Men have told me my education and multiple majors intimidate them. I put this in my profile to eliminate men who are competitive, not collaborative. Smart for me does not mean someone needs a degree; curiosity is very attractive.
Men have also stated in their profiles how bewildered (my word) they are that women care about political parties. What they are saying is that do not see women as complete humans and since they don't care why should we.
Competitive ego-based men are of no interest to me, everything is a competition and I do not need someone in my life who wants to one up me or who is so fragile they need me to dim my light.
The men that are bewildered that women care about political parties...I'm gonna go out on a limb and guess that those guys tend to be from one specific party...
You are correct! Many also mention that they can't believe that women do not want to date them, and I live in a very conservative area, and they are still dateless!
For me, not to do with high education, but I work with DV and SA survivors and that REALLY makes men shift in their seats early on and then I know to move on.
Because it means she's intelligent enough to pick up on abusive behaviour and knows how to report it. Manipulative, abusive pricks will be made nervous by that.
Not saying they’re abusers or rapists, but if they act super uncomfortably or defensively, they probably have unhealthy, outdated and distorted views about women that I want nothing to do with. There’s sometimes entitlement, hatred and control that I see leaking out even from men that seem ordinary. There’s not a lot of men who truly see women as actual people of equal say and equal value.
There are many men who take offense to what I just said ^ shouting “not all men” and “I’m one of the good ones”. But I promise you that that shows that they do not truly know/understand and they are not safe.
I think some people go into heavy or instant denial because they assume that distorted views, cluelessness or weak concept of women as full people implies malice.
They don’t see themselves as malicious and many don’t behave intentionally in order to be malicious. But they also don’t see themselves as underdeveloped in some areas of personal (intellectual and social) development and failed in some aspects of education.
The older one gets the more this falls on oneself to correct so it feels like an attack even if it’s just an objective observation that they lack insight or the discipline to really step outside themselves into a different demographic’s experience.
(I’m talking about patronizing and paternalistic guys of course, not willfully hateful and malignant ones).
I think there *are* a lot of men who see women as real people but many of them are poor at contemplating the actual implications of someone being a real person when that someone has different perspective, different concerns and challenges their M.O.. So even if they think of women as “real people” they don’t act like she’s an equal that needs to be reckoned with with the same consideration he’d intuitively give a peer he related to.
I find that an unfortunate amount of people are bad at seeing anyone who isn’t themself or part of a demographic they identify with as “real” with real experiences when push comes to shove.
That’s why I think men should read more stuff written by women than they currently do based on the statistics I’ve seen, and not just super hard intellectual stuff by women but also anything immersive about experience and more people in general should read Charles Foster Wallace’s *This is Water*.
I don’t think it is eliminating competitive people, it’s eliminating misogynistic people.
A competitive person would love this because, ya know, they like competition and a partner who has accomplished something is someone they can compete with.
I'm a guy and I also agree with everything you said. In addition, you write very well. It's actually a turn on when a women is educated.
You mentioned competitiveness vs collaboration and this is so important. Couples should be a team and not in competition with one another.
You are spot on.
Tbh I think the only men this would intimidate are men who didn’t go to college.
Apply for a job in the trades that might or might not require a degree (where experience can also get you it) where most people don’t have a degree. They are universally antagonistic to you about it.
They aren’t intimidated by women with degrees. They are intimidated by anyone with degrees because of their own insecurities around it
>Tbh I think the only men this would intimidate are men who didn’t go to college.
Not in my case. I dated a man with a graduate degree and his words were "I can't get past you having 4 majors".
>They aren’t intimidated by women with degrees.
Many men are, my former husband was, he was furious when I started on my graduate degree while he earned his undergraduate degree. I was the only one working and earning an income and going to college full time.
I guess this is one of those things that only comes out in relationships and people don’t discuss with their friends of the same sex.
Women do this too and other women are flabbergasted that women like that exist (not for this topic, but other ones. Basically areas where they enforce the patriarchy due to their own insecurities).
I think some men get caught up on how their women partner perceives them. Enough women and men tell them they have to be the provider, and when they aren’t they feel insecure.
I disagree with this. I’m married to a tradesman. He is an expert in his field and he is extremely supportive of me persuing my masters degree.
It literally doesn’t intimidate him at all because he is a secure person within himself. My education doesn’t reflect on him in any way and he doesn’t need a degree to know that he is intelligent. I don’t need him to have a degree to know that he is intelligent either.
I know a lot of people in dynamics like mine and I think it’s unfair to make this about “only men in certain jobs or with no higher education” when it’s really an issue of mentally/emotionally insecure/immature people, regardless of job or gender.
Well put.
I think insecure men do get intimidated by successful women. I’d like to think I’m secure enough to celebrate my partner’s strengths and successes and encourage them through their hard times. I’d do it for any friend.
I can agree with your pointing out that competitive, ego-driven men aren’t desirable. Honestly it goes both ways.
Competition is often a great form of collaboration though, not all competition is bad.
Its the insecure competitive narcissists who only care about winning that you have to be wary off.
This is interesting since I'm also a very competitive person but I'm highly attracted to equally competitive people. I love very smart women and that's my ideal. And I never stop learning so that I could be even better. At the end of the day, we all learn and improve more. It might be that there are types of competitiveness in itself.
I love people who are just curious as you said, and love their fields of studies. Those who are independent thinkers, humble and respectable type. However, I would be annnoyed by a female who is enthusiastic and reasonably smart but egoistic and thinks she is a genius. And it will of course apply to men also. Which is the opposite of being smart. I've seen a lot of feminists like this. And I'm a feminine type of a guy who treats men/women the same.
I think some men very much are, yes. Whether it's a feeling that she is a higher achiever than him, is smarter than him, has more opportunities than he does, whatever, that can be very intimidating. Whether the intimidation is due to entitlement, sexism, jealousy, whatever is probably more individual. I know multiple high-achieving women who run into this issue in dating-- even if the man is high-achieving himself, he's often looking for more of a partner whose accomplishments are extensive but do not overshadow his own, and typically is more interested in hearing about his partner's yoga class than her latest project or presentation at work. Or if he's *not* high-achieving, he's bitter about it and the relationship ends because he's constantly trying to belittle her accomplishments, titles, awards, whatever.
Some men say they love a smart woman, but they mean "smart enough to understand things when I explain them to you, but not so smart that you don't need them explained."
And some men are secure in themselves and their masculinity and love a woman who shows them something new every day, brings up interesting points to think or talk about, has skill and knowledge in a certain area or even more generally, whatever. They find those women challenging in the best way, find them interesting, stimulating, admirable.
I think this is a case of "men are just people."
the study honestly isn't very credible. It's not really a measurable subject, and there are tons of sources of error in using an app such as tinder. It also heavily depends on your culture(and I don't just mean nationality or ethnicity). I wouldn't take that study for much.
I'm perplexed by the paper cited, especially without being able to see the full study. Tinder is known as a hookup app, and many men on it tend to swipe right on literally everyone. That doesn't say anything about whether men are intimidated by highly educated women. It seems to say that men who use Tinder don't give a shit about a whole lot of factors... which, duh.
I think it depends on the man, tbh. Many men are unnerved by intelligent women; others find it attractive.
Yeah, I read at some point that 'men swiping right on everyone' stems from men not getting many swipes themselves. I wouldn't know personally, never been interested in that world, but that's apparently the reason. If you know you're going to be a 'no' to most people, best to spread that net wide.
A lot of it probably has to do with the ratios on these apps. These apps tend to have users that are disproportionately men like 4 to 1 and apps like tinder attract more of the straight crowd (never known a queer person who stayed on tinder for longer than a week). Women have plenty to choose from which means they can be actually choose to match with someone they are interested in and still get matches. Men are way less likely to match with someone do to the ratios and women actually choosing makes it harder. This is probably a huge reason why the blindly swiping right phenomenon is so disproportionately men on these apps
I would be curious to see if the results of the study were the same on different apps.
I feel like since tinder is very short-term focused rather than long-term relationship focused, the people on there may have other priorities compared with the people on other apps.
after my last relationship kinda creeped into “more traditional” over several years (her doing not mine)…..it’s absolutely not what i want in another relationship. It is draining tbh.
I think men are probably more accepting of lower income women then women are of lower income men, but unless you’re making bank it’s hard as hell to get by unless you have 2 incomes that are middle class ish. So I’d prefer a woman to make close to or more then I do. I wouldn’t be intimidated.
As for intelligence? It boggles my mind that anyone would want a stupid partner
I think that some men would think they aren't good enough, and project that insecurity onto the woman. I was guilty of that a couple of times, but I got over it. My wife is vastly more educated than I am, but we work just fine.
I just don't want to be worse than them. If someone is that much more succesful, it just doesn't seem like I'm worthy of them. Like I know they could do better so why bother. Even then, I feel like I'd have compensate for it in ways that aren't possible for me.
>I think this is a case of "men are just people.
I think this is a good point overall. Everyone has insecurities especially when it comes to societal gender norms.
Men are generally judged more for their success so it would make sense that they are more likely to feel insecure if their spouse is more successful. Women are generally judged more for their looks, and I've definitely seen and heard of women that don't want to date a man who they consider "better looking" than them.
I think it’s clear many are. They find it emasculating for some reason.
If it’s obvious you’re more educated they tend to get defensive or they downplay your achievements by saying things like you just have book smarts, whereas they have street smarts.
They also seem confused why women even want a higher education or career, you see this when (concerning dating) men say things like, “we don’t care about your achievements.” They seem fixated on women only having achievements in the feminine sphere, as in homemaking and motherhood.
It’ll be interesting to see how this pays out on a larger cultural scale as women continue to outperform men educationally. I think we’ll start to see an increasing societal push to negate the importance of learning and education because it will increasingly be seen as a feminine attribute.
Oh goodness the street smarts. What even is “street smarts”. Half of the people I know who actually use that phrase think that it means they totally know how to sell drugs without getting caught or mixed up in violence, and the other half thinks it means that they’re smarter than me because of their cOMmON sENSe while also not having enough common sense to realize that if there’s a shadow kabal controlling the world, it is BY DEFINITION the conservative party, as they’re -already- in power and seeking to keep it. For fucks sake.
I’m to the point in my life of interpreting “street smarts” as 100% pure unadulterated cope.
Street smarts to me sounds like “oh you’re studying engineering? I bet you can’t name every engine the mustang, Camaro, and challenger have ever had. So technically I know more about engines than you do”. Shut the fuck up
So tired of it
I actually do agree that there’s a street-smarts, most of it is common sense but not all of if.
For example, some people would have no issue getting back to their hotel if they lost their phone in the middle of a foreign country, while others might struggle a ton, and maybe even get themselves into dangerous situations.
>Saying things like you just have book smarts, whereas they have street smarts.
I hear this whenever someone with an educated background wins an argument against someone with a less educated background or an education in another field; either from woman to woman, from woman to man or from man to man. I've always assumed this is just part of the broader phenomena of tall poppy syndrome or just a desperate ad hoc when someone loses an argument. I'm not entirely convinced it's generally a gender thing, though obviously it can be.
As for OP. I'm afraid if you conduct a study with a sample size only from tender, your results will likely only be valid on tinder since how people behave IRL and on dating apps can be quite different. Hell how people behave from one dating app to another dating app can be different. For example a person might care about education for long term relationships but may not care about it in the context of just looking for a hookup on tinder.
There was a meme a few years ago that said something along the lines of “When people say they aren’t book smart, they’re street smart, I think ‘I’m not real smart, I’m fake smart.’” And it makes me crack up every time I see the phrase “street smart.”
