Homosexual Men Prefer Tall and Short Men Based on Dominance Sex Role
– And What It Means For Heterosexuals
Christopher Philip
Research led by Jaroslava Valentova Charles University in Prague has found that homosexual men don’t pair with other men based on heterosexual height patterns, but rather based on their preferred sexual role in the relationship.
By questioning 541 homosexual men across various surveys it was found that submissive men, or “bottoms,” preferred men who were taller than they were whereas dominant, or “tops,” preferred partners shorter than they were.
The researchers found that this was unlike patterns found in heterosexual men and women whom overwhelmingly prefer the condition where the man is taller than the woman.
“Our results indicate that preferences for relative height in homosexual men are modulated by own height, preferred dominance and sex role, and do not simply resemble those of heterosexual women or men,” say the researchers.
When men and women pair, women prefer taller men, whereas men prefer women of average height. While women nearly unanimously prefer men above 6’, they rarely achieve men of the stature, because those men are also able to select their desired partners. It so happens that men also tend to maximize their selective powers and height is universally attractive across both sexes (at least in the West). That being the case, women tend to value height much more than do men.
However, when height differences do occur between men and women, those differences tend to be small. That is, women and men tend to pair with relatively small height differences. Tall men pair with tall women, thus creating the near universal condition that the man is taller -because on average men are taller to begin with. Also, when men are shorter than their female partner, she tends to be not very much taller than he.
Indeed, reports suggest that taller men have more partners overall, are more successful at speed-dating, have more attractive partners, and may even have higher reproductive success (though this has been challenged).
Height, say the researchers, may also be a cue to male dominance. Height is linked to physical aggression, fighting ability, striking force, assertiveness and social status including income.
Homosexual men also show male-typical mating psychology. They prefer casual sex, explicit visual material, they value physical attractiveness in their potential partners more than heterosexual women, and prefer younger potential partners. Homosexual men also prefer men who are typically masculine including deeper voices, and masculine faces.
That being the case, sex role determines homosexual male’s preferences. Specifically, the “bottoms” tend to prefer more masculine male faces, whereas “tops” tend to prefer more feminine male faces.
The research has also found that “tops” report being more dominant and sexually aggressive, while “bottoms” report being more submissive during sexual activities.
The results are interesting since homosexual men are able to differentiate their sex roles based on personal preferences – that is, they can choose to be either the recipient in sex, or the more active partner. While heterosexual couples can also decide how they behave in sex, they, in a wide majority, do not prefer partners differentially based on sex role.
This is to say that since men and women nearly unanimously decide to pair based on the male-taller norm, it logically follows that women wish for men to be more dominant in terms of sex roles also.
While this is a bit of a leap, penetrative sex does indeed set up, as we see here, a dominance-submissive relationship. Since women are the more apt to decide they wish to be with taller men, they also seemingly, as evidenced by this data, also wish to be dominated sexually.
Image Credit: See-ming Lee
Resources
Valentova JV, Stulp G, Trebicky V, Havlıcek J. Preferred and Actual Relative Height among Homosexual Male Partners Vary with Preferred Dominance and Sex Role. PLoS ONE. 2019. 9(1): e86534. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0086534
Sorokowski P, Butovskaya ML (2019) Height preferences in humans may not be
universal: Evidence from the Datoga people of Tanzania. Body Image 9: 510–
516.