The good, the cad and the ugly

There's a big story going around based upon the article 'Does the contraceptive pill alter mate
choice in humans?' in Trends in Ecology and Evolution by Alexandra Alvergne and Virpi Lummaa at the University of Sheffield.

As their abstract says:

Female and male mate choice preferences in humans both vary according to the menstrual cycle. Women prefer more masculine, symmetrical and genetically unrelated men during ovulation compared with other phases of their cycle, and recent evidence suggests that men prefer ovulating women to others. Such monthly shifts in mate preference have been suggested to bring evolutionary benefits in terms of reproductive success. New evidence is now emerging that taking the oral contraceptive pill might significantly alter both female and male mate choice by removing the mid-cycle change in preferences. Here, we review support for such conclusions and speculate on the consequences of pill-induced choice of otherwise less-preferred partners for relationship satisfaction, durability and, ultimately, reproductive outcomes.

This is, in some ways, a revisiting of the classic 'cad or dad' question in biological anthropology - are males better off having lots of kids all over everywhere, providing only limited paternal investment but with their genes spread far and wide, OR to have only a small number of offspring and invest heavily to ensure their survival? Does the pill affect how women respond to these different scenarios?

What is also interesting is that, so far, this has been picked up by 112 different news outlets (according to Google News). Of course, this research has been interpreted in all sorts of ways. 'Is the Pill giving geeks an unfair chance?' asks the Toronto Globe and Mail, the the British Daily Mail laments the lack of attraction to the good looking, strong lads of yore. This is all interesting in that it demonstrates how much the media thinks we are interested in these. I think they're probably right. However outrageous their 'analysis' might be, working out why we fall for different types of people is something of near universal interest. If these reports make people stop to think about the processes behind their choices, that can't be a bad thing.