Over at Gene Expression, I review the new data on birth rates. Basically, birth rates are up across the board by age and race, and the closer you get to the female fecundity peak in the early 20s, the stronger that signal is. There's nothing special, that is, about births being up among young people. The changes among 15 to 17 year-olds isn't very dramatic, and it's hardly visible compared to the long-term downward trend. The only young group that's shown a pretty steady increase in recent years is 18 to 19 year-old Hispanics, whose birth rates have been increasing since 2000.
Yak over there. Comments closed here.
January 9, 2009
Data: going out more to bars = more sex partners
Updated
I thought of starting this with "no surprise," but that's only true for girls who live in bars -- we already think of them as promiscuous. A lot of people, though, are skeptical that guys who go to bars a lot actually end up in bed with more girls. The General Social Survey asks people how often they go out to bars, and how many sex partners they had in the past year. Here's a graph of the relationship for males and females (the pattern is the same when only unmarried people are counted):
Sure enough, female bar flies are sluts. (I left out the "goes almost daily" group because they were a small sample compared to the rest.) That's yet another reason to approach "the new girl" at your favorite clubs and bars -- aside from novelty value, if you rarely see her there, she probably doesn't frequent bars so often, and won't cheat on you. Unless she goes to every single bar in the area, coming back to one only after a month's cycle -- but you should be able to tell which case she is.
And in case you were skeptical, guys who go out to bars a lot do bed more women. Really, where else would you go to boost the notch count? Maybe the skepticism is based on the image of the group of doofuses who go out frequently yet do all the wrong things. (See any TGI Fridays commercial.) And yet, as goofy as these guys may be, at least they're out and about playing some kind of numbers game -- they've got more promise than if they'd stayed home the entire year.
Correlation isn't causation, as they say, so it could just be that extraverted people both go out more and are better at persuading others into the bedroom. Still, don't forget what Woody Allen said: "Eighty percent of success is showing up."
Update: Instead of looking at average number of partners, here is the percent who had 3+ and 4+ partners in the past year, by how often they go to bars.
For males who go almost daily, 20% had 4+ partners, and 35% had 3+ partners, vs. 2% and 5%, resp., for males who never go. For females who go several times a week, 6% had 4+ partners and 13% had 3+ partners, vs. 0.4% and 0.9%, resp., for females who never go. Basically, by going a lot instead of not at all, the chances of having several partners per year go up by an order of magnitude. The data don't tell us anything about how many times the person has sex with each partner -- for all we know, they had 3 or 4 semi-steady relationships with people they met in bars.
GSS variables used: PARTNERS, SOCBAR, SEX
I thought of starting this with "no surprise," but that's only true for girls who live in bars -- we already think of them as promiscuous. A lot of people, though, are skeptical that guys who go to bars a lot actually end up in bed with more girls. The General Social Survey asks people how often they go out to bars, and how many sex partners they had in the past year. Here's a graph of the relationship for males and females (the pattern is the same when only unmarried people are counted):
Sure enough, female bar flies are sluts. (I left out the "goes almost daily" group because they were a small sample compared to the rest.) That's yet another reason to approach "the new girl" at your favorite clubs and bars -- aside from novelty value, if you rarely see her there, she probably doesn't frequent bars so often, and won't cheat on you. Unless she goes to every single bar in the area, coming back to one only after a month's cycle -- but you should be able to tell which case she is.
And in case you were skeptical, guys who go out to bars a lot do bed more women. Really, where else would you go to boost the notch count? Maybe the skepticism is based on the image of the group of doofuses who go out frequently yet do all the wrong things. (See any TGI Fridays commercial.) And yet, as goofy as these guys may be, at least they're out and about playing some kind of numbers game -- they've got more promise than if they'd stayed home the entire year.
Correlation isn't causation, as they say, so it could just be that extraverted people both go out more and are better at persuading others into the bedroom. Still, don't forget what Woody Allen said: "Eighty percent of success is showing up."
Update: Instead of looking at average number of partners, here is the percent who had 3+ and 4+ partners in the past year, by how often they go to bars.
For males who go almost daily, 20% had 4+ partners, and 35% had 3+ partners, vs. 2% and 5%, resp., for males who never go. For females who go several times a week, 6% had 4+ partners and 13% had 3+ partners, vs. 0.4% and 0.9%, resp., for females who never go. Basically, by going a lot instead of not at all, the chances of having several partners per year go up by an order of magnitude. The data don't tell us anything about how many times the person has sex with each partner -- for all we know, they had 3 or 4 semi-steady relationships with people they met in bars.
