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Death and the Real Girl: The Impact of Mortality Salience on Men’s Attraction to Women as Objects

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Feminist Perspectives on Building a Better Psychological Science of Gender

Abstract

Feminist scholars, philosophers, and more recently, social psychological researchers have argued and provided evidence that women are objectified, often in a very literal manner. Terror management theory offers additional insight, suggesting there is an existential threat associated with men’s attraction to women’s natural bodies. When a woman’s body is objectified, however, it is devoid of this complication. In this chapter, we argue that existential concerns set the stage for men to find objectified depictions of women appealing. To examine this hypothesis, men and women rated the attractiveness of real women and men, or females and males that are literal objects—that is, mannequins—subsequent to being reminded of their mortality. As hypothesized, heterosexual men rated the female mannequin, but not the real woman (or either male target), as more attractive after being primed with mortality. The prime did not impact the ratings that heterosexual women gave to the targets. We discuss these findings and consider implications and remaining questions.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Psychology, University of South Florida, PCD 4118G, 4202 E. Fowler Ave., Tampa, FL, 33620, USA

    Jamie L. Goldenberg & Kasey Lynn Morris

Authors
  1. Jamie L. Goldenberg
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  2. Kasey Lynn Morris
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Correspondence to Jamie L. Goldenberg .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Psychology, Colorado College, Colorado Springs, Colorado, USA

    Tomi-Ann Roberts

  2. Psychology, Clark University, Worcester, Massachusetts, USA

    Nicola Curtin

  3. Psychology, Smith College, Northampton, Massachusetts, USA

    Lauren E. Duncan

  4. Psychology and Women’s Studies, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan, USA

    Lilia M. Cortina

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© 2016 Springer International Publishing Switzerland

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Goldenberg, J.L., Morris, K.L. (2016). Death and the Real Girl: The Impact of Mortality Salience on Men’s Attraction to Women as Objects. In: Roberts, TA., Curtin, N., Duncan, L., Cortina, L. (eds) Feminist Perspectives on Building a Better Psychological Science of Gender. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-32141-7_3

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