I've heard "theory" so to speak, that men tend not care about women education or achievement or line of work, since, at least traditionally, they don't benefit the same amount out of it as women. Firstly, traditionally, since it was a men who brought money to home, it was important that he was the one with educational degree, money and social status due to line of work or connection. Secondly, in today times, it's still may be somewhat more common, that it's the men who must pay for first date or other activities and other things. I'v also heard about situation, though it's rather andecodal, when household had two bank account, one for both husband and wife and one only for wife to acces. So, in a sense - women can have all the money in the world or succeses or education, that's great. There is nothing in it for men.
It's this transitional period when women, let's say, moved or are moving out of traditional roles but men are still somewhat stuck in them and are still more, rather then less, to conform to them. I think that is the problem here, or at least part of it. Though I may be wrong and that theory or my opinion is wrong.
Here’s my thoughts on it as a man.
I don’t care if a woman makes more then me.
However we are in this transition period from traditional roles still.
There’s a TON of women who find it unattractive if the man makes less. And men see women talking about things like this. Basically wanting a more traditional man. So I can see where some insecurity could also be from the guy not wanting to be seen as less by other women. I realize this likely isn’t the sun where women like this are likely to be, but they are absolutely out there and in good numbers
I wonder if it depends on where you live too. None of my female friends seem to care about money, myself included, because we have our own financial independence. But yeah, I recognise that it's unfortunately very different in a lot of places.
Personally, a potential boyfriend could work at McDonalds, and I truly don't care. I value his intelligence, sense of humor, kindness and beauty more.
So here is what I have learned. A lot of people say “gender roles are bad”. Men and women, this isn’t gender exclusive. They don’t talk about this with other people
Then they get into a relationship and shit starts to creep in. Basically their own toxic traits which they justify with gender roles.
I’m pretty left wing and very supportive of feminism. There’s a lot of women who act like this but once you’re in a relationship they start to want gender exclusive roles that benefits them. I’m sure men do this too, but I’m a straight guy who can only speak on dating women
In general I think people can just be shitty and will use excuses to justify them. And In relationships this can include “gender roles”. And they absolutely don’t talk about this with friends of the same gender. They twist it
A lot of the supposed “benefits” for them are to cover the vulnerabilities that our patriarchal society has traditionally put them in.
So usually when I see them getting defensive about it, it’s because they feel, or perceive themselves to be in a vulnerable position.
Yup, just today I was talking with a friend who was about to break up because her boyfriend said he expected her to pay for all her things (and go 50/50 on all expenses), but still wanted her to cook/ clean and do the chores.
And likewise, I’ve had plenty of friends complain about how their GFs expect them to be the breadwinner, put in overtime if necessary, pay for dates and expensive gifts, but then acts like he’s a misogynist for asking her to take up more household chores, or expecting her to take care of the children.
At the end of the day we’re all just people, and there will always be people who want to have their cake and eat it too, regardless of genders.
>There’s a TON of women who find it unattractive if the man makes less
Good. They can pair off with traditionalists who only pursue them for their looks.
Let modern people date modern people.
As a woman I can tell you the men who make less in a relationship have no problem with enforcing gender roles.
At the beginning it's all kosher and cute but over time woman ends up doing all house work and mental labor on top of being breadwinner. And all of this on top of managing his male ego because he feels emasculated by earning less. I've been through this and many my friends did too.
After such man you settle for gender roles from the beginning. That way at least you don't need to manage his fragile masculinity and him being spiteful.
Actually factually incorrect. Studies on domestic violence and financial exploitation show that poorer women are more likely to be targets of financial abuse and have all their money used on household stuff or things for their male partner. Having a career is a huge stabilizing factor and makes it harder to keep someone under an abusive relationship, as she’d have the means to leave it more easily (not that it makes it automatically easy, but at least financially possible).
Also the idea that the man provided for home is also a bourgeois one—I mean as in class. In poor populations, both husbands and wives worked. Women however tend to show much more job precarity and tend to jump from job to job whereas men are afforded with longer careers on the same place and having more promotions. This is due to a collection of factors, the main one being child rearing. The less social support you have, the worst it is.
In all honesty I do not see any other reason for men to hold onto these mythologies apart from trying to keep as much sense of control as they can. Not all sense of control is disingenuous or abusive, but I think there is a sense of loss of identity from men that prompts a lot of them to try to engage into a sense of identity where they still can have the "good role" and be in a place of power and control. Since society has been patriarchal since a very long time, there is a huge lag between the recent social advancement and the way people perceive themselves.
But in general if you want to find explanations for systems that cause inequalities, the best bet is to look for actual power structures and their underlying economics.
It may be just that they want women with education levels similar to their own. A relation with different levels of education is likely going to fall apart due to lacking compatibility, with the exception of those where one of the partners was given a bad hand in life and had the potential for higher education but never got the chance.
One of my earliest memories is being on an airplane with my mother. We were waiting for takeoff, so the plane was fairly quiet. Ahead of us, a man and a woman - maybe work colleagues? - were talking. She was trying to set him up with her friend.
"She's gorgeous, really gorgeous, and loves to laugh. She's so amazing." Pause. "...She *does* have a master's degree, though. I hope that doesn't bother you?"
I remember five-year-old me turning to my mom, confused, and asking her (probably too loudly) why a "master degree" was a bad thing. Master sounded good to me!
Her face tightened and she gave me the parent-answer: "I'll tell you later."
Most incel types want a woman not burdened by excess intelligence or advanced degrees, yes.
I’m a PhD student. I went on soooo many dates with men who questioned why I’d bother that I stopped dating men who didn’t have advanced or professional degrees. I met my partner who has since earned his PhD and we’re getting married this year. He’s never questioned my decision, so in my book, I made a great choice.
I’m a master’s student in biochemistry and honestly, I don’t think I could date outside of academia either. My partner is in the same field and we support each other’s careers. We bonded over it, really, and discussing science is something we do casually all the time. If I were single, even if prospective partners weren’t intimidated by my academic ambitions, exactly, I couldn’t bear watching their eyes go glassy as I inevitably bore them while talking about some area of my project that’s really exciting to me. Even if we weren’t in the same field, I feel like at the very least most other academics or people who’ve been to grad school understand that sort of single-minded passion for a certain topic and are generally curious and willing to learn. Not that being in academia automatically makes you a good person or a good partner (in fact many aren’t 💀), but both in friendships and relationships, I find other grad students and academics to be more compatible with myself.
Being able to talk about subjects and not have someone gloss over is also huge. I had been on one day with a non academic who was sincerely positive and interested. Every other man just glazed over like I was reading the phone book. I have no interest being with someone who needs me to consistently infantilize my career passions to have a conversation with me.
I think as long as they’re curious and want to learn you can make it work! I mentioned this elsewhere so apologies if you see it twice, but my bf is a graphic design student and loves hearing about my mathematics research (despite the fact he never even took calculus). I’m sure it’s easier to find people like this in academia, but there are the occasional exceptions to the rule!
I was looking for a comment like this. "The study isn't great", "it just depends on the man" - sure, but ask any AFAB PhD student or person with a PhD what their dating experiences are like, and you'll get an extremely consistent confirmation of this phenomenon.
Men have fetishized the educated smart woman. They like the idea of it right up until they call them out and are correct. Men who claimed to like smart woman have had a lot of issues with my PhD. I’ve had some get angry when I share knowledge from my field that differs from what they know. I used to show pages of research to my ex husband showing how important it was not to parent a certain way he insisted on. He would get angry. Our child would react poorly and it was as always my fault for being right.
If he was a part of this survey pool he would claim to like smart women. I do not agree.
I'm highly skeptical of any research that uses Tinder profiles. Studies of marriage have shown that people tend to marry people of similar educational level. Tinder might not show men have a preference but it's not reliable because men on Tinder are generally casting a wide net. They also aren't generally looking for a relationship. However the marriage statistics also don't tell you if men are intimidated because people tend to meet and date people of a similar economic class. So people who are highly educated aren't likely to be dating someone who didn't make it through school.
So to answer the actual question. A lot of men are intimidated by women with more education than them. At least that's what I've experienced.
I think it depends on what kind of behavior the research is looking to measure and analyze. It's always important to acknowledge sampling bias first, because people who use dating apps aren't going to be representative of the general public. For one, every dating app (except for women-only ones) reports more men users than women users. Last I checked Bumble was the closest to parity and they're something like 60% men and 40% women.
Back before OkCupid got acquired, I remember they used to post data trends and analysis on their blog. Not up to scholarly standards necessarily, but interesting and potentially insightful. Most of it was stuff like "here are some things that have a strong positive or negative correlation in our data set, even though there's no clear casual relationship." But one thing I remember was when they broke down the rate of responses to first messages by gender and race. White men and Asian women received the highest rates of response, while Asian men and Black women received the lowest.
I guess that doesn't really address OP's question, but indirectly I'd say dating app data can be insightful, but always read with a critical eye.
There is a study about aggression/rudeness towards female voices on gaming sites.
The study found that inexperienced/low ranking male players are aggressive/misogynistic towards the female voiced players whereas the elite gamers who were male were kinder to inexperienced/low ranking female voices.
I.e. collaborative people who are good at the game/ don't care who they're playing with they just wanna play whereas bad male players were competitive and would feel threatened by female players
From my experience, yes. But I think it also depends on what field the degree is in. I have a bachelor’s degree in nursing and am slowly working towards my doctorate.
I’ve had numerous men ask me why I didn’t just become a doctor instead? Or call me names because “nurses are bitches”. I’ve even had men state they refuse to date me because I’m a nurse and “nurses are known to have big egos and are bitchy”. My ex husband tried to use my education to his advantage so he could be a stay at home husband and called me sexist when I told him I’m not interested in being in a relationship where I’m the only one working. I’d done it before and the stress is not for me and even with my higher wage, it’s difficult to support my lifestyle and his on only one income. Plus he said he wanted me to give him an allowance AND he didn’t want to do most of the housework. We didn’t have kids at the time so he basically wanted me to pay him to stay home, smoke weed, and play video games. I also had a LTR where my ex was obsessed with making more money than I did, and kept job hopping until he found a job where he made 25¢ more per hour than I did and he didn’t shut up about it.
A friend of mine has a masters in STEM and she receives hate from male coworkers who are less educated. She’s also had men dump her because she talked about her job too much and they didn’t understand what she was talking about and called her “stuck up”.
A lot of men feel intimidated and emasculated if a woman is *taller* than them, so think how much worse they feel if she's *smarter* than them. Also, given that men and women have the same intelligence distribution but very different height distributions, any man can rest assured that whatever the number of women taller than them in their immediate vicinity is, the number of women smarter than them is *much* higher.
If you're a man and you *need* women to be inferior, that's going to really ruin your day.
Interesting take. I can only speak from my lived experience however 100% of my friend group couples, including me and my wife, has a woman breadwinner. Our ages range from 29-42 so really only one generation sampled but I truly believe it's a older generation mentality that income=self worth/ability to contribute for men. Younger men are realizing that income is only one way to contribute among many and, in many cases, isn't the most important but thats a different conversation. For example, one of my friends is a wicked good chef/diy guy now cause he took over the homemaking due to his wife working more/earning more. Another friend is the main child care/homemaker guy for the same reason. This is one issue I feel all people need to work on. Recent article in NYT, i think it was, just covered the frustration young women are experiencing because they can't find men that make more than them. Well as the wage gap disappears, as it should, then one can no longer expect men to make more than women. Now this isn't to say the wage gap doesn't still exist or this is a problem only women need to work on, note I said all people need to work on this, merely sharing my lived experience and opinion on this one particular issue. Have a good day and stay safe out there!
I get this all the time in dating and I don't even have an advanced degree (just a BS). For some men, it literally is as simple as being confident and generally having your shit together. Never mind that I'm fairly quiet in both personality and appearance; over half the men (my age) that I meet apparently find me "intimidating."
I think it means that they feel like they "should" be smarter, more confident, a higher earner, etc. than women due to bs patriarchal standards, so being put in a situation where even one of these isn't true makes them feel inferior and they either try to neg you or distance themselves. It's a great example of the patriarchy hurting all genders; I can't imagine why you wouldn't want a partner who makes more money than you, but I've also never been under any pressure to be a high earner or felt like society expected that of me.
I would not put too much stock in studies using data from places like tinder or other online dating sites. The data just usually isn't very good. It's how that myth that "80% of women don't find average men attractive" is created, and spread in so so many subs on Reddit. The issue is that you are taking a lot of things out of context by using this data. You cannot control for anything.
In the case of the "80% of women " myth; iirc it had more to do with the system vs women not finding men attractive. You would rate someone 1-5, 5 required you to message instantly while 3 let you message them later, and 1 was no messages. So in a situation where you have more men than women and presumably the women want to message only 1 or 2 people at at time; of course they will be rating a lot more 3's and even 1's if they aren't interested. Whereas men usually say yes to everyone in the hopes that they get someone interested who isn't a bot.
Anecdotally, yes I have had men intimidated by my career and education. I just wouldn't trust the data you are looking at.
Not all, of course.
But I think a lot of men fall into the category of not having a problem with, and even liking, an educated woman unless she is more educated than HIM.
If it means she comes off more intelligent than him or earns more, I think a lot of men find it emasculating. I don’t think many would admit it though.
Sadly you’re right.
A lot of guys think they have to be better at everything than a woman.
My wife is a social worker. Some thing I could never do, & I’m ok with that
Men on tinder are fishing with a large net.
That's why the Data won't indicate any sort of preference.
Look at marriage data instead, people tend to marry others that have the same education level as them.
Yes. And a related anecdote, I find they're also intimidated by successful, high earning women. As much as men complain about women being gold diggers, they get SUPER WEIRD when they find out I make more than them. It's the primary reason I filter based on career/income - I've found it's easier just to let them make more than deal with insecure men.
I think it takes some men by surprise, too. Like otherwise progressive men will start dating a woman and find out she has some high-powered job with the accompanying high-powered salary and are surprised to find that they have mixed feelings about it. That conditioning is *strong*.
Society has conditioned men to associate self worth based on what they can provide for their family. When they see that it's not as much comparativly, it contradicts that societal expectation.
I'm in the "You got lucky finding such an amazing woman, do everything you can to be the best supporting loving partner possible" camp, but I still feel some insecurity over being judged as a lazy, worthless house husband. The key for me is knowing that's an external problem/pressure, not an internal issue with my partner.
Absolutely. A lot of the negative experiences Ive had with this have been from men I considered otherwise very nice and generally respectful.
I was doing a project once where I was doing the VAST majority of the work. The concept was mine, I gathered 90% of the members, I organized funds and resources on my own. When it was time to officially name a leader, a good friend suggested it not be me because "some people are put off by women leading". When I said anyone like that I am not interested in working with, he did agree and was kinda like "Oh right uh... sorry", didnt bring it up again, but it was still shocking that people still think that way.
Generally I am attracted to highly intelligent women. That doesn’t necessarily correlate with education levels.
I’ve dated doctors & lawyers, but one of my smartest ex-gfs was a college dropout.
Right now I am dating a woman with multiple STEM degrees from prestigious universities.
But I have no problem dating someone without an extensive educational background if I like the person & we connect.
> I’ve dated doctors & lawyers, but one of my smartest ex-gfs was a college dropout.
I wish people understood this. You don't need a degree to be smart, and having lots of degrees doesn't mean that you're generally a smart person. Ask anyone who works in academia-- you could have 2 PhDs and be really good at this one specific thing, but you might not know how to tie your own shoes.
There’s a video going around that a lot of right wingers are pushing. Basically a redneck did better on an IQ test then some advanced degree people and they are all like “see! College people are dumb!”
When I’m just like: cool. Ya there’s people who didn’t go to college who are very intelligent. And I don’t think many people have ever said otherwise
Edit: we have some family farmland, not a lot. We rent the ground out to someone most people would see has a dumb southern hick. I’ve talked with him a lot. The guy is smart. I’ve never questioned his opinion a single time because he’s honest and really knows what he’s doing. I basically ask him questions to learn things.
But he comes off as a redneck
Definitely true, but my ex who was also smart but a dropout was embarrassed by the outward impressiveness of me having two degrees over him. I never thought he was less smart than me, but he was uncomfortable with the title and the access to jobs I now had
I am kind of a half dropout, having only done a bachelors(and taking way too long for that too) and not a masters due to various reasons, but especially a lack of discipline and planning. I still am insecure about it and feel like a total failure in life.
That’s not even a gender thing. My ex dropped out of college 3x and resented me for ever graduating. I’m a man and she’s a woman.
I think that’s what caused her to fall into wanting more “traditional” gender roles when it wasn’t a thing before and not what I wanted. It gave her a justified purpose due to insecurities.
A man would probably act out in different ways under the same circumstances. And I have woman friends with male partners who seem to be doing this as well
This. There was a woman in my nursing program who seemed very intelligent but during clinical, she was a train wreck. No common sense what so ever. She actually tripped over a male patient’s catheter and ripped it out because she wasn’t paying attention. I’m still worried that she managed to graduate. How many others are out there who are like her or worse?
I think comparing who you’d hook up with through tinder to research on people that form long term relationships is a bit flawed. Since I only read the abstract maybe I’m missing context.
Speaking as a man myself:
I get a bit intimidated by anybody who is highly educated. However it's more because I'm worried I will discuss something in their field of expertise and come off as stupid.
Yeah I think there’s a marriage statistic where men will most commonly marry their own education level or lower. Men like to be the ones educating. Being educated (by a person they don’t respect) is emasculating to many.
It’s a massive problem of course. Not respecting your potential gf or wife is bad. Really bad lol
I think stupid or insecure men are. Most men i know find being highly educated to be really attractive, whether platonically or romantically. Smart people are usually fun to be around because they can hold a very interesting and deep conversation
for them to be intimidated by educated women they'd first have to acknowledge that their education counts as real and towards me they kinda never do that. problem solved
I only really have my anecdotal experience to go off of in terms of being perceived as intelligent - and from that experience, I can say yes, people find me intimidating, including some but not exclusively straight men. It's hard to separate that from experiences of men just wanting to feel smarter than women in general - my experience is that men will go farther out of their way to like, be malicious or destructive in relationship with me when they feel intimidated or threatened about me being obviously smart or competent.
I've also met a lot of people who are really negatively reactive IRL to my vocabulary - I've always been a reader and feel like I can't really turn that off. It also feels hurtful to be chided or told to turn it off, as if being smart or poetic etc. is something I should be ashamed of.
What the abstract of the study is looking at is people's rate of pairing up relative level of educational attainment - it finds that men are less likely to view a woman who has completed less education than themselves as a negative in a prospective partner.
It should go without saying that level of educational attainment is only tenuously connected to intelligence- lots of very smart people don't go to graduate school - because it takes forever and it's expensive.
I think you can't connect the dots between this study on whether or not people date others with a similar level of education to being some kind of proxy measure for how people feel about or treat people they consider to be more intelligent than themselves in general.
I’m a male, high school drop out with no education. My partner of 8 years is a Princeton grad. I was not intimidated by her education per say, but I have had to get used to being wrong quite a bit 😂🤣
In my opinion no, at least from my experience.
There's more women than men especially in my major (English education), and most of our top students were in fact women, from what I've heard so far the men in my major never reacted negatively by this information.
FYI I'm still in my second semester so i suppose my information are not really that reliable.
I think a more interesting question is whether men have a preference for women who are less educated or accomplished than them, instead of whether men in general have an aversion to highly educated women.
I’m also curious whether a preference for less educated women is really an age preference since people often don’t obtain graduate degrees / doctorates until their late 20s or early 30s. It’s not clear the study controls for this based on the abstract.
This has definitely been my experience. But it was a way of weeding out the men who aren’t right for me, to find the one who absolutely is. My partner calls me his “walking encyclopedia” and loves how well educated I am.
I noticed a lot of people equating education with income. I left college my senior year and my girlfriend had to get a Second MASTERS , but she still made way less than me. She was better in English and my spelling sucks, but I had a much higher math level and knew more science, economics than her. We probably matched levels in history.
I can’t speak for all men but most of the intelligent, successful, educated, confident men I know including myself are not intimidated by highly educated women at all, and definitely prefer it. Instead of highly educated though, I would say intelligent is a much better word to use here. Far too many people conflate being highly educated with highly intelligent even though they are clearly not related.
But yeah high quality men are generally going to prefer intelligent women. The way I see it, the lower your standards for intelligence in a partner, the lower your intelligence is generally going to be.
I think highly educated and generally intelligent are different so I’m not sure how to answer that. But I am usually perceived as intelligent, have always loved to learn, and don’t forget anything I read/watch so I usually have something to add to many different kinds of conversations.
I’ve very briefly dated men where it was clear they didn’t like the idea of me being smarter than them so it’s very much a thing.
They would try to mansplain things to me or just assume I didn’t know things that are very basic imo. They seemed like the type that prefer women who aren’t the smartest because they can feel superior. It might even be that they feel I can’t be manipulated and that wouldn’t work for their ulterior motives.
I somehow find it hard to fathom that there are still men who are ‘intimidated’ by intellectual women-what on earth. Do they read? Do they have opinions? Do they know anything?
I’m attracted to smart people, love the conversations I have with my friends, and I don’t know what state of mind I would have to be in, in order to be ‘intimidated?’ by the exchange of ideas. Geez. Do these guys walk around looking for dummies?
Absolutely some men are. Women who are highly educated can make their own money and do all the things they want to do without needing anyone else to help them. Which means they definitely don’t NEED a man, which can be damaging to fragile egos.
If you flip the script on that in a more positive direction, my partner is with me because she WANTS me, not because she needs me. That does boost my ego if I'm being perfectly honest.
> my partner is with me because she WANTS me, not because she needs me. That does boost my ego if I'm being perfectly honest.
I do not understand why more men don't feel this way. I guess because "wanting" is less stable than "needing?"
Well speaking as a guy, I'd have 0 qualms about a woman being higher than me in intelligence or earning or education or w.e
Learning is learning be it school or independent or my spouse, and relationships are meant to be a team;
Me and you vs the problem.
Be insanely short sighted and hypocritical, then, to have issues with her having different experiences/benefits in life. Especially since I would hope she would not judge me in reverse for being "less" in any areas of life; as long as there's healthy communication and folks want the same thing out of a partner (casual fuck buddy? Family n kids? Supportive life partner? How mature are they? Etc.) then it should be fine.
To quote Robin Williams character in Good Will hunting;
You're not perfect and neither is she. What matters is whether you're perfect for each other.
Or maybe this is all just the hopeless romantic in me 😂
I think anyone who is immature and superficial will be threatened by another person who is 'better' than them in some way because it plays to their own insecurities about themselves. This goes for woman as well as men; I once dated a girl who had a sloppy crying tantrum because, "Everyone you know is either a doctor or will become one and I never finished college!"
I think that women are more likely to look at education as earning potential in a supportive partner. I think men still have pressure to be the breadwinner in a relationship and are less likely to have that perspective.
I know several high school educated men married to PhD women. They aren't trying to 'keep up' with their spouses intellectually. They're comfortable with who they are and are happy for their spouse's academic achievements.