GSS variables used: PARTNERS, SOCBAR, SEX
January 8, 2009
Latin teen booty or Asian MILF boobies? Trends in porn over the past 20 years
One feature of the mid-late '90s that I've always found bizarre was the brief rise of Asian girls as sex symbols, despite having no ass or breasts, flat and fat faces, and a cold demeanor (Lucy Liu on Ally McBeal). This was an on-the-ground phenomenon too, with guys saying things like, "Dude, did you see her roommate? She's ASIAN!" Other aspects of female sex symbols -- the ones that aren't so central to her value -- go through fashion cycles, such as the recent domination of the ass over the boobs.
To investigate how real these apparent trends were, and when they started and stopped, I searched for certain keywords within the titles of porn movies at the Internet Adult Film Database. This can't tell us what percent of porn chicks were Asian in a given year, but it at least tells us about the strength of the niche market for Asian videos (or whatever), where the word appears right there in the title. Most of the keywords show up around 1988, so I started all of them there to make the graphs comparable.
I looked up three trends: Latin vs. Asian ethnicity, teen vs. MILF ages, and emphasis on asses vs. boobs. The number of titles in each year is standardized by dividing by the number of titles with "the," a neutral word to compare against. I've plotted the trend for each of the two types on the same graph, as well as another graph with the difference between the two. First, the ethnic groups (click to see full-size):
In the trend graph, we see that an increasing fraction of porn movies have either an Asian or Latin focus -- the titles are no longer vague, like "Sexual Inferno," but explicitly name the type of girl and act you're looking for, like "Latin Booty Worship 2." This trend begins in the mid-'90s. The Latin - Asian gap favored Asians from '92 to '99, though not by a lot. After being neck-and-neck in 2000 and '01, Latins have taken over since then, peaking in 2004.
And now for trends in unusual ages (young or old):
Teens became a popular niche in 2000, and MILFs in 2003 or '04. Looks like teens have stalled out as a niche, while MILFs are still rising in popularity. There wasn't much difference between the two age groups throughout the '90s, but from 2000 to '06, teens blew MILFs out of the water, peaking in '03. For the past two years, though, MILFs have been a stronger niche than teenagers -- a sure sign that civilization is doomed.
Lastly, the trends in focus on the ass or breasts:
These two increase throughout the '90s, but at the turn of the millennium both increase even faster. It seems that the late '90s was when porn changed from movies with acting to an unconnected series of scenes on the same theme. Booty movies have always been more popular than boob movies, which I wouldn't have guessed would be true before 2000. Either there are more assmen than boobmen, or even boobmen become more interested in asses when they need to get the job done. The ass - boob gap was greatest in 2006, but has declined somewhat in the past two years. Has the booty bubble burst? Let's hope not. But Congress can always break it off a piece of its big stimulus package to keep it floating.
So, along with rock music, we can add "porn" to the list of pop culture things whose most recent peak was around 2003 - '06.
Guys like to think that they're largely immune to fashion changes in female sex symbols, and to a great extent, we're right -- short of driving a spike through our brain, you can't convince us that Sarah Jessica Parker is sexy. But for traits that don't matter so much, we may go along with whatever's cool at the moment, like a J-Lo booty. I've been a fan of that shape ever since my first girlfriend in sixth grade, a Central American with a full rump and the largest breasts in the entire middle school. But for others, it may be like the Asian craze of the mid-late '90s.
To investigate how real these apparent trends were, and when they started and stopped, I searched for certain keywords within the titles of porn movies at the Internet Adult Film Database. This can't tell us what percent of porn chicks were Asian in a given year, but it at least tells us about the strength of the niche market for Asian videos (or whatever), where the word appears right there in the title. Most of the keywords show up around 1988, so I started all of them there to make the graphs comparable.
I looked up three trends: Latin vs. Asian ethnicity, teen vs. MILF ages, and emphasis on asses vs. boobs. The number of titles in each year is standardized by dividing by the number of titles with "the," a neutral word to compare against. I've plotted the trend for each of the two types on the same graph, as well as another graph with the difference between the two. First, the ethnic groups (click to see full-size):
In the trend graph, we see that an increasing fraction of porn movies have either an Asian or Latin focus -- the titles are no longer vague, like "Sexual Inferno," but explicitly name the type of girl and act you're looking for, like "Latin Booty Worship 2." This trend begins in the mid-'90s. The Latin - Asian gap favored Asians from '92 to '99, though not by a lot. After being neck-and-neck in 2000 and '01, Latins have taken over since then, peaking in 2004.
And now for trends in unusual ages (young or old):
Teens became a popular niche in 2000, and MILFs in 2003 or '04. Looks like teens have stalled out as a niche, while MILFs are still rising in popularity. There wasn't much difference between the two age groups throughout the '90s, but from 2000 to '06, teens blew MILFs out of the water, peaking in '03. For the past two years, though, MILFs have been a stronger niche than teenagers -- a sure sign that civilization is doomed.
Lastly, the trends in focus on the ass or breasts:
These two increase throughout the '90s, but at the turn of the millennium both increase even faster. It seems that the late '90s was when porn changed from movies with acting to an unconnected series of scenes on the same theme. Booty movies have always been more popular than boob movies, which I wouldn't have guessed would be true before 2000. Either there are more assmen than boobmen, or even boobmen become more interested in asses when they need to get the job done. The ass - boob gap was greatest in 2006, but has declined somewhat in the past two years. Has the booty bubble burst? Let's hope not. But Congress can always break it off a piece of its big stimulus package to keep it floating.
So, along with rock music, we can add "porn" to the list of pop culture things whose most recent peak was around 2003 - '06.
Guys like to think that they're largely immune to fashion changes in female sex symbols, and to a great extent, we're right -- short of driving a spike through our brain, you can't convince us that Sarah Jessica Parker is sexy. But for traits that don't matter so much, we may go along with whatever's cool at the moment, like a J-Lo booty. I've been a fan of that shape ever since my first girlfriend in sixth grade, a Central American with a full rump and the largest breasts in the entire middle school. But for others, it may be like the Asian craze of the mid-late '90s.
January 7, 2009
A deceptive signaling theory of The Eternal Ingenue
Alias Clio made up a list of female heartbreaker types, one of whom is The Eternal Ingenue. Almost everyone who's read that description, including me, was confusing this type with a girly girl -- one who just happened to be a heartbreaker. But I've come to realize that she is really a wolf in sheep's clothing, and there are key points in Clio's description that support this.
All animals signal information to other animals. Biologists debate whether a signal is honest or deceptive -- does a deep, resonant voice mean he's big, and therefore could probably kick our ass, or has a non-threatening creature found a way to fake us out? (See Maynard Smith & Harper's book Animal Signals or Oren Hasson's articles on signaling.)
When we use appearances to divine the hidden essence of someone's personality, we rely heavily on the face. Sure, there are other parts that tell us about their behavior, but the face is always visible and doesn't move inconveniently when we're talking.
There's one known example of deceptive signaling involving the face -- namely, that babyfaced men tend to have more dominant personalities than maturefaced men, and tend to excel more at whatever they do. For example, high-IQ babyfaced men achieve more in school than their maturefaced counterparts, while low-IQ babyfaced men commit more crime compared to their gangmates. (See Leslie Zebrowitz's book Reading Faces, or her articles.) People expect these guys to be innocent, harmless, and docile, but they've been fooled. *
Most men don't have babyfaces because, otherwise, it would be very clear to people that an innocent-looking face didn't mean innocent behavior, and the jig would be up. But there clearly is an open niche to be filled. So, there will be a small but persistent fraction of men who fool others this way. The cost to others isn't so great because they will rarely encounter such a man, and there would be huge costs to ignoring the face when it was accurate -- that is, in most cases. So, there's no selection pressure to ignore what the face claims lies inside.
I think the same is true of the Eternal Ingenue type. Whether this is true of the exact type Clio had in mind isn't important -- that's just a matter of terminology and classification. Here is what she looks like, according to Clio:
How can it be that a girl with such a super-feminine face can have so masculine of a body shape, assuming she's past puberty? Based only on personal experience, I also contend that these women have masculine digit ratios (ring finger of right hand noticeably longer than the index finger). ** It shouldn't be hard to check this for the women Clio mentions, though.
To me, this suggests that she has a higher-than-average level of testosterone, which is reflected in her body overall, but which is disguised by her facial features. Why just the face? Because that's primarily where people -- the suckers -- are going to look when predicting personality from appearance, not her waist-to-hip ratio, digit ratio, boob size, or whatever else.
This high-T view also explains why these women tend to be heartbreakers, going from one man to another without feeling very bad about it -- that's a guy's way. I'm sure they rationalize it in a girly way, like they're just in love with the ideal of being in love (as Clio says). But regardless of how they spin their roving eye and wandering ways, in the end they do show fairly masculine dating behavior. It's also no accident that these women do well in highly competitive jobs like acting or dancing -- you don't climb to the top of anything without a fair amount of balls.
If this is correct, then the genes of an Eternal Ingenue have found some way to allow testosterone to affect most of her body -- including parts of her brain -- but to cut it off before it reaches the skull proper, where it would masculinize her face and let everyone know what her personality is really like. It also seems to preserve the girliness of the parts of the brain responsible for giggliness and extraversion.
I know almost nothing about molecular biology, but there could be some gene or team of genes that get testosterone where it needs to go, or that are local receptors for androgens. These genes would be expressed everywhere where testosterone typically has an effect -- but they're switched off when they're in the skull.
If altering her biology incurs some cost, in the same way that it takes more resources to partially dam a river rather than let it run totally free, then only females with lots of bodily resources to invest could afford the cost and still get by. If her genes were so great that she had to deal far less with infection, stress, random insults, and so on, that would free up resources to block a high flow of testosterone from reaching her face. So, if the deception is costly, a further prediction is that Eternal Ingenue types will be better looking than the average female. Maybe not Louise Brooks, but still.
This type of woman gets the best of both worlds: she gets to fall deeply in love with person A, who because she seems so innocent will actually slow the courtship down, so much so that she moves on to person B before having to give it up, though she may be physical with him. And so on, always having a steady supply of new flavors of her love-drug, which she hardly has to pay anything for. And of course, when she wants kids, she gets her pick, and all the while many men will continue investing resources in her. This is the female version of Genghiz Khan or Wilt Chamberlain, who get to plow through thousands of nubile women with nary a rejection to slow them down, and without having to stick around either.
When a guy sees an Eternal Ingenue, he's going to get completely suckered, just like those who interact with babyfaced men. But as with the latter, being fooled by her won't cost you so much because you so rarely run into them -- unless you go where they tend to congregate, such as among ballet dancers or actresses. Just make sure not to go with your gut the next time you see a girl with a mega-cute face and bubbly mien -- check her for boyish hips and a masculine digit ratio, as well as other tells such as a lowish voice, and doing anything competitive (including performing, since she had to beat out many others to get that spot).
It's not that there really aren't girly girls out there -- but the most captivating, inside and out, will tend to be these wolves in sheep's clothing. If you're after one for the long-term, you'd do better to look for one who has a wallflower's job and who blushes or turns shy easily, although not one who's depressive like the Waif / Neurotic. She'll be less of a rush to be around -- girls are more boring than boys -- but then she won't quickly skip away in search of another fairy tale boyfriend.
* Needless to say, this means that if a guy is babyfaced, then he's more likely than not to have that personality -- not that if a guy has that personality, then he's more likely than not to have a babyface.
** I base this on the ones I've known, including this enchantress from the teen dance club. My 19 y.o. close friend, who I initially thought was an Amazonian Alpha (in Clio's terms), I know recognize as someone whose delightfully girly face only fools men into thinking she's a non-threatening girly girl. Her masculine digit ratio and waist-to-hip ratio say otherwise. And she is most definitely a heartbreaker. (Fortunately I never fell for her, since as such a close friend I saw early how competitive and dominant her personality is -- which I don't mind in friends, but is a turn-off in girlfriends.)
For an example to check yourselves, see this video. Everyone is falling for this girl on YouTube because of her bursting-open brown eyes, delicate features, and uber-girly demeanor. (Just as in the lonelygirl15 hoax.) But she has a masculine digit ratio (pause that video at 6:10), a low voice, and (in some other video) very boyish hips. Plus she performs in front of a global audience without cracking, something a true girly girl would be too shy and nervous to get through -- let alone time after time.
All animals signal information to other animals. Biologists debate whether a signal is honest or deceptive -- does a deep, resonant voice mean he's big, and therefore could probably kick our ass, or has a non-threatening creature found a way to fake us out? (See Maynard Smith & Harper's book Animal Signals or Oren Hasson's articles on signaling.)
When we use appearances to divine the hidden essence of someone's personality, we rely heavily on the face. Sure, there are other parts that tell us about their behavior, but the face is always visible and doesn't move inconveniently when we're talking.
There's one known example of deceptive signaling involving the face -- namely, that babyfaced men tend to have more dominant personalities than maturefaced men, and tend to excel more at whatever they do. For example, high-IQ babyfaced men achieve more in school than their maturefaced counterparts, while low-IQ babyfaced men commit more crime compared to their gangmates. (See Leslie Zebrowitz's book Reading Faces, or her articles.) People expect these guys to be innocent, harmless, and docile, but they've been fooled. *
Most men don't have babyfaces because, otherwise, it would be very clear to people that an innocent-looking face didn't mean innocent behavior, and the jig would be up. But there clearly is an open niche to be filled. So, there will be a small but persistent fraction of men who fool others this way. The cost to others isn't so great because they will rarely encounter such a man, and there would be huge costs to ignoring the face when it was accurate -- that is, in most cases. So, there's no selection pressure to ignore what the face claims lies inside.
I think the same is true of the Eternal Ingenue type. Whether this is true of the exact type Clio had in mind isn't important -- that's just a matter of terminology and classification. Here is what she looks like, according to Clio:
She has a superficial physical resemblance to the Waif, in that she tends to have big eyes, small features, and a rather boyish body, thin and not voluptuous. (This is not invariable: there are curvy ingenue heartbreakers.)
How can it be that a girl with such a super-feminine face can have so masculine of a body shape, assuming she's past puberty? Based only on personal experience, I also contend that these women have masculine digit ratios (ring finger of right hand noticeably longer than the index finger). ** It shouldn't be hard to check this for the women Clio mentions, though.
To me, this suggests that she has a higher-than-average level of testosterone, which is reflected in her body overall, but which is disguised by her facial features. Why just the face? Because that's primarily where people -- the suckers -- are going to look when predicting personality from appearance, not her waist-to-hip ratio, digit ratio, boob size, or whatever else.
