21st Century Dating: Women Still Coy, Men Still Obvious
Not that we would ever imply that you won't be taught everything you need to know about the mysteries of dating by the He's Just Not That Into You movie (even though it made the Observer's Sara Vilkomerson "not want to be a member of the entire human race"), but a new study has shown that a woman should indeed play hard to get unless she wants to end up a lonely spinster, cursing the day she decided not to buy a copy of The Rules.
According to the study's lead researcher, Skyler S. Place, participants in (and spectators of) speed dating could easily tell if a man was interested in a woman, but not vice versa: "Being coy forces the men to spend more time interacting with the woman, because they are unsure if they have successfully courted her. Therefore, the woman has more time to gather information about her date... it is simply in her best interest not to present herself as actually interested immediately."
As for extrapolating romantic wisdom from the behavior of women who, in a desperate quest for love, voluntarily spend evenings held captive across the table from a parade of creepy strangers—well, it's at least as valid as living your life according to the diktats of a forty-something man with frosted tips, right?
