London - If you’re wondering whether a woman is on the lookout for love, the answer may lie in what she’s wearing.
A growing body of research has revealed that women give off signals about the inner workings of their body by the way they dress – and red, quite simply, means “I want sex”.
Scientists have discovered that women tend to wear red or pink when they are ovulating – the time of the month that they are at their most fertile – in a bid to attract a mate.
It isn’t fully understood why red attracts, but there are several hypotheses.
Some say it has to do with the flushing of the face after sex, following the argument that men’s animal brains are awakened when confronted with “some deep primal force”, according to a Medical Daily report.
“It’s only recently that psychologists and researchers in other disciplines have been looking closely and systematically at the relationship between colour and behaviour,” said Andrew Elliot, professor of psychology at the University of Rochester, New York.
‘Much is known about colour physics and colour physiology, but very little about colour psychology.
“It’s fascinating to find that something as ubiquitous as colour can be having an effect on our behaviour without our awareness.”
Researchers from the University of British Columbia in Canada surveyed 124 women, asking them the colour of their clothing and how many days it had been since their last period.
They found that women at highest risk of becoming pregnant were more likely to be wearing a red or pink shirt compared with women at low risk.
Those who wore red or pink were about three times more likely to be at peak fertility than those who wore other colours.
And this preference for red is not in vain.
A survey by dating website OkCupid found that women who wore red in their online dating profile photos were more likely to get messages and dates than those wearing any other colour.
A study by the University of Southern Brittany in France, backs up the dating website’s findings.
Experts asked 64 women to digitally alter the T-shirt colour in their profile photos every two weeks for a year.
They found red tops generated 21 percent of the total messages, compared with 14 to 16 percent when the women were wearing black, white, blue, yellow or green.
It has also been found that men are more likely to find a woman attractive, more likely to ask her out, and even to spend more money if she is wearing red. – Daily Mail