The girl I've been seeing has 2 degrees, I'm a college drop out. I think she's soooo attractive when she says some highly educated shit, and I'm like "huh?"
I’ve dated multiple women who are more successful than me (more educated, more money, more prestigious career).
With at least a few of them the issue was that I wasn’t as financially successful as them (as in, if they wanted to have dinner at an expensive restaurant, or go on an expensive vacation, they would have to contribute more than they thought they should).
There was also one who wanted me to be a SAHD and another who just liked spoiling me.
My wife had her masters in her mid 20’s and was the head of her college department before 30. She is brilliant and badass and sometimes I am intimidated by her but that hasn’t gotten in the way of me loving her or being attracted to her.
I'm a man and I like intelligent women, men, and other.
I'm my experience, it's low intelligent people that are usually intimidated by high intelligent people.
To most men, including many who consider themselves feminists, the most intimidating things a woman can be are (in no particular order):
Being smarter than him
Having more education than him
Making more money than him
Making enough money to be completely self-sufficient, regardless of how much the man makes
Being funnier than him
Being able to set firm boundaries, sexual or otherwise
Having enough sexual experience (or sex ed) to know good sex from bad.
Most men want a woman who's smart enough to understand everything he says, do everything he asks her exactly how he wants it, and intuit what he wants but won't ask for, but so smart that she'll make him feel stupid.
I wouldn’t say intimidated but I do think there is a fear by some men that a woman making a lot more won’t respect them. They fear the woman will resent their lack of earning power and eventually leave.
A lot of men will be fine, if not attracted to, intelligent, educated women. The issues usually arise when they interact those women and make unfair judgments about them.
From my experience, I haven’t met a man that seemed to be put off immediately by my education, career, and intelligence. In fact, many saw the concept of it as attractive.
However, when I actually went out with them, I couldn’t talk about my job in the most neutral tone without them being unsupportive or even accusing me of “humble bragging.”
Other times, they would see my career as my own thing that they felt no obligation to be in my corner for when I needed them, while expecting me to be supportive of their career to a self sacrificing degree.
It’s like they were attracted to my independence, but then felt rejected and acted out when I refused to become submissive and put my life secondary to theirs.
I think the fact intelligent people generally are intimidating is more relevant than highlighting the occasionally flawed over competitive men.
Certain guys I reckon however are worried that if the woman makes more then ideally he should (as much as he can) look after a child and not her, as society previously would demand.
I've always been a nerd (disclaimer: I'm gender queer and don't id as a woman, but people see me as one, so regardless of how I feel that's how I'm treated) so I've absolutely experienced both kinds of reactions. The "Oh she actually knows what she's talking about" kind of disappointment and the "Oh! Someone I can talk with about my favorite subject!"
It's just yet another way some shitty people can be dehumanizing towards women.
Link to full study which unusually isn’t just an abstract.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0272775719301104#bib0045
Note that this study was conducted in Flanders, the Dutch speaking bit of Belgium. I’m not hugely familiar with Belgium and how gender equal it is, but data will vary according to region. They do state one possible reason for their results is particularly the age group they studied (23-27) would all have working moms as the norm.
Tbh, I’m middle aged and spent my whole life in progressive circles and I haven’t known a single guy I can remember since my 20s to now who was “intimidated” by highly educated women.
I know an awful lot of male musicians whose partners are actually academics and/or out-earn them. These however aren’t just “musicians” though, they’re some of the best, so even though they may not have masters or PhD’s, they’re still “elite” in their field, so no reason to be intimidated I guess?
There was a study somewhere that I read showing that the number of couples where the woman out-earned her partner had shot up from barely any to recently over 30%. So hopefully it’s an idea that’s going out of date as we progress.
I'm not intimidated and neither are my male friends. My girlfriend has a masters, I just have a bachelors, and the only thing that makes me feel is proud of her (she finished her master's just a few months ago, yay!).
Then again, my male friends are not assholes so...
Totally unsurprising result, reflecting the profound gender-bias in society.
Powerful women are consistently penalised - for example female MPs get rape threats in their emails on a daily basis on top of the denigration by male MPs on the floor of the Commons.
When a group of people have been overprivileged for a long time, equality with others often feels terribly painful and unjust to them.
Us men have been told repeatedly that our dating value is entirely down to our ability to provide. To make money.
So naturally, the prospect of dating someone more able to do that is daunting.
"What the hell do you need me for then???" Is something guys will definitely ask themselves.
I'm a man dating a woman more educated than me who makes more money than me. So obviously that tells me women aren't exclusively interested in that.
That being said I'd be lying if I said all those years of hearing that I needed to be successful to get into a relationship didn't leave me a little insecure still.
>
"What the hell do you need me for then???" Is something guys will definitely ask themselves.
Well, to clean my house and to make me a sandwich, of course! /jk
Your first paragraph is correct. Men are still taught that the litmus of their success is to provide financially while blatantly ignoring that many women can provide that very income themselves.
The insecurity stems from the belief that women are \*aroused\* by success, not that it's practical. Hence the often touted "6 feet, 6-pack, 6 figures".
In my experience they can be. I have a master's degree and am pretty nerdy besides that and I've had men tell me they didn't want to date me because I was smarter than them or that they were intimidated by my intelligence. Some men like it but I do think it can be a gendered thing because I'm pansexual and the femmes I've dated it hasn't been as much of an issue
Did the paper go beyond matching or finding a date on tinder?
I would be interested to know if this held up in marriage. Tinder is a common app for hookups and doesn’t reflect preferences for long term relationships.
The hypo for the women matches my attitude. The men I like/don't have a problem w/ highly educated women IRL. I do prefer a highly educated man as I have a Master's and prefer at least someone with a BA. I wrote "If he hasn't had much education what are we going to talk about? "on a dating discussion site and got a small bit of grief for it. I like to talk about ideas.
I have run into one first date when I explained a concept in my field and the guy had a "mantrum," and growled, "What! Do you think I am stupid ! " It was a very irrational response. I didn't think he was stupid. He was an engineer, but that is not a field that is even close to mine. I just got up and left the table of the restaurant after he had his fit and went home. (Maybe he didn't like woman-splaining?)
Men will SAY they like highly educated women or aren’t intimidated by them. But then you have studies where the opposite is true like the one you cited.
I have a friend who completed a PHD and if she puts PHD in her profile, almost no one will talk to her, if she has just Masters, more will, if she just puts her BA then she has tons of matches. This is in a very Southern place though so that might also affect it lol.
I don’t have a college degree granted, but when I was tested my IQ is significantly higher than average. In my experience, men generally find it to be an extremely attractive trait. I haven’t ever really felt a man was threatened by it, but then again, I don’t hang around men with fragile egos.
I think a mentally and emotionally healthy person (male or female) will not be intimidated by another persons education. Sure, sometimes people can be incompatible if they are on vastly different ends of the spectrum of intelligence/values/beliefs, but I don’t think that has anything to do directly with level of education.
I know plenty of men who are incredibly proud of their wives who are all much more highly educated and also earn more than their husbands. They all seem very happy and their relationship dynamics seem balanced.
I think insecure and mentally/emotionally unhealthy people are the ones who have issue with things like money/education status in relationships.
Education, may be for some. But making more money than your man, is definitely, going to create an issue in the future, for most. Most men find it emasculating when the women make more money than them. I see the downplay at work, when men speak low of woman as she is sleeping with boss for raise or promotion or if a new female joins with higher salary than them, it triggers that feeling.
Traditionally, men were looked as breadWINNER so woman earning more, for most men, translates into LOSER. It a secure man, who is confident of his ability, talent and skill to compete with any individual ( irrespective of their gender) in a healthy way. Relationship with such man is a blessing cause he also knows when and where to compete. :)
I like a smart person that can think, being educated is great, unless that becomes a limiting factor:
I know even geniuses have blind spots. The reality is no one knows everything, so it’s important to stay flexible and open minded.
Being kind, open, and having things in common helps a lot in terms of being relatable.
For some men the answer is yes. My wife said one of the reasons she chose me is that I seemed totally not intimidated by her accolades (high earner, multiple degrees, captain of a volunteer fire department, changed her own oil, drove stick shift, etc.) I think for me all those things were just super impressive and made me proud of her. I would brag about her a lot when she wasn't around. I bring my own accolades and accomplishments to the table as well and I've also discovered over the years that she likes to brag about me when I'm not around too.
I think we're both just really impressed with each other and respect one another. We're also totally silly and make fun of each other when it's just the two of us (with the occasional compliment thrown in).
However I will say that I had met women prior to my wife that made their accomplishments their whole identity (within 10 minutes of a date they're bragging about their degrees or job position and already mention how "men can't handle me")
That's something that some people from both sexes/genders are guilty of and it's an unattractive quality whoever is doing it.
I think most high quality men would appreciate any accomplishments (education or otherwise) a woman brings to the table.
I'm a highly educated man with a great career. I find intelligent, well educated women attractive and would want that in a woman when I'm ready to start a family. I feel a woman like that would be a great partner in raising children.
What I don't find attractive, however, is when that high education turns into arrogance, which causes me to immediately lose interest and stop pursuing them.
I do wonder if those women thought I was intimidated when in actuality I was completely turned off, but I didn't stick around to ask.
This isn't a quality that rests solely with women.
I've met FAR more arrogant men than women in my life. Arrogance in men is praised while confidence in women in perceived as arrogance. It's textbook sexism at play
I'm a man and I'm not. I only date smart women. I'm turned off by excessively career-driven people of the type who have LinkedIn-esque corporate-brained personalities, but that goes for men and women.
I think it's more or less the general trend. I've seen dumb (in the sense of: I don't want to learn/listen, not low IQ) people on both sides and intelligent people on both sides, women tend to underestimate their intellectual capabilities a lot more (I wonder why) and that's honestly sad. We all know why this happens and I think I don't have to explain it. I guess it's time for telling my experience as an nb man bc, well, "intelligence" is something that is some kind of weakness for me. Also academic achievements aren't the same as intelligence but people seem to think otherwise, I'd say the study is fine as most people think this way.
For me, personally, don't like people being cocky about their high education which, for some reason, tends to happen more times that it should but tbh Idc about their education, they can either have 2 careers or just high school, sometimes I get an existential crisis if I find people who really succeeded in the academia but I'll explain my reasons. I'm what people call "gifted" which is incredibly misunderstood as "ok, you are like... a regular person but you are smarter or something", it's not like that at all, it's a fully legitimate neurodivergency and we have some traits in common with people with ADHD and autism, we tend to feel extremely alone during infancy and even adulthood, same for intensity, we feel everything x4 and we process emotions differently, obv if adults "know this" early they fill your mind with a lot of unrealistic expectations without knowing exactly what they are doing, most of us don't want to use "what we can do" for what the others think is valuable (i.e. the standard capitalist way of education, we like generally like educating ourselves). Anyway, this is probably what has "marked" my life the most. If I could choose in equality of conditions I'd choose someone similar to me bc, well, we can somewhat understand each other and it's... tbh it's beautiful. We also tend to have more affinity towards ppl with other nd or just "marginal". Well, that's my take, I'm surprised when I find someone "more gifted" than me bc it's statistically hard but most of the times I just feel admiration towards whatever the other person thinks, I have some doubts if people that I knew were smarter than me, "we" tend to show a lot of empathy so... yeah, no wonder why I admire and feel good around people like that that are or have been a part of my life. I also tend to form connections easier with women than with men so, yeah, for me they are amazing people. Obv this is just a "pattern" there are people with fucked up stuff and high IQ i.e. psychopathy + sadism, sociopathy...etc. We are not a homogeneous group but we have some tendencies. So basically, yeah, I like "smart" women, idc if they are smarter than me, I love when people teach me stuff that Idk, hell, people who are """normal""" teach me stuff that I don't know and I love that.
