Part I
We've had so much interest in this topic that I've decided to write a three part post on game theory, dating and sex. Now you're probably wondering what on earth does game theory have to do with dating and sex? Good question! In fact, scientists and mathematicians have been studying mating from this perspective for the last 20 years. Game theory, to recap, is a type of applied mathematics that has been used extensively in evolutionary biology and economics. It attempts to fathom the great mystery of human behavior and the choices we make when the success or outcome of those choices depends on other people's choices. And nowhere are those choices more at risk and more reliant on others than in the convoluted dance of dating and sex.
For example, the mathematicians Peter Sozou and Robert Seymouri studied the value of gifts in the outcomes of dating. And their results are intriguing. Sozou got to thinking about the real value of gift-giving after he read about a woman who was sleeping around with different guys-- but whose rent was being paid by her so called "exclusive boyfriend." The idea germinated into a study that had as its thesis that costly but essentially valueless gifts, like expensive dinners or limo rides, facilitate courtship but gifts with real value, like paying the rent, giving jewelry, or cold hard cash may bring on unwelcome "gold diggers" like the woman in the newspaper.
In Souzou and Seymour's research game, men could choose to give three kinds of gifts: extravagant, valuable or cheap. The women, on the other hand, had to accept or turn down the gift and then choose whether to sleep with the guy. The study found that guys were able to avoid gold diggers and connect to women who were into them and eventually willing to have sex by offering extravagant yet valueless gifts most of the time with a valuable gift occasionally thrown in.
Lesson learned for guys: hold off on the big ticket items and you will find rewards. In Part II, we'll look at how women use other signals, in the area of male sexual behavior, to decide mating strategies and whether to sleep with a guy
From the "good" (ie, non-gold diggers) woman's perspective, theater tickets or fancy dinners are nice because they show true interest and weed out the less successful guys. These are signals that the man is "good" in terms of offering more potential to care for them and their young. But in the end, however, these "good" women still needed the guys to hang in there over time.
Lesson learned for the ladies: be alert to the kinds of gifts that he gives and whether he is willing to persist, even without sex.
Part II
In Part I of this series we showed that men can discriminate between women and their intentions based on the gifts they give. For one thing, they can eliminate gold diggers. But women can also understand men's intentions over time using other signals. For example if you want a partner who will be a good father, game theory offers real answers. In a follow-up to their 2005 study on gifts and dating1, the mathematicians, Robert Seymour and Peter Sozou, researchers at the University College London, and The London School of Economics used game theory to understand the benefits and costs of waiting to have sex during dating. The game had three possible and independent outcomes:
1. The female has sex with male.
2. The female quits the game without having sex
3. The male quits the game before mating.
According to this fascinating study, the duration of the man's dating effort represents the strength of his courtship signal. And it's that signal that a woman should focus on. Males who are more available for lasting and true love relationships were willing to wait and delay having sex and hung in there longer. The authors consider these subjects to be "good men" from the women's point of view, with "goodness" defined as willingness to care for their young after mating. "Bad men," according to these male scholars, try to get to mating right away and then quit the courtship process right after sex.
To all men, the courtship game is a kind of war of attrition, with the opportunity to mate with the woman the real benefit for which they wait. According to the findings, which required rejuvenating the statistician in me, a "good" male has a higher ratio of benefit to cost per unit time of courting than a "bad" male. In other words, "bad" men see waiting to have sex as paying too high a price. A "good" male, on the other hand, values mating with the female and having a lasting relationship relative to the costs of courtship, more highly than a "bad" male does. In other words, they can wait longer.
Game theorists, evolutionary biologists2 and psychologists like me, share the view that a woman faces a fundamental dilemma in courtship: how to discriminate and make decisions in the face of great uncertainty and not enough information about her prospective partner. (Of course, men face a similar but not exactly the same dilemma.) The answer offered here is that it's best to wait and see how the prospects shake themselves out by not having sex for awhile. If a man is really interested in a relationship, he'll wait for awhile; if not, he'll drop out.
责任编辑：sealion1986