This high-T view also explains why these women tend to be heartbreakers, going from one man to another without feeling very bad about it -- that's a guy's way. I'm sure they rationalize it in a girly way, like they're just in love with the ideal of being in love (as Clio says). But regardless of how they spin their roving eye and wandering ways, in the end they do show fairly masculine dating behavior. It's also no accident that these women do well in highly competitive jobs like acting or dancing -- you don't climb to the top of anything without a fair amount of balls.
If this is correct, then the genes of an Eternal Ingenue have found some way to allow testosterone to affect most of her body -- including parts of her brain -- but to cut it off before it reaches the skull proper, where it would masculinize her face and let everyone know what her personality is really like. It also seems to preserve the girliness of the parts of the brain responsible for giggliness and extraversion.
I know almost nothing about molecular biology, but there could be some gene or team of genes that get testosterone where it needs to go, or that are local receptors for androgens. These genes would be expressed everywhere where testosterone typically has an effect -- but they're switched off when they're in the skull.
If altering her biology incurs some cost, in the same way that it takes more resources to partially dam a river rather than let it run totally free, then only females with lots of bodily resources to invest could afford the cost and still get by. If her genes were so great that she had to deal far less with infection, stress, random insults, and so on, that would free up resources to block a high flow of testosterone from reaching her face. So, if the deception is costly, a further prediction is that Eternal Ingenue types will be better looking than the average female. Maybe not Louise Brooks, but still.
This type of woman gets the best of both worlds: she gets to fall deeply in love with person A, who because she seems so innocent will actually slow the courtship down, so much so that she moves on to person B before having to give it up, though she may be physical with him. And so on, always having a steady supply of new flavors of her love-drug, which she hardly has to pay anything for. And of course, when she wants kids, she gets her pick, and all the while many men will continue investing resources in her. This is the female version of Genghiz Khan or Wilt Chamberlain, who get to plow through thousands of nubile women with nary a rejection to slow them down, and without having to stick around either.
When a guy sees an Eternal Ingenue, he's going to get completely suckered, just like those who interact with babyfaced men. But as with the latter, being fooled by her won't cost you so much because you so rarely run into them -- unless you go where they tend to congregate, such as among ballet dancers or actresses. Just make sure not to go with your gut the next time you see a girl with a mega-cute face and bubbly mien -- check her for boyish hips and a masculine digit ratio, as well as other tells such as a lowish voice, and doing anything competitive (including performing, since she had to beat out many others to get that spot).
It's not that there really aren't girly girls out there -- but the most captivating, inside and out, will tend to be these wolves in sheep's clothing. If you're after one for the long-term, you'd do better to look for one who has a wallflower's job and who blushes or turns shy easily, although not one who's depressive like the Waif / Neurotic. She'll be less of a rush to be around -- girls are more boring than boys -- but then she won't quickly skip away in search of another fairy tale boyfriend.
* Needless to say, this means that if a guy is babyfaced, then he's more likely than not to have that personality -- not that if a guy has that personality, then he's more likely than not to have a babyface.
** I base this on the ones I've known, including this enchantress from the teen dance club. My 19 y.o. close friend, who I initially thought was an Amazonian Alpha (in Clio's terms), I know recognize as someone whose delightfully girly face only fools men into thinking she's a non-threatening girly girl. Her masculine digit ratio and waist-to-hip ratio say otherwise. And she is most definitely a heartbreaker. (Fortunately I never fell for her, since as such a close friend I saw early how competitive and dominant her personality is -- which I don't mind in friends, but is a turn-off in girlfriends.)
For an example to check yourselves, see this video. Everyone is falling for this girl on YouTube because of her bursting-open brown eyes, delicate features, and uber-girly demeanor. (Just as in the lonelygirl15 hoax.) But she has a masculine digit ratio (pause that video at 6:10), a low voice, and (in some other video) very boyish hips. Plus she performs in front of a global audience without cracking, something a true girly girl would be too shy and nervous to get through -- let alone time after time.
January 6, 2009
Data show we imprint on music from our teens and don't budge
Lots of people suspect this, but here's some hard data to back it up. In 1993, the General Social Survey asked people whether they like various types of music. There are three that are somewhat similar but that came out decades apart: big band, oldies, and contemporary rock.
To look for a cohort effect, I pooled people into three-year age groups, from 18 - 20 to 72 - 74, to get decent sample sizes. Then I took the year that a group turned 15, as a guess of when your mind is most impressionable to popular culture. Here are graphs showing what percent of an age group "likes very much" the three music styles, according to when they turned 15. Click to see full-size:
People who were 15 in the late '30s like big band music the most, while those who turned 15 around 1960 like oldies the most, and those who turned 15 in 1989 like contemporary rock the most. "Contemporary rock" in 1993 likely meant alternative rock. In all cases, the year when the music style peaked is the year when its greatest fans were 15. This isn't so clear in the contemporary rock graph since alternative rock peaked around 1994, so that those who were 15 then were not covered by the survey. You can tell, though, that it's still going up in popularity after 1990.