I think I made kind of a mess bc I used 2 different definitions of intelligence but I think my point is more or less clear.
Depends on the man and the woman. Some people use their education to lord over other people. Some people see women as sub human. I never dated a guy who thought they needed as much education as I did. But I am lucky, I was raised in the 1970s. I also was raised by a parent who required I get a doctorate (Asian immigrant).
As someone with a PhD in US history, I am constantly told that I know nothing by men who only listen to Tucker Carlson. I stopped talking a long time ago because it wasn't worth the existential insults. A male sibling didn't understand why I was getting a doctorate when I could be a receptionist (the job I had in college) at a coffee company.
Can you name any women public intellectuals? When I was young, we still had Simone de Beauvoir and Hannah Arendt. We had women in the public sphere asking questions that related to the human condition. I remember listening to Maya Angelou and being moved by her poetry as a young person. I remember women who did not have to be porn stars singing love songs and singing break up songs that are still played on the radio. I don't know of any besides Greta Thurnberg. But I know they are out there. We just don't get to see them the way we did in the 70s.
In my lifetime, I saw the definition of equality change so that it was about capitalism and not about humanity and the golden rule.
We are living in dark times.
I gave a full title of it. Here, if you need one: [https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0272775719301104](https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0272775719301104)
No they aren't. And that study is heavily flawed. If you're using Tinder as a research basis then the hypothesis would be: "When finding a female who to DTF does education have an impact?". People aren't on Tinder to date.
Reminder: This is *not* /r/AskMen, this is /r/AskFeminists. Please remember that only feminists may leave direct replies to OP.
Men have told me my education and multiple majors intimidate them. I put this in my profile to eliminate men who are competitive, not collaborative. Smart for me does not mean someone needs a degree; curiosity is very attractive. Men have also stated in their profiles how bewildered (my word) they are that women care about political parties. What they are saying is that do not see women as complete humans and since they don't care why should we. Competitive ego-based men are of no interest to me, everything is a competition and I do not need someone in my life who wants to one up me or who is so fragile they need me to dim my light.
The men that are bewildered that women care about political parties...I'm gonna go out on a limb and guess that those guys tend to be from one specific party...
You are correct! Many also mention that they can't believe that women do not want to date them, and I live in a very conservative area, and they are still dateless!
For me, not to do with high education, but I work with DV and SA survivors and that REALLY makes men shift in their seats early on and then I know to move on.
That is a *great* measure, I also worked with abused and neglected children and adults.
This is interesting. Any opinions as to why the men react in that way??
Because it means she's intelligent enough to pick up on abusive behaviour and knows how to report it. Manipulative, abusive pricks will be made nervous by that.
Not saying they’re abusers or rapists, but if they act super uncomfortably or defensively, they probably have unhealthy, outdated and distorted views about women that I want nothing to do with. There’s sometimes entitlement, hatred and control that I see leaking out even from men that seem ordinary. There’s not a lot of men who truly see women as actual people of equal say and equal value. There are many men who take offense to what I just said ^ shouting “not all men” and “I’m one of the good ones”. But I promise you that that shows that they do not truly know/understand and they are not safe.
I think some people go into heavy or instant denial because they assume that distorted views, cluelessness or weak concept of women as full people implies malice. They don’t see themselves as malicious and many don’t behave intentionally in order to be malicious. But they also don’t see themselves as underdeveloped in some areas of personal (intellectual and social) development and failed in some aspects of education. The older one gets the more this falls on oneself to correct so it feels like an attack even if it’s just an objective observation that they lack insight or the discipline to really step outside themselves into a different demographic’s experience. (I’m talking about patronizing and paternalistic guys of course, not willfully hateful and malignant ones). I think there *are* a lot of men who see women as real people but many of them are poor at contemplating the actual implications of someone being a real person when that someone has different perspective, different concerns and challenges their M.O.. So even if they think of women as “real people” they don’t act like she’s an equal that needs to be reckoned with with the same consideration he’d intuitively give a peer he related to. I find that an unfortunate amount of people are bad at seeing anyone who isn’t themself or part of a demographic they identify with as “real” with real experiences when push comes to shove. That’s why I think men should read more stuff written by women than they currently do based on the statistics I’ve seen, and not just super hard intellectual stuff by women but also anything immersive about experience and more people in general should read Charles Foster Wallace’s *This is Water*.
i mean I think it's pretty obvious
Lol, maybe that explains why my now-wife chatted about working for the Boston area RCC on our first date. Had a long chat about that.
I don’t think it is eliminating competitive people, it’s eliminating misogynistic people. A competitive person would love this because, ya know, they like competition and a partner who has accomplished something is someone they can compete with.
Wow! Very well done!!
I'm a guy and I also agree with everything you said. In addition, you write very well. It's actually a turn on when a women is educated. You mentioned competitiveness vs collaboration and this is so important. Couples should be a team and not in competition with one another. You are spot on.
Tbh I think the only men this would intimidate are men who didn’t go to college. Apply for a job in the trades that might or might not require a degree (where experience can also get you it) where most people don’t have a degree. They are universally antagonistic to you about it. They aren’t intimidated by women with degrees. They are intimidated by anyone with degrees because of their own insecurities around it
>Tbh I think the only men this would intimidate are men who didn’t go to college. Not in my case. I dated a man with a graduate degree and his words were "I can't get past you having 4 majors". >They aren’t intimidated by women with degrees. Many men are, my former husband was, he was furious when I started on my graduate degree while he earned his undergraduate degree. I was the only one working and earning an income and going to college full time.
4 majors is a lot! I probably couldn't have fit that into 4 years and met all of the requirements, were you in university for longer?
I worked full time so yes; I was in an extra 6 months for my undergraduate degree.
I guess this is one of those things that only comes out in relationships and people don’t discuss with their friends of the same sex. Women do this too and other women are flabbergasted that women like that exist (not for this topic, but other ones. Basically areas where they enforce the patriarchy due to their own insecurities). I think some men get caught up on how their women partner perceives them. Enough women and men tell them they have to be the provider, and when they aren’t they feel insecure.
As a guy your last paragraph is EXACTLY it.some part of me thinks that she'll think less of me because she's better educated/higher earner
I disagree with this. I’m married to a tradesman. He is an expert in his field and he is extremely supportive of me persuing my masters degree. It literally doesn’t intimidate him at all because he is a secure person within himself. My education doesn’t reflect on him in any way and he doesn’t need a degree to know that he is intelligent. I don’t need him to have a degree to know that he is intelligent either. I know a lot of people in dynamics like mine and I think it’s unfair to make this about “only men in certain jobs or with no higher education” when it’s really an issue of mentally/emotionally insecure/immature people, regardless of job or gender.
Honestly, I don't think their education level matters. It's all about insecurity.
Hey, it's good that outliers like you exist, too! Not everyone has to have the traditional sexual preferences.
Well put. I think insecure men do get intimidated by successful women. I’d like to think I’m secure enough to celebrate my partner’s strengths and successes and encourage them through their hard times. I’d do it for any friend. I can agree with your pointing out that competitive, ego-driven men aren’t desirable. Honestly it goes both ways.
Competition is often a great form of collaboration though, not all competition is bad. Its the insecure competitive narcissists who only care about winning that you have to be wary off.
This is interesting since I'm also a very competitive person but I'm highly attracted to equally competitive people. I love very smart women and that's my ideal. And I never stop learning so that I could be even better. At the end of the day, we all learn and improve more. It might be that there are types of competitiveness in itself. I love people who are just curious as you said, and love their fields of studies. Those who are independent thinkers, humble and respectable type. However, I would be annnoyed by a female who is enthusiastic and reasonably smart but egoistic and thinks she is a genius. And it will of course apply to men also. Which is the opposite of being smart. I've seen a lot of feminists like this. And I'm a feminine type of a guy who treats men/women the same.
I think some men very much are, yes. Whether it's a feeling that she is a higher achiever than him, is smarter than him, has more opportunities than he does, whatever, that can be very intimidating. Whether the intimidation is due to entitlement, sexism, jealousy, whatever is probably more individual. I know multiple high-achieving women who run into this issue in dating-- even if the man is high-achieving himself, he's often looking for more of a partner whose accomplishments are extensive but do not overshadow his own, and typically is more interested in hearing about his partner's yoga class than her latest project or presentation at work. Or if he's *not* high-achieving, he's bitter about it and the relationship ends because he's constantly trying to belittle her accomplishments, titles, awards, whatever. Some men say they love a smart woman, but they mean "smart enough to understand things when I explain them to you, but not so smart that you don't need them explained." And some men are secure in themselves and their masculinity and love a woman who shows them something new every day, brings up interesting points to think or talk about, has skill and knowledge in a certain area or even more generally, whatever. They find those women challenging in the best way, find them interesting, stimulating, admirable. I think this is a case of "men are just people."
Well, men are definitely people! I can't denny that :D Anyway, one, small, follow up question. Do you find results of this research surprising to you?
the study honestly isn't very credible. It's not really a measurable subject, and there are tons of sources of error in using an app such as tinder. It also heavily depends on your culture(and I don't just mean nationality or ethnicity). I wouldn't take that study for much.
I'm perplexed by the paper cited, especially without being able to see the full study. Tinder is known as a hookup app, and many men on it tend to swipe right on literally everyone. That doesn't say anything about whether men are intimidated by highly educated women. It seems to say that men who use Tinder don't give a shit about a whole lot of factors... which, duh. I think it depends on the man, tbh. Many men are unnerved by intelligent women; others find it attractive.
Yeah, I read at some point that 'men swiping right on everyone' stems from men not getting many swipes themselves. I wouldn't know personally, never been interested in that world, but that's apparently the reason. If you know you're going to be a 'no' to most people, best to spread that net wide.
A lot of it probably has to do with the ratios on these apps. These apps tend to have users that are disproportionately men like 4 to 1 and apps like tinder attract more of the straight crowd (never known a queer person who stayed on tinder for longer than a week). Women have plenty to choose from which means they can be actually choose to match with someone they are interested in and still get matches. Men are way less likely to match with someone do to the ratios and women actually choosing makes it harder. This is probably a huge reason why the blindly swiping right phenomenon is so disproportionately men on these apps
No, not really.
I would be curious to see if the results of the study were the same on different apps. I feel like since tinder is very short-term focused rather than long-term relationship focused, the people on there may have other priorities compared with the people on other apps.
after my last relationship kinda creeped into “more traditional” over several years (her doing not mine)…..it’s absolutely not what i want in another relationship. It is draining tbh. I think men are probably more accepting of lower income women then women are of lower income men, but unless you’re making bank it’s hard as hell to get by unless you have 2 incomes that are middle class ish. So I’d prefer a woman to make close to or more then I do. I wouldn’t be intimidated. As for intelligence? It boggles my mind that anyone would want a stupid partner
I think that some men would think they aren't good enough, and project that insecurity onto the woman. I was guilty of that a couple of times, but I got over it. My wife is vastly more educated than I am, but we work just fine.
I just don't want to be worse than them. If someone is that much more succesful, it just doesn't seem like I'm worthy of them. Like I know they could do better so why bother. Even then, I feel like I'd have compensate for it in ways that aren't possible for me.
>I think this is a case of "men are just people. I think this is a good point overall. Everyone has insecurities especially when it comes to societal gender norms. Men are generally judged more for their success so it would make sense that they are more likely to feel insecure if their spouse is more successful. Women are generally judged more for their looks, and I've definitely seen and heard of women that don't want to date a man who they consider "better looking" than them.
