Physical Wellness

Study Reports Red is the Sexiest Color to Wear

By Cheri Cheng | Update Date: Aug 17, 2013 10:32 AM EDT

When people wear clothes, they often pick outfits that express themselves, especially through colors. Colors not only improve one's own mood, they can also help set the mood in certain situations. For example, during funerals the only appropriate color to wear is black because the mood is somber. On the other end of the spectrum, weddings are often full of bright colors, which help create a jovial atmosphere. Since color can greatly influence people's mindset, a team of researchers decided to examine which color is associated with the natural desire to reproduce.

For this study, researchers from the Canadian University of British Columbia interviewed 124 women, 100 were Americans and 24 were Canadians. The participants answered questions about what colors they wore and how many days since their last menstrual cycle. The researchers found that during days where women were considered to be high risk for fertilization, they tend to wear shirts that are red or variants of pink. The researchers calculated that for women who wore red or pink, their chances of peaking during fertility tripled in comparison to women who did not wear these colors.

"It's only recently that psychologists and researchers in other disciplines have been looking closely and systematically at the relationship between color and behavior," said Andrew Elliot, professor of psychology at the University of Rochester according to Daily Mail. Elliot was not a part of this study. "Much is known about color physics and color physiology, but very little about color psychology. It's fascinating to find that something as ubiquitous as color can be having an effect on our behavior without our awareness."

This study is just one of many studies that have looked into the relationship between color and sexual reproduction. In a survey that was conducted by OkCupid, a popular dating website, researchers reported that women who wore red in their dating profile pictures were more likely to get messages in comparison to women who wore other colors. In another study done at the French University of Southern Brittany, researchers asked women to only change the color of their shirts on their dating profiles. Out of the group of 64 women, the researchers had found that women with red tops made up of 21 percent of the overall messages received. Women who wore other colors, such as black, white, blue, yellow or green only brought in 14 to 16 percent of the messages.

These studies have repeatedly tied the color red to an increased chance of finding a mate. Even though researchers cannot explain why this is the case, for women looking for men, wearing red might help. The study was published in Psychological Science.

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