Female Competition and Short Hair

[whitecoast]

I found an interesting study online that shows that more competitive women recommend other women cut their hair shorter, presumably because they think it would make their competition for mates less attractive.

A seemingly light-hearted study on women's haircut advice has surprisingly dark psychological implications

Highly competitive women are more inclined to advise other women, especially those of similar attractiveness, to opt for shorter hairstyles in a potential attempt to lessen their rivals' attractiveness, reveals a study from Personality and Individual Differences. This behavior, seen even among...

www.psypost.org

Highly competitive women are more likely to recommend shorter haircuts to other women, potentially to diminish the physical attractiveness of their romantic rivals, according to new research. This phenomenon occurs even among women who are unfamiliar with one another, suggesting an innate tendency among some women to sabotage potential rivals even without a direct threat.

The new findings, published in Personality and Individual Differences, provide unique insights into an understudied aspect of intrasexual competition, which refers to competition between members of the same sex. Intrasexual competition has been a subject of interest in psychology, particularly in understanding how individuals vie for social status, access to resources, and desirable mates.
….

The researchers conducted two separate studies, which included 450 women (aged 17-67) who were recruited from an undergraduate participant pool and the general public. The participants were presented with hypothetical salon clients, each with a portrait image that varied in attractiveness, a close-up image of their hair (described as either good or poor condition), and the client’s preference for cutting off “as little as possible” or “as much as necessary” hair. Participants were asked to recommend the amount of hair to be cut off for each client.

The researchers found that women who reported higher levels of intrasexual competitiveness were more likely to recommend that clients have more hair cut off when the hair was in good condition and clients expressed a preference for minimal cutting. The reason behind this recommendation might be to subtly manipulate the appearance of their rivals. By advising more extensive haircuts, these women could potentially diminish the physical attractiveness of other women.

Another intriguing finding is that women advised clients of similar attractiveness as themselves to cut off the most hair. In this scenario, participants effectively targeted women they perceived as being on the same attractiveness level as themselves. This suggests a form of competitive behavior known as horizontal competition, which occurs when individuals compete with others of similar attributes or qualities.
…

“The way we set up the scenario in this study was such that the ‘hairdresser’ and the ‘client’ didn’t know each other, and there was no implied competition between them (no suggestion that they would ever compete with each other for men, jobs or anything else). The implications of this are substantial. It suggests that at least some women engage in sabotage of other women as almost a default response – in the complete absence of any identifiable reason to do so.”

“It’s understandable, and expected, for women to engage in some sort of sabotage if another woman is a direct threat – if she’s flirting with your partner, for example. But the suggestion that at least some women might engage in sabotage of other women as a default setting whenever the opportunity presents itself, is a new implication from the current study.”

Looking at the pervasiveness of severely short haircuts in a lot of progressive or feminist women, I can’t help but think they have been victims of a subtle con by the women who write, publish, or run a lot of the media, who due to their more competitive nature are spreading certain fashion trends for self-serving ends.

 

[Debra]

I found an interesting study online that shows that more competitive women recommend other women cut their hair shorter, presumably because they think it would make their competition for mates less attractive.
[…]
Looking at the pervasiveness of severely short haircuts in a lot of progressive or feminist women, I can’t help but think they have been victims of a subtle con by the women who write, publish, or run a lot of the media, who due to their more competitive nature are spreading certain fashion trends for self-serving ends.

I find this study to be very superficial and portrays women in a rather shallow, 2 dimensional way.
I’m also gonna remind readers, that these “studies” are biased, and it helps to keep the statement “correlation does not always indicate causation” handy, especially when weeding through mainstream material.

First, my disclaimer, in case any “dedicated White Coats” take offence for what I’m about to post:

“The “medical” information in this post is provided as an information resource only, and is not to be used or relied on for any diagnostic or treatment purposes. This information does not create any patient-physician relationship, I do not claim any degrees or authority, and should not be used as a substitute for professional diagnosis and treatment.”
Hopefully that will suffice.

I’ve dedicated the last 20 some years to learning all I could regarding the human psyche, or as Pierre so brilliantly reminded me, the “Bodymind”.

Accusing these so called “competitive, manipulative women” of evily plotting against other women to chop off their flowing locks of beautiful cascading hair, because of jealousy and female competitive behaviour, is nothing short of pathological, in my humble opinion.
In my experience, as a woman, these actions are not done consciously, or “on purpose to harm”.
The behaviours are hormonally and instinctively acted out.