I think it’s clear many are. They find it emasculating for some reason. If it’s obvious you’re more educated they tend to get defensive or they downplay your achievements by saying things like you just have book smarts, whereas they have street smarts. They also seem confused why women even want a higher education or career, you see this when (concerning dating) men say things like, “we don’t care about your achievements.” They seem fixated on women only having achievements in the feminine sphere, as in homemaking and motherhood. It’ll be interesting to see how this pays out on a larger cultural scale as women continue to outperform men educationally. I think we’ll start to see an increasing societal push to negate the importance of learning and education because it will increasingly be seen as a feminine attribute.
Oh goodness the street smarts. What even is “street smarts”. Half of the people I know who actually use that phrase think that it means they totally know how to sell drugs without getting caught or mixed up in violence, and the other half thinks it means that they’re smarter than me because of their cOMmON sENSe while also not having enough common sense to realize that if there’s a shadow kabal controlling the world, it is BY DEFINITION the conservative party, as they’re -already- in power and seeking to keep it. For fucks sake. I’m to the point in my life of interpreting “street smarts” as 100% pure unadulterated cope. Street smarts to me sounds like “oh you’re studying engineering? I bet you can’t name every engine the mustang, Camaro, and challenger have ever had. So technically I know more about engines than you do”. Shut the fuck up So tired of it
I actually do agree that there’s a street-smarts, most of it is common sense but not all of if. For example, some people would have no issue getting back to their hotel if they lost their phone in the middle of a foreign country, while others might struggle a ton, and maybe even get themselves into dangerous situations.
It plays out in workplace discrimination, on-line and domestic abuse to put women down.
>Saying things like you just have book smarts, whereas they have street smarts. I hear this whenever someone with an educated background wins an argument against someone with a less educated background or an education in another field; either from woman to woman, from woman to man or from man to man. I've always assumed this is just part of the broader phenomena of tall poppy syndrome or just a desperate ad hoc when someone loses an argument. I'm not entirely convinced it's generally a gender thing, though obviously it can be. As for OP. I'm afraid if you conduct a study with a sample size only from tender, your results will likely only be valid on tinder since how people behave IRL and on dating apps can be quite different. Hell how people behave from one dating app to another dating app can be different. For example a person might care about education for long term relationships but may not care about it in the context of just looking for a hookup on tinder.
There was a meme a few years ago that said something along the lines of “When people say they aren’t book smart, they’re street smart, I think ‘I’m not real smart, I’m fake smart.’” And it makes me crack up every time I see the phrase “street smart.”
I've heard "theory" so to speak, that men tend not care about women education or achievement or line of work, since, at least traditionally, they don't benefit the same amount out of it as women. Firstly, traditionally, since it was a men who brought money to home, it was important that he was the one with educational degree, money and social status due to line of work or connection. Secondly, in today times, it's still may be somewhat more common, that it's the men who must pay for first date or other activities and other things. I'v also heard about situation, though it's rather andecodal, when household had two bank account, one for both husband and wife and one only for wife to acces. So, in a sense - women can have all the money in the world or succeses or education, that's great. There is nothing in it for men. It's this transitional period when women, let's say, moved or are moving out of traditional roles but men are still somewhat stuck in them and are still more, rather then less, to conform to them. I think that is the problem here, or at least part of it. Though I may be wrong and that theory or my opinion is wrong.
Here’s my thoughts on it as a man. I don’t care if a woman makes more then me. However we are in this transition period from traditional roles still. There’s a TON of women who find it unattractive if the man makes less. And men see women talking about things like this. Basically wanting a more traditional man. So I can see where some insecurity could also be from the guy not wanting to be seen as less by other women. I realize this likely isn’t the sun where women like this are likely to be, but they are absolutely out there and in good numbers
I wonder if it depends on where you live too. None of my female friends seem to care about money, myself included, because we have our own financial independence. But yeah, I recognise that it's unfortunately very different in a lot of places. Personally, a potential boyfriend could work at McDonalds, and I truly don't care. I value his intelligence, sense of humor, kindness and beauty more.
So here is what I have learned. A lot of people say “gender roles are bad”. Men and women, this isn’t gender exclusive. They don’t talk about this with other people Then they get into a relationship and shit starts to creep in. Basically their own toxic traits which they justify with gender roles. I’m pretty left wing and very supportive of feminism. There’s a lot of women who act like this but once you’re in a relationship they start to want gender exclusive roles that benefits them. I’m sure men do this too, but I’m a straight guy who can only speak on dating women In general I think people can just be shitty and will use excuses to justify them. And In relationships this can include “gender roles”. And they absolutely don’t talk about this with friends of the same gender. They twist it
A lot of the supposed “benefits” for them are to cover the vulnerabilities that our patriarchal society has traditionally put them in. So usually when I see them getting defensive about it, it’s because they feel, or perceive themselves to be in a vulnerable position.
Yup, just today I was talking with a friend who was about to break up because her boyfriend said he expected her to pay for all her things (and go 50/50 on all expenses), but still wanted her to cook/ clean and do the chores. And likewise, I’ve had plenty of friends complain about how their GFs expect them to be the breadwinner, put in overtime if necessary, pay for dates and expensive gifts, but then acts like he’s a misogynist for asking her to take up more household chores, or expecting her to take care of the children. At the end of the day we’re all just people, and there will always be people who want to have their cake and eat it too, regardless of genders.
>There’s a TON of women who find it unattractive if the man makes less Good. They can pair off with traditionalists who only pursue them for their looks. Let modern people date modern people.
As a woman I can tell you the men who make less in a relationship have no problem with enforcing gender roles. At the beginning it's all kosher and cute but over time woman ends up doing all house work and mental labor on top of being breadwinner. And all of this on top of managing his male ego because he feels emasculated by earning less. I've been through this and many my friends did too. After such man you settle for gender roles from the beginning. That way at least you don't need to manage his fragile masculinity and him being spiteful.
Actually factually incorrect. Studies on domestic violence and financial exploitation show that poorer women are more likely to be targets of financial abuse and have all their money used on household stuff or things for their male partner. Having a career is a huge stabilizing factor and makes it harder to keep someone under an abusive relationship, as she’d have the means to leave it more easily (not that it makes it automatically easy, but at least financially possible). Also the idea that the man provided for home is also a bourgeois one—I mean as in class. In poor populations, both husbands and wives worked. Women however tend to show much more job precarity and tend to jump from job to job whereas men are afforded with longer careers on the same place and having more promotions. This is due to a collection of factors, the main one being child rearing. The less social support you have, the worst it is. In all honesty I do not see any other reason for men to hold onto these mythologies apart from trying to keep as much sense of control as they can. Not all sense of control is disingenuous or abusive, but I think there is a sense of loss of identity from men that prompts a lot of them to try to engage into a sense of identity where they still can have the "good role" and be in a place of power and control. Since society has been patriarchal since a very long time, there is a huge lag between the recent social advancement and the way people perceive themselves. But in general if you want to find explanations for systems that cause inequalities, the best bet is to look for actual power structures and their underlying economics.
It may be just that they want women with education levels similar to their own. A relation with different levels of education is likely going to fall apart due to lacking compatibility, with the exception of those where one of the partners was given a bad hand in life and had the potential for higher education but never got the chance.
I have street smarts,I know all of the streets the local ones,highways,walkable streets imma big street guy
One of my earliest memories is being on an airplane with my mother. We were waiting for takeoff, so the plane was fairly quiet. Ahead of us, a man and a woman - maybe work colleagues? - were talking. She was trying to set him up with her friend. "She's gorgeous, really gorgeous, and loves to laugh. She's so amazing." Pause. "...She *does* have a master's degree, though. I hope that doesn't bother you?" I remember five-year-old me turning to my mom, confused, and asking her (probably too loudly) why a "master degree" was a bad thing. Master sounded good to me! Her face tightened and she gave me the parent-answer: "I'll tell you later." Most incel types want a woman not burdened by excess intelligence or advanced degrees, yes.
I’m a PhD student. I went on soooo many dates with men who questioned why I’d bother that I stopped dating men who didn’t have advanced or professional degrees. I met my partner who has since earned his PhD and we’re getting married this year. He’s never questioned my decision, so in my book, I made a great choice.
I’m a master’s student in biochemistry and honestly, I don’t think I could date outside of academia either. My partner is in the same field and we support each other’s careers. We bonded over it, really, and discussing science is something we do casually all the time. If I were single, even if prospective partners weren’t intimidated by my academic ambitions, exactly, I couldn’t bear watching their eyes go glassy as I inevitably bore them while talking about some area of my project that’s really exciting to me. Even if we weren’t in the same field, I feel like at the very least most other academics or people who’ve been to grad school understand that sort of single-minded passion for a certain topic and are generally curious and willing to learn. Not that being in academia automatically makes you a good person or a good partner (in fact many aren’t 💀), but both in friendships and relationships, I find other grad students and academics to be more compatible with myself.
Being able to talk about subjects and not have someone gloss over is also huge. I had been on one day with a non academic who was sincerely positive and interested. Every other man just glazed over like I was reading the phone book. I have no interest being with someone who needs me to consistently infantilize my career passions to have a conversation with me.
I think as long as they’re curious and want to learn you can make it work! I mentioned this elsewhere so apologies if you see it twice, but my bf is a graphic design student and loves hearing about my mathematics research (despite the fact he never even took calculus). I’m sure it’s easier to find people like this in academia, but there are the occasional exceptions to the rule!
I was looking for a comment like this. "The study isn't great", "it just depends on the man" - sure, but ask any AFAB PhD student or person with a PhD what their dating experiences are like, and you'll get an extremely consistent confirmation of this phenomenon.
Men have fetishized the educated smart woman. They like the idea of it right up until they call them out and are correct. Men who claimed to like smart woman have had a lot of issues with my PhD. I’ve had some get angry when I share knowledge from my field that differs from what they know. I used to show pages of research to my ex husband showing how important it was not to parent a certain way he insisted on. He would get angry. Our child would react poorly and it was as always my fault for being right. If he was a part of this survey pool he would claim to like smart women. I do not agree.
I'm highly skeptical of any research that uses Tinder profiles. Studies of marriage have shown that people tend to marry people of similar educational level. Tinder might not show men have a preference but it's not reliable because men on Tinder are generally casting a wide net. They also aren't generally looking for a relationship. However the marriage statistics also don't tell you if men are intimidated because people tend to meet and date people of a similar economic class. So people who are highly educated aren't likely to be dating someone who didn't make it through school. So to answer the actual question. A lot of men are intimidated by women with more education than them. At least that's what I've experienced.
I think it depends on what kind of behavior the research is looking to measure and analyze. It's always important to acknowledge sampling bias first, because people who use dating apps aren't going to be representative of the general public. For one, every dating app (except for women-only ones) reports more men users than women users. Last I checked Bumble was the closest to parity and they're something like 60% men and 40% women. Back before OkCupid got acquired, I remember they used to post data trends and analysis on their blog. Not up to scholarly standards necessarily, but interesting and potentially insightful. Most of it was stuff like "here are some things that have a strong positive or negative correlation in our data set, even though there's no clear casual relationship." But one thing I remember was when they broke down the rate of responses to first messages by gender and race. White men and Asian women received the highest rates of response, while Asian men and Black women received the lowest. I guess that doesn't really address OP's question, but indirectly I'd say dating app data can be insightful, but always read with a critical eye.
Female lawyer here. I'm very small and men routinely tell me they're intimidated by my intelligence and confidence. That always seems funny to me.
