This article from the NYTimes was really surprising to me. Of course, it's conventional wisdom that women find taller guys attractive. This study shows that it's a MUCH bigger factor than I would have ever guessed.
LINK TO ARTICLE
The important part:
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Just as Darwin could have predicted, the researchers have found that women are pickier than men. While men concentrate mainly on looks and will ask out a lot of women as long as they’re above a certain threshold of attractiveness, women focus on fewer prospects.
They’re less willing to date someone of another race. When using online services, they pay more attention than men do to a potential partner’s education, profession and income. They prefer taller men, but they’re willing to relax their standards for the Ron Perelmans of the world, as revealed in a study of more than 20,000 online daters by Gunter Hitsch and Ali Hortacsu of the University of Chicago and Dan Ariely of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
They found that a 5-foot-8 man was just as successful in getting dates as a 6-footer if he made more money — precisely $146,000 a year more. For a 5-foot-2 man, the number was $277,000. [For more of these trade-offs, see nytimes.com/tierneylab.]
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