Historically, women cooperated, women helped each other, assisted in births, and nursed each other’s babies, nurtured and cared FOR each other, for Pete’s sake!
What’s happened to that?
Abuse, Shocks, traumas and conflicts have impacted and constellated the human brain so severely, that it’s gonna take more than a few generations to even begin to remember how to be “excellent to each other”, in my opinion.

Our personality is shaped tho’, BY the registered conflict shocks that are activated in our brains, by our psyche, our Bodymind.
Our Bodymind is not our personality, it is the equivalent to a computer mother board, in a way, but the sum total of constellations and active conflicts, DO make us “who we are”, that is, until we heal the conflicts, if they are caught in time.

The Psyche, our Bodymind is the complete, innate operating mainframe, it’s on 24/7, always on alert for dangers, and triggering Biological programs, in nanoseconds, in response to conflict shocks sustained by the surprise events that take us “off guard”.
Biological programs are the template for the diversity of being, in every living organism on this planet.
So, here’s what my point is based on:
“[…]
FEMININE AND MASCULINE BEHAVIORS

Dr. Hamer discovered that feminine and masculine behaviors are controlled from the same areas in the brain that regulate the estrogen and testosterone levels. Next to the hormone status, a person’s biological handedness is of equal significance.

Generally, both males and females can exhibit feminine and masculine traits. However, independent of one’s gender, conflict activity related to the left temporal lobe accentuates a masculine behavior, whereas a feminine behavior prevails with conflict activity linked to the right temporal lobe. Based on Dr. Hamer's findings, gender roles are first and foremost determined by biological conflicts a person experiences in the course of life rather than solely a result of social and cultural conditioning, as suggested.”
[…]
Link if anyone is interested:

The Temporal Lobes

Understanding depression, manic depression (bipolar disorders), postpartum psychosis, obsessive-compulisve behaviors, maturity stop, male and female behaviors, and homosexuality

learninggnm.com

 

[Jefferson]

Maybe whitecoast should have written "Trigger alert" at the beginning of his post .

Jokes aside, nobody is "accusing" anyone here, @Debra , and what is pointed out is that a small cohort of more character-disturbed women might be using this as a type of con. It's just a data point, as we strive to point out various pathological phenomena out there without drawing definite conclusions. Obviously the majority of women are supportive and all that as you mentioned.

 

[T.C.]

Accusing these so called “competitive, manipulative women”

It doesn't say they're manipulative.

of evily plotting against other women to chop off their flowing locks of beautiful cascading hair

The article doesn't moralise about it. It doesn't use words like bad, or evil. It's just pointing out an objective finding about horizontal competitiveness in women.

because of jealousy and female competitive behaviour, is nothing short of pathological, in my humble opinion.

The article doesn't say anything about jealousy. It doesn't say anything about it being done in a conscious way. It does say that this type of behaviour is exhibited by women who class themselves as more highly competitive though. Which you say is "nothing short of pathological" to suggest. But you then go on to confirm the existence of this type of behaviour and to give reasons for it:

In my experience, as a woman, these actions are not done consciously, or “on purpose to harm”.
The behaviours are hormonally and instinctively acted out.

Historically, women cooperated, women helped each other, assisted in births, and nursed each other’s babies, nurtured and cared FOR each other, for Pete’s sake!
What’s happened to that?
Abuse, Shocks, traumas and conflicts have impacted and constellated the human brain so severely, that it’s gonna take more than a few generations to even begin to remember how to be “excellent to each other”, in my opinion.

Our personality is shaped tho’, BY the registered conflict shocks that are activated in our brains, by our psyche, our Bodymind.
Our Bodymind is not our personality, it is the equivalent to a computer mother board, in a way, but the sum total of constellations and active conflicts, DO make us “who we are”, that is, until we heal the conflicts, if they are caught in time.

So if you say that it's pathological to suggest that women who are higher in competitiveness would unconsciously cut a client's hair shorter if that client was typically in the same 'pool' of sexual competition as them, then why are you giving reasons why it is probably true?

As an outside observer, it looks to me like the article pushed some buttons in you that caused you to dump a lot of stuff onto it that isn't really there and to miss the technical nature of the wording of it, and from there your thinking was clouded by emotional energy and the things you wrote in your post didn't logically follow.

I hope you're not offended by what I've said. I'm basically just curious how you're doing? If there's anything you want to get off your chest then you could post in the "How are you feeling?" thread or make your own. I hope you take that as being of genuine care and concern, and not patronising. But if you do take it as the latter, then I apologise because I don't mean it like that.