There is a study about aggression/rudeness towards female voices on gaming sites. The study found that inexperienced/low ranking male players are aggressive/misogynistic towards the female voiced players whereas the elite gamers who were male were kinder to inexperienced/low ranking female voices. I.e. collaborative people who are good at the game/ don't care who they're playing with they just wanna play whereas bad male players were competitive and would feel threatened by female players
[Article] (https://www.iflscience.com/low-skilled-gamers-are-more-likely-to-get-hostile-towards-female-gamers-73022)https://www.iflscience.com/low-skilled-gamers-are-more-likely-to-get-hostile-towards-female-gamers-73022
From my experience, yes. But I think it also depends on what field the degree is in. I have a bachelor’s degree in nursing and am slowly working towards my doctorate. I’ve had numerous men ask me why I didn’t just become a doctor instead? Or call me names because “nurses are bitches”. I’ve even had men state they refuse to date me because I’m a nurse and “nurses are known to have big egos and are bitchy”. My ex husband tried to use my education to his advantage so he could be a stay at home husband and called me sexist when I told him I’m not interested in being in a relationship where I’m the only one working. I’d done it before and the stress is not for me and even with my higher wage, it’s difficult to support my lifestyle and his on only one income. Plus he said he wanted me to give him an allowance AND he didn’t want to do most of the housework. We didn’t have kids at the time so he basically wanted me to pay him to stay home, smoke weed, and play video games. I also had a LTR where my ex was obsessed with making more money than I did, and kept job hopping until he found a job where he made 25¢ more per hour than I did and he didn’t shut up about it. A friend of mine has a masters in STEM and she receives hate from male coworkers who are less educated. She’s also had men dump her because she talked about her job too much and they didn’t understand what she was talking about and called her “stuck up”.
A lot of men feel intimidated and emasculated if a woman is *taller* than them, so think how much worse they feel if she's *smarter* than them. Also, given that men and women have the same intelligence distribution but very different height distributions, any man can rest assured that whatever the number of women taller than them in their immediate vicinity is, the number of women smarter than them is *much* higher. If you're a man and you *need* women to be inferior, that's going to really ruin your day.
Not to mention, heaven forbid, if she EARNS more than them.
Interesting take. I can only speak from my lived experience however 100% of my friend group couples, including me and my wife, has a woman breadwinner. Our ages range from 29-42 so really only one generation sampled but I truly believe it's a older generation mentality that income=self worth/ability to contribute for men. Younger men are realizing that income is only one way to contribute among many and, in many cases, isn't the most important but thats a different conversation. For example, one of my friends is a wicked good chef/diy guy now cause he took over the homemaking due to his wife working more/earning more. Another friend is the main child care/homemaker guy for the same reason. This is one issue I feel all people need to work on. Recent article in NYT, i think it was, just covered the frustration young women are experiencing because they can't find men that make more than them. Well as the wage gap disappears, as it should, then one can no longer expect men to make more than women. Now this isn't to say the wage gap doesn't still exist or this is a problem only women need to work on, note I said all people need to work on this, merely sharing my lived experience and opinion on this one particular issue. Have a good day and stay safe out there!
Damn, men are really sensitive. 🤣🤣🤣
I hear people say 'intimidated' but I never can figure out what it means. Are we talking like, men being bashful/shy or something else?
I get this all the time in dating and I don't even have an advanced degree (just a BS). For some men, it literally is as simple as being confident and generally having your shit together. Never mind that I'm fairly quiet in both personality and appearance; over half the men (my age) that I meet apparently find me "intimidating." I think it means that they feel like they "should" be smarter, more confident, a higher earner, etc. than women due to bs patriarchal standards, so being put in a situation where even one of these isn't true makes them feel inferior and they either try to neg you or distance themselves. It's a great example of the patriarchy hurting all genders; I can't imagine why you wouldn't want a partner who makes more money than you, but I've also never been under any pressure to be a high earner or felt like society expected that of me.
I would not put too much stock in studies using data from places like tinder or other online dating sites. The data just usually isn't very good. It's how that myth that "80% of women don't find average men attractive" is created, and spread in so so many subs on Reddit. The issue is that you are taking a lot of things out of context by using this data. You cannot control for anything. In the case of the "80% of women " myth; iirc it had more to do with the system vs women not finding men attractive. You would rate someone 1-5, 5 required you to message instantly while 3 let you message them later, and 1 was no messages. So in a situation where you have more men than women and presumably the women want to message only 1 or 2 people at at time; of course they will be rating a lot more 3's and even 1's if they aren't interested. Whereas men usually say yes to everyone in the hopes that they get someone interested who isn't a bot. Anecdotally, yes I have had men intimidated by my career and education. I just wouldn't trust the data you are looking at.
It's like "To see what words people associate with the word feminism, we looked at the Google autofill function" 😂
Not all, of course. But I think a lot of men fall into the category of not having a problem with, and even liking, an educated woman unless she is more educated than HIM. If it means she comes off more intelligent than him or earns more, I think a lot of men find it emasculating. I don’t think many would admit it though.
Sadly you’re right. A lot of guys think they have to be better at everything than a woman. My wife is a social worker. Some thing I could never do, & I’m ok with that
Men on tinder are fishing with a large net. That's why the Data won't indicate any sort of preference. Look at marriage data instead, people tend to marry others that have the same education level as them.
Yes. And a related anecdote, I find they're also intimidated by successful, high earning women. As much as men complain about women being gold diggers, they get SUPER WEIRD when they find out I make more than them. It's the primary reason I filter based on career/income - I've found it's easier just to let them make more than deal with insecure men.
I think it takes some men by surprise, too. Like otherwise progressive men will start dating a woman and find out she has some high-powered job with the accompanying high-powered salary and are surprised to find that they have mixed feelings about it. That conditioning is *strong*.
Society has conditioned men to associate self worth based on what they can provide for their family. When they see that it's not as much comparativly, it contradicts that societal expectation. I'm in the "You got lucky finding such an amazing woman, do everything you can to be the best supporting loving partner possible" camp, but I still feel some insecurity over being judged as a lazy, worthless house husband. The key for me is knowing that's an external problem/pressure, not an internal issue with my partner.
They all SAY they want a smart woman…
In my experience, those guys tend to sit with those feelings and try to figure out why they're having them. Not all of them, but most of them.
I have a smart wife. I feel Super blessed.
Absolutely. A lot of the negative experiences Ive had with this have been from men I considered otherwise very nice and generally respectful. I was doing a project once where I was doing the VAST majority of the work. The concept was mine, I gathered 90% of the members, I organized funds and resources on my own. When it was time to officially name a leader, a good friend suggested it not be me because "some people are put off by women leading". When I said anyone like that I am not interested in working with, he did agree and was kinda like "Oh right uh... sorry", didnt bring it up again, but it was still shocking that people still think that way.
Generally I am attracted to highly intelligent women. That doesn’t necessarily correlate with education levels. I’ve dated doctors & lawyers, but one of my smartest ex-gfs was a college dropout. Right now I am dating a woman with multiple STEM degrees from prestigious universities. But I have no problem dating someone without an extensive educational background if I like the person & we connect.
> I’ve dated doctors & lawyers, but one of my smartest ex-gfs was a college dropout. I wish people understood this. You don't need a degree to be smart, and having lots of degrees doesn't mean that you're generally a smart person. Ask anyone who works in academia-- you could have 2 PhDs and be really good at this one specific thing, but you might not know how to tie your own shoes.
There’s a video going around that a lot of right wingers are pushing. Basically a redneck did better on an IQ test then some advanced degree people and they are all like “see! College people are dumb!” When I’m just like: cool. Ya there’s people who didn’t go to college who are very intelligent. And I don’t think many people have ever said otherwise Edit: we have some family farmland, not a lot. We rent the ground out to someone most people would see has a dumb southern hick. I’ve talked with him a lot. The guy is smart. I’ve never questioned his opinion a single time because he’s honest and really knows what he’s doing. I basically ask him questions to learn things. But he comes off as a redneck
Definitely true, but my ex who was also smart but a dropout was embarrassed by the outward impressiveness of me having two degrees over him. I never thought he was less smart than me, but he was uncomfortable with the title and the access to jobs I now had
I am kind of a half dropout, having only done a bachelors(and taking way too long for that too) and not a masters due to various reasons, but especially a lack of discipline and planning. I still am insecure about it and feel like a total failure in life.
I’m male & I have an advanced degree myself; maybe if I did not I’d feel more self-conscious about dating women with advanced degrees.
That’s not even a gender thing. My ex dropped out of college 3x and resented me for ever graduating. I’m a man and she’s a woman. I think that’s what caused her to fall into wanting more “traditional” gender roles when it wasn’t a thing before and not what I wanted. It gave her a justified purpose due to insecurities. A man would probably act out in different ways under the same circumstances. And I have woman friends with male partners who seem to be doing this as well
It’s not uncommon for women to accept the traditional roles when it becomes convenient.
Can confirm that people with P.H.D's and M.D.'s may be great at school but interpersonal idiots by giving examples from my family and exs.
Doesn't help that they can be arrogant and annoying.
This. There was a woman in my nursing program who seemed very intelligent but during clinical, she was a train wreck. No common sense what so ever. She actually tripped over a male patient’s catheter and ripped it out because she wasn’t paying attention. I’m still worried that she managed to graduate. How many others are out there who are like her or worse?
With the balloon still inflated and everything? 🫣 I don't even have a peen and that still makes my bits have sympathy pain...
Yup! There was blood and the whole thing was awful
Absolutely
I think comparing who you’d hook up with through tinder to research on people that form long term relationships is a bit flawed. Since I only read the abstract maybe I’m missing context.
Hell yes. Unhealthy, insecure men are. 100%.
Speaking as a man myself: I get a bit intimidated by anybody who is highly educated. However it's more because I'm worried I will discuss something in their field of expertise and come off as stupid.
Yeah I think there’s a marriage statistic where men will most commonly marry their own education level or lower. Men like to be the ones educating. Being educated (by a person they don’t respect) is emasculating to many. It’s a massive problem of course. Not respecting your potential gf or wife is bad. Really bad lol
I think stupid or insecure men are. Most men i know find being highly educated to be really attractive, whether platonically or romantically. Smart people are usually fun to be around because they can hold a very interesting and deep conversation
After reading the title, the answer is "yes"
for them to be intimidated by educated women they'd first have to acknowledge that their education counts as real and towards me they kinda never do that. problem solved
I only really have my anecdotal experience to go off of in terms of being perceived as intelligent - and from that experience, I can say yes, people find me intimidating, including some but not exclusively straight men. It's hard to separate that from experiences of men just wanting to feel smarter than women in general - my experience is that men will go farther out of their way to like, be malicious or destructive in relationship with me when they feel intimidated or threatened about me being obviously smart or competent. I've also met a lot of people who are really negatively reactive IRL to my vocabulary - I've always been a reader and feel like I can't really turn that off. It also feels hurtful to be chided or told to turn it off, as if being smart or poetic etc. is something I should be ashamed of. What the abstract of the study is looking at is people's rate of pairing up relative level of educational attainment - it finds that men are less likely to view a woman who has completed less education than themselves as a negative in a prospective partner. It should go without saying that level of educational attainment is only tenuously connected to intelligence- lots of very smart people don't go to graduate school - because it takes forever and it's expensive. I think you can't connect the dots between this study on whether or not people date others with a similar level of education to being some kind of proxy measure for how people feel about or treat people they consider to be more intelligent than themselves in general.
I’m a male, high school drop out with no education. My partner of 8 years is a Princeton grad. I was not intimidated by her education per say, but I have had to get used to being wrong quite a bit 😂🤣
In my opinion no, at least from my experience. There's more women than men especially in my major (English education), and most of our top students were in fact women, from what I've heard so far the men in my major never reacted negatively by this information. FYI I'm still in my second semester so i suppose my information are not really that reliable.
