Looking at the pictures, the change in the pose could also be responsible for the change. Even looking at just the face they leave different impressions.

And what the hell is with the discussion suddenly suggesting that woman might subconsciously find the men holding cats gay? If holding a cat supposedly makes you look less masculine, surely all sorts of behavior besides being gay would have the same link.

I've literally been on a date where I told a woman I was thinking of getting a cat and her exact response, in a public restaurant, was "that's gaaaaaay"; she was a data scientist.

No idea how cats ended up as a "feminine" signal. I've seen cats act as deadly hunters killing snakes, birds, rodents and fighting off animals significantly larger than themselves, standing their ground. If anything I'd thing that'd fit closer to the "traditional" masculine stereotypes. I don't own any pets now but had both cats and dogs growing up.

One thing I was hoping to see in the research that I didn’t was using photos of the same person with and without a cat and showing the “same person with cat” and “same person without cat” to different people as the “with cat” and “non with cat” person. I think that would have been more powerful.

Also, candid cat ownership photos versus the very uncomfortable and forced holding cat photos that we were shown here. Studio lighting and keeping a cat in place for posing unnaturally made the cat ownership photos ... awkward.

Ummm, in the article it says: "Each participant only rated one man, with and without a cat."

The top photo in the article is a posed photo. But the second one is one that was part of the study.

I must have misunderstood that part. I still didn't see any reference to using the same person with and without a cat to different people.

I don't care what research says... I'm leaving my cat in my profile, haha. If that scares women away looking for more "masculine men," sounds fine to me.

I had a similar discussion with someone about hunting pictures in dating profiles. My initial opinion was to include them, because I hunt and I’m not going to compromise on that, so if it’s a dealbreaker for a potential partner, it is best to have that out in front, right? But it was explained to me that this isn’t a subtle approach. Having a picture of yourself with a thing you killed is likely to illicit a strong response from the middle group, women who don’t have a considered opinion on hunting, for or against. If that is one of the first images they see of you, they might reject you out of hand, whereas after a few dates, a mention of a hunting trip is a better way to broach the subject.

So I would take the same approach with a cat. Let her find out you have a cat the first time she comes to your house. At that point she’s already decided you’re masculine enough to hang out with so it isn’t going to change anything.

As a man who never had any issue with talking to women this is similar in spirit to what I usually tell my more "traditional" nerd friends who struggle with this.

They ask me how they have to talk and to be so a woman likes them, what to avoid, what to do etc. Of course there is some very general conversational things that one can do (e.g. striking a good balance between not getting to personal and not staying to vague, revealing your inner workings a bit, but not too much etc), but they are not specific to talking to women. If you ever catch yourself to totally be a different person, maybe ask yourself how you'd ever expect to figure out if that person likes you as a person, or the image you represent?

And you should ask yourself if you even have the chance to ask yourself the same question about her. Suprisingly, women are people as well. Most nerds wouldn't feel like talking to 80% of male collegues - maybe because they are boring, mean, idiots, extroverts, whatever. So why would that be different for the female side? Because they have a female body? Forget that they are a women for a moment and try to get to know the person and make sure they get a chance to get to know you (the person) as well. If they don't like you, it might not have worked out anyways. If they like you, but you don't then you found out something as well.

Of course the whole being attracted to someone-thing makes this harder, because whe like to see the person we are attracted to in the best light, where in fact we still have to figure out who she really is.

If you put on an act to impress someone, you will have to maintain it. I also think that suppressing your quirks make you pretty bland, as if your personality was designed by committee.

I found that when I am unapologetically me, I build stronger friendships with people I actually click with. I also feel more comfortable and that likely helps.

I'd have no issue about dating a women who owned a cat but I'd have reservations about dating a women holding her cat in her dating profile picture.

Maybe it's less about cat, more about context.

Would be interesting to track success of two groups of real guys: A group with both cat and non-cat profiles and B group with only catless profile.

> They also thought the men holding cats were less extroverted and more neurotic, agreeable and open.

I'm confused by the second part of this sentence. Neurotic is generally a negative trait, but are they saying agreeable and open are also negative traits?

They are saying women found them more neurotic, agreeable and open. It has nothing to do with whether they are positive or negative traits.

Good thing I'm a dog person then.