My research interests are broad but my central focus revolves around female physical attractiveness and female status hierarchy negotiation, with a strong emphasis on conspicuous/luxury consumption as a modern-day proxy that mimics ancestral cues of status.
My work on female physical attractiveness includes studies of perceptual biases for low waist-to-hip ratios and the relative priority men and women place on short-term and long-term mates’ facial and bodily attractiveness.
A growing focal point of my research examines women’s drive for status from an evolutionary perspective: why women should be concerned about their relative status standing (e.g., access to resources, ability to manipulate one’s social environment), how women flaunt and feign their status (e.g., conspicuous consumption), and how women exploit their mates’ status to increase their own status.
I am currently involved in research concerning the aforementioned topics as well as the adaptive problems faced by attractive and less attractive women (as rated by third-party judges) and emotional and sexual jealousy as it relates to heterosexual and homosexual affairs.
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