Who are you attracted to?

Falling for someone makes it difficult to stop gushing about them. Their looks, sense of humor, their irresistible spark makes you feel amazing.

When someone compelling comes to view, your heart rate increases and body temperature rises.

Surely love is mysterious but attraction isn’t.

Attraction comes over us like a wave, and is powerful and unstoppable.

Believe it or not, your biology plays a crucial role in deciding who you are typically attracted to.

Attraction is purely unconscious controlled by the limbic system i.e the emotional center of the brain.

When encountering a possible mate, the hypothalamus stimulates the release of dopamine and serotonin which causes the sensation of love and lust.

Dr. Helen Fisher a biological anthropologist says that this mechanism helps people decide within 3 minutes if they like someone or not!

No matter how much one Denys looks don’t matter but in the initial dating phase, they do. The emphasis makes sense because we link physical attraction with traits like health, youth, and fertility.

People are more attracted to people who have symmetrical faces. This may be partly because of the perception that symmetry is familiar and less threatening.

A Chicago University research showed that we focus on the faces of people who we love and focus on the body where there is just physical attraction.

Heterosexual men are typically attracted to younger women who are attractive and in their childbearing years. A 2016 study found men with a higher level of testosterone found women with feminine features ( described to be as big eyes, high eyebrows and smaller jaws)to be more attractive. Women find men with a low voice to be attractive.

Media, peers, and family also play a role in sketching out who we find attractive. If media narrates frequently about thin and light skin tone being attractive that’s what we adapt to.

Who we are attracted to stems from patterns of life experiences and early childhood experiences.

Heterosexual people often took for a partner who matches the opposite sex parent in some way because this is what they learned while growing up. They tend to remind us of someone important, Subconsciously the person triggers a resemblance.

Sexual Imprinting theory explains that animals pick up cues from the environment about how a partner is supposed to be. Initially, parents are the ones providing those cues thus later in life most individuals look for someone similar to their parents.

Daniel Sher a clinical psychologist says that kind people are seen as more attractive.

In a 2007 study, people were asked to rate strangers' pictures for attractiveness. The pictures had descriptions some being positive and others negative. Results showed the pictures with positive descriptions were rated higher on attractiveness than the ones having a negative description.

Merely repeated exposure to someone increases the likelihood of you being attracted to them. Proximity is the strongest indicator of attraction. We simply are attracted to people we have frequent interaction with. This explains why co-stars, classmates, and colleagues often end up dating each other!

80% of us believe that opposites attract but sorry for breaking the cliché for you.

You are more attracted to people who are similar to you.

Donn Byre in his phantom stranger’s technique research found a greater degree of similarity leads to greater attraction and liking. A study found out that we might be less attracted to people who are different from us and more attracted to ones whom we consider to be better versions of ourselves.

An evolutionary reason behind why we like someone similar to us is because familiarity provides safety and certainty.

At the end of the day attraction to others is primitive and instinctive. We can engage our higher-order thinking if we remain conscious of our intrinsic preferences and features that trigger our attraction. As a result, locating possible partners has become a more deliberate procedure.