Men’s Sexual Selectivity, Romantic Confidence, and Gender Ratios in the Media.

An experiment was conducted to examine the impact of media gender ratios on male audience members. One hundred thirty young adult men read a series of media narratives featuring either multiple men and a single woman or multiple women and a single man as well as a measure of endorsement of traditional masculinity and measures of romantic and sexual selectivity and confidence. Men who read the abundant partners narratives exhibited greater selectivity for marriage partners relative to control participants. Partner availability or scarcity in media narratives also influenced romantic confidence, although this was moderated by endorsement of traditional masculine ideology (TMI). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]