These cohort effects are not merely due to young people trying to distinguish themselves from old people -- "ew, that's like my dad's music" -- but also about older people trying to distinguish themselves from younger people -- "these kids these days don't know what good music is!" Middle-aged people hate both their parents' music and their kids' music. So, the simplest explanation has nothing to do with family dynamics or anything like that -- only that generations try to distinguish themselves from other generations.
People my age got lucky and experienced two waves of good popular rock music during their formative years -- I was 14 in 1994 and 24 in 2004. I hate on a lot of the mopier, brooding stuff from the alternative rock period, but to be fair, there was some cool stuff too, especially Dookie by Green Day. I can still play that all the way through several times, moving around to it non-stop. Its stripped-down sound and short songs make it more like the Ramones era of punk rock, and not at all like the overwrought stuff that was popular on MTV's 120 Minutes.
The graphs show that some people from the following cohort like music from before their time, probably because they don't care for most of what's being played when they're 15. Aside from Green Day and maybe a few other current bands, I spent most of my time around that age digging into the mid-late '80s "underground / college radio" stuff: Dead Milkmen, Camper Van Beethoven, They Might Be Giants, Big Black, Mojo Nixon, etc.
I tried going back further to experimental '70s music -- The Residents, Captain Beefheart, Talking Heads, Frank Zappa -- but in hindsight, it was mostly a pose that I struck, and I don't like it nearly as much now as I thought I did then. Except for Frank Zappa's Waka/Jawaka and Grand Wazoo. Snakefinger's music has also left a more lasting impression than The Residents'. The coolest thing I remember about this music is buying it on vinyl, when CDs had become standard. (Joe's Record Paradise in Maryland and Orpheus Records in DC -- are they still surviving?)
Popular rock music has sucked for the past two years -- I have more graphs that show that, just wait (in fact, for several types of music). Probably the last good rock album was My Chemical Romance's The Black Parade in late 2006. By the time another new wave surges, I'll be about 33 or 34, so enjoying it won't be a problem. The real test will be the one after that, when I'll be in my mid-40s. If history is any guide, styles will have come full circle many times by then, and it won't sound so queer to my fuddy-duddy ears.
GSS variables used: BIGBAND, OLDIES, CONROCK, AGE.
To look for a cohort effect, I pooled people into three-year age groups, from 18 - 20 to 72 - 74, to get decent sample sizes. Then I took the year that a group turned 15, as a guess of when your mind is most impressionable to popular culture. Here are graphs showing what percent of an age group "likes very much" the three music styles, according to when they turned 15. Click to see full-size:
People who were 15 in the late '30s like big band music the most, while those who turned 15 around 1960 like oldies the most, and those who turned 15 in 1989 like contemporary rock the most. "Contemporary rock" in 1993 likely meant alternative rock. In all cases, the year when the music style peaked is the year when its greatest fans were 15. This isn't so clear in the contemporary rock graph since alternative rock peaked around 1994, so that those who were 15 then were not covered by the survey. You can tell, though, that it's still going up in popularity after 1990.
These cohort effects are not merely due to young people trying to distinguish themselves from old people -- "ew, that's like my dad's music" -- but also about older people trying to distinguish themselves from younger people -- "these kids these days don't know what good music is!" Middle-aged people hate both their parents' music and their kids' music. So, the simplest explanation has nothing to do with family dynamics or anything like that -- only that generations try to distinguish themselves from other generations.
People my age got lucky and experienced two waves of good popular rock music during their formative years -- I was 14 in 1994 and 24 in 2004. I hate on a lot of the mopier, brooding stuff from the alternative rock period, but to be fair, there was some cool stuff too, especially Dookie by Green Day. I can still play that all the way through several times, moving around to it non-stop. Its stripped-down sound and short songs make it more like the Ramones era of punk rock, and not at all like the overwrought stuff that was popular on MTV's 120 Minutes.
The graphs show that some people from the following cohort like music from before their time, probably because they don't care for most of what's being played when they're 15. Aside from Green Day and maybe a few other current bands, I spent most of my time around that age digging into the mid-late '80s "underground / college radio" stuff: Dead Milkmen, Camper Van Beethoven, They Might Be Giants, Big Black, Mojo Nixon, etc.
I tried going back further to experimental '70s music -- The Residents, Captain Beefheart, Talking Heads, Frank Zappa -- but in hindsight, it was mostly a pose that I struck, and I don't like it nearly as much now as I thought I did then. Except for Frank Zappa's Waka/Jawaka and Grand Wazoo. Snakefinger's music has also left a more lasting impression than The Residents'. The coolest thing I remember about this music is buying it on vinyl, when CDs had become standard. (Joe's Record Paradise in Maryland and Orpheus Records in DC -- are they still surviving?)
