surroundings.

這項發現有對應的進化論理論支持。進化論認爲，當缺乏食物或來源不穩定的情況下，體形纖瘦的女性容易虛弱疲乏，失去生育能力。Tovée和倫敦維斯敏斯特大學的Viren Swami之前發現，當男性感到難受，例如極度飢餓，他們會更偏愛豐腴的女性，覺得他們更性感。他們認爲這是本能的生物機制，環境支配着體內的血糖和荷爾蒙。

“Our work in parts of Malaysia and Africa has shown that in poorer environments where resources are scarce, people prefer a heavy body in a potential partner, ” said Tovée. “If you live in an environment where food is scarce, being heavier means you have fat stored up as a buffer against a potential food reduction in the future, and that you must be higher social status to afford the food in the first place. Both of these are attractive qualities in a partner in those circumstances.”

Tovée說到，“馬來西亞和非洲的研究顯示了，貧窮社會中，資源匱乏，人們期待未來的 伴侶體重更重。當缺乏食物，胖意味着你有脂肪儲存來度過之後一段食物緊缺的日子，首先你要有高的社會地位纔買得起食物。在這類社會環境下，這兩點是優秀伴侶人選應具備的。”

Moving from a low-resource environment to a richer one, like the U.K. or the U.S., can cause a shift in these preferences, says Tovée, and to test the theory further, the researchers recruited some male volunteers and manipulated their stress levels — a key problem for people living in poor environments.

而在富裕社會，例如英國或美國，人們的偏好卻不是這樣的。爲了進一步證明這個理論，研究人員招募了一些男性試驗者，並控制他們的精神壓力。而壓力是貧窮社會中重要問題之一。

The study examined 81 heterosexual men, about half of whom underwent the Trier Social Stress Test. In the test, the men participated in an impromptu job interview in front of four interviewers. They were asked them to “sell” themselves for five minutes, and then calculate answers to simple math problems under time pressure.

參與研究的81位直男試驗者中，一半參加了Trier社會壓力測試。測試內容是，試驗者沒有準備地參加了工作面試，面對4爲面試官。試驗者要“推銷”自己5分鐘，隨後在規定時間內做簡單的計算題。

Afterward, all the study participants were shown images of 10 women with body types ranging from emaciated to obese and were asked to rank them based on their attractiveness.[The images were numbered on a scale of 1 to 10 based on the women’s body mass index (BMI), with 1 representing very thin and 10 obese. The largest body size rated attractive by the stressed-out men was 7.17, which fell in the overweight category. The largest body type deemed attractive by the unstressed control group was 6.25, which was considered normal on the BMI scale.

所有試驗者都看了10張不同體形女性的照片，跨越瘦骨嶙峋到珠圓玉潤。實驗者要依據照片中女性的吸引力打分。之後，所有試驗者看了10張女性照片。按照照片中的女性體重指數“BMI”，他們被標註1到10的分數，1爲最瘦，10爲最胖。在壓力組男性評選爲美麗的女性中，身材最胖的體重指數爲7.17，屬於超重。而非壓力組的結果中，美麗的女性體形BMI指數最大僅爲6.25，屬於正常。

Overall, stressed men preferred a bigger body — their “ideal” figure was a 4.44 — than the unstressed men, who idealized a thinner body type, at 3.90. Stressed-out men not only rated heavier women as more attractive, but they also gave higher ratings to a wider range of body types overall.

總體看來，壓力中的男性偏好殷實的體形——他們心目中理想身材的BMI是4.44，相對的，非壓力組的結果是3.90，更瘦一些。處於壓力下的男性不僅覺得胖女人更有吸引力，他們給高分的體形範圍也更廣。

“This shift suggests that stress alters what you find attractive in a potential partner, and it is another factor helping you to optimize the fit of your partner preferences to your environment, ” said Tovérstanding how body preferences may change or be influenced by circumstance also sheds light on the development of warped body image, the authors say. “People suffering from conditions such as anorexia nervosa have a distorted perception of body size and body ideals, and it’s important that research focus on the mechanisms underlying and influencing the perception of body size, ” says Tovée.

“這個區別顯示了，壓力能改變對未來配偶的偏好，你會更偏好能適應按照當前環境的配偶。”Tovée闡述。文章中提到，環境能改變或影響我們對身材的喜好，這個發現會讓我們更好的理解目前扭曲的體形形象是如何發展形成的。“爲追求完美體形，而在厭食症的煎熬下的人對體形的理解是有失偏頗的，這就是爲什麼研究需要關注影響體形偏好的機制。”Tovée說。

Despite our media’s seeming reverence for size-zero models and ripped muscle men, it may help people suffering from eating disorders and other body-image problems to know that such body “ideals” are not exactly ideal after all. “The information from this article could be useful in therapy of anxiety and eating disorders, ” Dr. Igor Galynker, associate chairman of the department of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at Beth Israel Medical Center, told ABC News. “The information could be an alternative to thoughts such as, ‘I am fat; no man would find me attractive.’”

儘管我們的媒體似乎過度宣揚零號模特和肌肉男，其實卻可以幫助飲食絮亂的人，糾正他們對“完美”身材的誤解。“本文提供的信息可以應用到煩躁症和飲食混亂症的治療。”貝斯以色列醫學中心精神病和行爲科學系副主任Igor Galynker博士，告訴ABC新聞。“我們傳達的信息代替了有些人原來的想法：我很胖，沒有人覺得我漂亮”。