The Woman in Red Is Seen as a Threat by Other Wom
In the 1939 film classic The Women, much is made of the alluring quality of a specific color of nail polish: “Jungle Red.” It turns out that the characters’ faith in the product was not misplaced.
New research suggests the color red on a woman does indeed signal sexual availability—not only to men, but also to other women.
As we have noted previously, studies have found that men tend to view women in red as more sexually attractive. But, ladies, if you were thinking wearing that color would send a subliminal signal only males would pick up on, you’re out of luck.
“Our results suggest that women perceive and behave toward other women in red as if these other women are actively advertising” their openness to the possibility of a sexual encounter, writes a research team led by University of Rochester psychologist Adam Pazda.
Pazda and his colleagues describe a experiment conducted on two different continents that provide evidence that wearing red sets off certain alarm bells. In the first, 196 women recruited online viewed a photo of “a moderately attractive women in her late 20s.”
Half saw an image of her wearing a white dress; the rest viewed an otherwise identical image of her in a red dress. Afterwards, all responded on a sliding scale to a series of statements such as “This person is sexy.”
As expected, the woman was seen as more sexy if she was wearing red. This held true whether or not the study participants were in a committed relationship.
The researchers caution that, needless to say, “not all women displaying red are actively advertising sexual availability.” For those who are not, it’s valuable to understand the ways their wardrobe choices are being interpreted—both by men, and by their female acquaintances.