Popular rock music has sucked for the past two years -- I have more graphs that show that, just wait (in fact, for several types of music). Probably the last good rock album was My Chemical Romance's The Black Parade in late 2006. By the time another new wave surges, I'll be about 33 or 34, so enjoying it won't be a problem. The real test will be the one after that, when I'll be in my mid-40s. If history is any guide, styles will have come full circle many times by then, and it won't sound so queer to my fuddy-duddy ears.
GSS variables used: BIGBAND, OLDIES, CONROCK, AGE.
January 5, 2009
Liberal and feminist women more likely to want kids to be popular
Liberals and feminists are supposed to transcend competitive status games, and value people for who they truly are, right? Yeah, just as soon as they start sending their kids to mediocre public schools, rather than one-up the neighbors in number of Ivy League decals on their car.
The General Social Survey asks people how important certain qualities are "for a child to learn to prepare him or her for life" -- basically, traits you want your kids to have: obedience, courteousness, etc. One is "to be well liked or popular." So let's see who really moves beyond popularity. Here is the percent of women who rated popularity the least important quality, by political orientation and whether or not they consider themselves feminists:
Not caring about kids' popularity increases as you go from extremely liberal to conservative women, with extremely conservative women scoring about what moderates do. Spearman's rank correlation is +0.78, p two-tailed = 0.058 (due to the extremely conservative women being marginally lower than conservatives). The same holds for feminist vs. non-feminist women. (Two-proportion z-test, equal variances, gives z = 2.52, p two-tailed = 0.012.)
So, the more liberal and feminist a woman is, the more likely she is to value popularity -- i.e., high status or dominance -- in kids. Interestingly, men are also more likely than women to value popularity in kids. * So we have yet another case of liberal, feminist women resembling men. You can imagine what it would be like to have one as the mother of your kids, constantly breathing down their -- and your -- necks to make sure they dominate everything. Little do they know that parental pressure won't make a kid any more popular -- although if your friends and schoolmates found out that your mom's a fucking psycho, it could certainly lower your popularity.
Final judgement: good for a screw or two, but after that, someone else can keep 'em.
* Data not shown, as they say, but easy to check for yourself.
GSS variables used: POPULAR, POLVIEWS, FEMINIST, SEX.
The General Social Survey asks people how important certain qualities are "for a child to learn to prepare him or her for life" -- basically, traits you want your kids to have: obedience, courteousness, etc. One is "to be well liked or popular." So let's see who really moves beyond popularity. Here is the percent of women who rated popularity the least important quality, by political orientation and whether or not they consider themselves feminists:
Not caring about kids' popularity increases as you go from extremely liberal to conservative women, with extremely conservative women scoring about what moderates do. Spearman's rank correlation is +0.78, p two-tailed = 0.058 (due to the extremely conservative women being marginally lower than conservatives). The same holds for feminist vs. non-feminist women. (Two-proportion z-test, equal variances, gives z = 2.52, p two-tailed = 0.012.)
So, the more liberal and feminist a woman is, the more likely she is to value popularity -- i.e., high status or dominance -- in kids. Interestingly, men are also more likely than women to value popularity in kids. * So we have yet another case of liberal, feminist women resembling men. You can imagine what it would be like to have one as the mother of your kids, constantly breathing down their -- and your -- necks to make sure they dominate everything. Little do they know that parental pressure won't make a kid any more popular -- although if your friends and schoolmates found out that your mom's a fucking psycho, it could certainly lower your popularity.
Final judgement: good for a screw or two, but after that, someone else can keep 'em.
* Data not shown, as they say, but easy to check for yourself.
GSS variables used: POPULAR, POLVIEWS, FEMINIST, SEX.
January 4, 2009
She's too cute to be a minute over seventeen
Not being much of an oldies buff, I was surprised to see how many oldies songs there are about 16 and 17 year-old girls. Chuck Berry was 32 or 33 when he released "Little Queenie." Looks like there's not too much after 1990, and even by the mid-'80s there isn't a lot. Instead we got "Hot for Teacher" and "Stacy's Mom." Of course, this trend in music parallels the trend toward older female sex symbols.
Rock lyrics sure have become more adolescent, treating a 14 year-old's desperation-driven fantasies about his teacher or friend's mom, rather than a mature adult's pursuit of elusive16 year-old hearts and bodies. This has obviously ruined most of the aging women of today -- popular culture is now the mirror that flatters Snow White's wicked stepmothers, who have only managed to kill her off by forcing everyone to consider her a child, and so unable to be thought the most beautiful.
Reality check: if she can fall deeply in love with you, fuck your brains out, and bear your child, she's no kid.
