Facial threat affects trust more strongly than facial attractiveness in women than it does in men.

ABSTRACT: Trust is essential in initiating social relationships. Due to the differential evolution of sex hormones as well as the fitness burdens of producing offspring, evaluations of a potential mating partner's trustworthiness likely differ across sexes. Here, we explore unknown sex-specific effects of facial attractiveness and threat on trusting other-sex individuals. Ninety-three participants (singles; 46 women) attracted by the other sex performed an incentivized trust game. They had to decide whether to trust individuals of the other sex represented by a priori-created face stimuli gradually varying in the intensities of both attractiveness and threat. Male and female participants trusted attractive and unthreatening-looking individuals more often. However, whereas male participants' trust be

SUBMITTER: Brustkern J 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8602253 | biostudies-literature | 2021 Nov

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature