Is mating psychology most closely tied to biological sex or preferred partner's sex?

- Heterosexual and homosexual participants completed questionnaires on mating psychology.
- In general, heterosexual women and lesbians appear to share aspects of mating psychology.
- Heterosexual and gay men show greater variation.
- Homosexual mating strategies are not simply a reversal of heterosexual strategies.

Most research into mating psychology focuses on heterosexual mating; however, it remains unknown whether the sex of the individual or the sex to whom that individual is attracted is most closely tied to mating psychology. In the current study, homosexual and heterosexual participants completed questionnaires designed to measure previously-documented sex differences in mating psychology from heterosexual samples. These included men's higher sociosexual orientation and number of lifetime sex partners, women's greater emotional attachment to casual sex partners, men's greater likelihood to overestimate women's sexual intent, women's greater likelihood to underestimate men's commitment intent, and differences in responses to emotional versus sexual infidelity. Based on our results, it appears that the sex of the individual and not the sex to whom that person is attracted tends to determine mating psychology. In particular, women, regardless of orientation, seem to share a similar mating psychology - supporting the idea female sexuality is relatively fluid. In comparison, there was greater variation between heterosexual men and gay men - consistent with the view that that male sexuality is more canalized. We conclude that homosexual mating strategies are complex: they represent neither a simple continuation of heterosexual evolved mating psychology nor a complete gender-role reversal.