January 2, 2009
Liberal women are more likely to be bar-hounds
No real surprise, but the General Social Survey shows that the more conservative a woman is, the more likely she is to never go to bars (Spearman's rank correlation is +0.96, two-tailed p = 0.018).
On the liberal side, a majority of women go to bars, while only a minority of fence-sitting and conservative women do. This backs up the conventional wisdom that if you want a long-term girlfriend or wife, you'd better look some place other than the nightclub scene. Either that, or invest in a liberal woman and suffer the consequences, like getting cheated on. It also supports the conventional wisdom that scoping for flings works best in bars and dance clubs.
GSS variables used: POLVIEWS, SOCBAR, SEX.
On the liberal side, a majority of women go to bars, while only a minority of fence-sitting and conservative women do. This backs up the conventional wisdom that if you want a long-term girlfriend or wife, you'd better look some place other than the nightclub scene. Either that, or invest in a liberal woman and suffer the consequences, like getting cheated on. It also supports the conventional wisdom that scoping for flings works best in bars and dance clubs.
GSS variables used: POLVIEWS, SOCBAR, SEX.
December 31, 2008
The thinking man's sex symbols -- yeah right
While looking for a list of sex symbols across the ages, I stumbled across this list of Thinking Man's Sex Symbols. I've never seen such shameless fawning over ugly, simpleminded, and annoying women. (Tina Fey's OK.) And they're almost all really old too. Perhaps the author Toure is trying to argue that a man starts using his brain when his dick no longer functions. But what he ends up demonstrating is laziness of both the mind and groin.
I'm not going to waste as much time as he did thinking up a better list -- let alone spell out why his lists sucks -- but here are a few. I'll even stick to over-30 women, since presumably that's who his audience wanted to see.
Jennifer Beals, the chick from Flashdance. Got into Yale before she became famous, though she majored in American Lit. Cute as a button -- especially compared to her peers. And she was born in 1963, so she gets bonus points for belonging to the disco / punk generation. Main drawback: black-white biracial, so may have a huge chip on her shoulder. Could be totally wrong about that -- just noting the possibility.
Pardis Sabeti, human genetics researcher who studies recent natural selection. Super-smart, plays in an alternative rock band, and is Persian. She could hold her own among actresses, but compared to female academics, she's probably #1. Main drawback: belongs to Generation X, and her deep concern about getting more women into science still sounds like a 1993 late-night conversation among college sophomore activists.
Danica McKellar, aka Winnie Cooper from The Wonder Years. Math wiz who co-authored a proof in mathematical physics with a professor when she was an undergrad at UCLA. She indulges her nurturing instinct by writing books to help middle school girls -- the smart ones, anyhow -- get through the bewildering jungle of math after arithmetic. Main drawback: also Gen-X, and gives off a slight ball-busting vibe.
Jennifer Connelly, the clever and courageous girl from Labyrinth. (No matter how many other movies I see with her in it, that's who she'll always be.) Studied at Yale before transferring to Stanford. Although Gen-X, she doesn't show it, from what little I've seen. Main drawback: now has a man-jaw, but she's 38, so it's not unusual.
Probably several more, but this off-the-cuff list just shows how clear your mind can be when you don't lick the rancid crotch of feminist ideology.
I'm not going to waste as much time as he did thinking up a better list -- let alone spell out why his lists sucks -- but here are a few. I'll even stick to over-30 women, since presumably that's who his audience wanted to see.
Jennifer Beals, the chick from Flashdance. Got into Yale before she became famous, though she majored in American Lit. Cute as a button -- especially compared to her peers. And she was born in 1963, so she gets bonus points for belonging to the disco / punk generation. Main drawback: black-white biracial, so may have a huge chip on her shoulder. Could be totally wrong about that -- just noting the possibility.
Pardis Sabeti, human genetics researcher who studies recent natural selection. Super-smart, plays in an alternative rock band, and is Persian. She could hold her own among actresses, but compared to female academics, she's probably #1. Main drawback: belongs to Generation X, and her deep concern about getting more women into science still sounds like a 1993 late-night conversation among college sophomore activists.
Danica McKellar, aka Winnie Cooper from The Wonder Years. Math wiz who co-authored a proof in mathematical physics with a professor when she was an undergrad at UCLA. She indulges her nurturing instinct by writing books to help middle school girls -- the smart ones, anyhow -- get through the bewildering jungle of math after arithmetic. Main drawback: also Gen-X, and gives off a slight ball-busting vibe.
Jennifer Connelly, the clever and courageous girl from Labyrinth. (No matter how many other movies I see with her in it, that's who she'll always be.) Studied at Yale before transferring to Stanford. Although Gen-X, she doesn't show it, from what little I've seen. Main drawback: now has a man-jaw, but she's 38, so it's not unusual.
Probably several more, but this off-the-cuff list just shows how clear your mind can be when you don't lick the rancid crotch of feminist ideology.
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