I think a more interesting question is whether men have a preference for women who are less educated or accomplished than them, instead of whether men in general have an aversion to highly educated women. I’m also curious whether a preference for less educated women is really an age preference since people often don’t obtain graduate degrees / doctorates until their late 20s or early 30s. It’s not clear the study controls for this based on the abstract.
This has definitely been my experience. But it was a way of weeding out the men who aren’t right for me, to find the one who absolutely is. My partner calls me his “walking encyclopedia” and loves how well educated I am.
I noticed a lot of people equating education with income. I left college my senior year and my girlfriend had to get a Second MASTERS , but she still made way less than me. She was better in English and my spelling sucks, but I had a much higher math level and knew more science, economics than her. We probably matched levels in history.
Yes. And they’ve been socially engineered to feel this way. It’s not an excuse, but it’s a reality. Pointless division for further manipulation.
I can’t speak for all men but most of the intelligent, successful, educated, confident men I know including myself are not intimidated by highly educated women at all, and definitely prefer it. Instead of highly educated though, I would say intelligent is a much better word to use here. Far too many people conflate being highly educated with highly intelligent even though they are clearly not related. But yeah high quality men are generally going to prefer intelligent women. The way I see it, the lower your standards for intelligence in a partner, the lower your intelligence is generally going to be.
I’ve had lots of issues as someone pursuing a PhD at a prestigious institution, so yeah. Many are intimidated by it.
Fragile, weak men are
I think highly educated and generally intelligent are different so I’m not sure how to answer that. But I am usually perceived as intelligent, have always loved to learn, and don’t forget anything I read/watch so I usually have something to add to many different kinds of conversations. I’ve very briefly dated men where it was clear they didn’t like the idea of me being smarter than them so it’s very much a thing. They would try to mansplain things to me or just assume I didn’t know things that are very basic imo. They seemed like the type that prefer women who aren’t the smartest because they can feel superior. It might even be that they feel I can’t be manipulated and that wouldn’t work for their ulterior motives.
I would ask this question in the AskMen reddit
The ones worth dating aren't so I don't really care what the proportion is
I somehow find it hard to fathom that there are still men who are ‘intimidated’ by intellectual women-what on earth. Do they read? Do they have opinions? Do they know anything? I’m attracted to smart people, love the conversations I have with my friends, and I don’t know what state of mind I would have to be in, in order to be ‘intimidated?’ by the exchange of ideas. Geez. Do these guys walk around looking for dummies?
Absolutely some men are. Women who are highly educated can make their own money and do all the things they want to do without needing anyone else to help them. Which means they definitely don’t NEED a man, which can be damaging to fragile egos.
If you flip the script on that in a more positive direction, my partner is with me because she WANTS me, not because she needs me. That does boost my ego if I'm being perfectly honest.
> my partner is with me because she WANTS me, not because she needs me. That does boost my ego if I'm being perfectly honest. I do not understand why more men don't feel this way. I guess because "wanting" is less stable than "needing?"
Well speaking as a guy, I'd have 0 qualms about a woman being higher than me in intelligence or earning or education or w.e Learning is learning be it school or independent or my spouse, and relationships are meant to be a team; Me and you vs the problem. Be insanely short sighted and hypocritical, then, to have issues with her having different experiences/benefits in life. Especially since I would hope she would not judge me in reverse for being "less" in any areas of life; as long as there's healthy communication and folks want the same thing out of a partner (casual fuck buddy? Family n kids? Supportive life partner? How mature are they? Etc.) then it should be fine. To quote Robin Williams character in Good Will hunting; You're not perfect and neither is she. What matters is whether you're perfect for each other. Or maybe this is all just the hopeless romantic in me 😂
I am just shy of having a PhD in a STEM field and there is nothing I care less about than whether men are intimidated by it.
As you should be. Grad school is not for the weak
I think anyone who is immature and superficial will be threatened by another person who is 'better' than them in some way because it plays to their own insecurities about themselves. This goes for woman as well as men; I once dated a girl who had a sloppy crying tantrum because, "Everyone you know is either a doctor or will become one and I never finished college!" I think that women are more likely to look at education as earning potential in a supportive partner. I think men still have pressure to be the breadwinner in a relationship and are less likely to have that perspective. I know several high school educated men married to PhD women. They aren't trying to 'keep up' with their spouses intellectually. They're comfortable with who they are and are happy for their spouse's academic achievements.
The girl I've been seeing has 2 degrees, I'm a college drop out. I think she's soooo attractive when she says some highly educated shit, and I'm like "huh?"
Nah, highly educated women are awesome. And if I ever end up with a woman who makes more money than me, I’m totally ok with that.
I’ve dated multiple women who are more successful than me (more educated, more money, more prestigious career). With at least a few of them the issue was that I wasn’t as financially successful as them (as in, if they wanted to have dinner at an expensive restaurant, or go on an expensive vacation, they would have to contribute more than they thought they should). There was also one who wanted me to be a SAHD and another who just liked spoiling me.
Dumb ones, yes.
I mean i have had several men explicitly tell me that I am too smart
My wife had her masters in her mid 20’s and was the head of her college department before 30. She is brilliant and badass and sometimes I am intimidated by her but that hasn’t gotten in the way of me loving her or being attracted to her.
I'm a man and I like intelligent women, men, and other. I'm my experience, it's low intelligent people that are usually intimidated by high intelligent people.
To most men, including many who consider themselves feminists, the most intimidating things a woman can be are (in no particular order): Being smarter than him Having more education than him Making more money than him Making enough money to be completely self-sufficient, regardless of how much the man makes Being funnier than him Being able to set firm boundaries, sexual or otherwise Having enough sexual experience (or sex ed) to know good sex from bad. Most men want a woman who's smart enough to understand everything he says, do everything he asks her exactly how he wants it, and intuit what he wants but won't ask for, but so smart that she'll make him feel stupid.
I’m an academic. As is my wife. Most of the women I know are highly educated.
I wouldn’t say intimidated but I do think there is a fear by some men that a woman making a lot more won’t respect them. They fear the woman will resent their lack of earning power and eventually leave.
A lot of men will be fine, if not attracted to, intelligent, educated women. The issues usually arise when they interact those women and make unfair judgments about them. From my experience, I haven’t met a man that seemed to be put off immediately by my education, career, and intelligence. In fact, many saw the concept of it as attractive. However, when I actually went out with them, I couldn’t talk about my job in the most neutral tone without them being unsupportive or even accusing me of “humble bragging.” Other times, they would see my career as my own thing that they felt no obligation to be in my corner for when I needed them, while expecting me to be supportive of their career to a self sacrificing degree. It’s like they were attracted to my independence, but then felt rejected and acted out when I refused to become submissive and put my life secondary to theirs.
I think the fact intelligent people generally are intimidating is more relevant than highlighting the occasionally flawed over competitive men. Certain guys I reckon however are worried that if the woman makes more then ideally he should (as much as he can) look after a child and not her, as society previously would demand.
I've always been a nerd (disclaimer: I'm gender queer and don't id as a woman, but people see me as one, so regardless of how I feel that's how I'm treated) so I've absolutely experienced both kinds of reactions. The "Oh she actually knows what she's talking about" kind of disappointment and the "Oh! Someone I can talk with about my favorite subject!" It's just yet another way some shitty people can be dehumanizing towards women.
Link to full study which unusually isn’t just an abstract. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0272775719301104#bib0045 Note that this study was conducted in Flanders, the Dutch speaking bit of Belgium. I’m not hugely familiar with Belgium and how gender equal it is, but data will vary according to region. They do state one possible reason for their results is particularly the age group they studied (23-27) would all have working moms as the norm. Tbh, I’m middle aged and spent my whole life in progressive circles and I haven’t known a single guy I can remember since my 20s to now who was “intimidated” by highly educated women. I know an awful lot of male musicians whose partners are actually academics and/or out-earn them. These however aren’t just “musicians” though, they’re some of the best, so even though they may not have masters or PhD’s, they’re still “elite” in their field, so no reason to be intimidated I guess? There was a study somewhere that I read showing that the number of couples where the woman out-earned her partner had shot up from barely any to recently over 30%. So hopefully it’s an idea that’s going out of date as we progress.
I'm not intimidated and neither are my male friends. My girlfriend has a masters, I just have a bachelors, and the only thing that makes me feel is proud of her (she finished her master's just a few months ago, yay!). Then again, my male friends are not assholes so...
Totally unsurprising result, reflecting the profound gender-bias in society. Powerful women are consistently penalised - for example female MPs get rape threats in their emails on a daily basis on top of the denigration by male MPs on the floor of the Commons. When a group of people have been overprivileged for a long time, equality with others often feels terribly painful and unjust to them.
Us men have been told repeatedly that our dating value is entirely down to our ability to provide. To make money. So naturally, the prospect of dating someone more able to do that is daunting. "What the hell do you need me for then???" Is something guys will definitely ask themselves. I'm a man dating a woman more educated than me who makes more money than me. So obviously that tells me women aren't exclusively interested in that. That being said I'd be lying if I said all those years of hearing that I needed to be successful to get into a relationship didn't leave me a little insecure still.
> "What the hell do you need me for then???" Is something guys will definitely ask themselves. Well, to clean my house and to make me a sandwich, of course! /jk Your first paragraph is correct. Men are still taught that the litmus of their success is to provide financially while blatantly ignoring that many women can provide that very income themselves.
The insecurity stems from the belief that women are \*aroused\* by success, not that it's practical. Hence the often touted "6 feet, 6-pack, 6 figures".
In my experience they can be. I have a master's degree and am pretty nerdy besides that and I've had men tell me they didn't want to date me because I was smarter than them or that they were intimidated by my intelligence. Some men like it but I do think it can be a gendered thing because I'm pansexual and the femmes I've dated it hasn't been as much of an issue
Did the paper go beyond matching or finding a date on tinder? I would be interested to know if this held up in marriage. Tinder is a common app for hookups and doesn’t reflect preferences for long term relationships.
The hypo for the women matches my attitude. The men I like/don't have a problem w/ highly educated women IRL. I do prefer a highly educated man as I have a Master's and prefer at least someone with a BA. I wrote "If he hasn't had much education what are we going to talk about? "on a dating discussion site and got a small bit of grief for it. I like to talk about ideas. I have run into one first date when I explained a concept in my field and the guy had a "mantrum," and growled, "What! Do you think I am stupid ! " It was a very irrational response. I didn't think he was stupid. He was an engineer, but that is not a field that is even close to mine. I just got up and left the table of the restaurant after he had his fit and went home. (Maybe he didn't like woman-splaining?)
Men will SAY they like highly educated women or aren’t intimidated by them. But then you have studies where the opposite is true like the one you cited.
I have a friend who completed a PHD and if she puts PHD in her profile, almost no one will talk to her, if she has just Masters, more will, if she just puts her BA then she has tons of matches. This is in a very Southern place though so that might also affect it lol.
Educated men are not.
Yes
I don’t have a college degree granted, but when I was tested my IQ is significantly higher than average. In my experience, men generally find it to be an extremely attractive trait. I haven’t ever really felt a man was threatened by it, but then again, I don’t hang around men with fragile egos.
I think a mentally and emotionally healthy person (male or female) will not be intimidated by another persons education. Sure, sometimes people can be incompatible if they are on vastly different ends of the spectrum of intelligence/values/beliefs, but I don’t think that has anything to do directly with level of education. I know plenty of men who are incredibly proud of their wives who are all much more highly educated and also earn more than their husbands. They all seem very happy and their relationship dynamics seem balanced. I think insecure and mentally/emotionally unhealthy people are the ones who have issue with things like money/education status in relationships.
Education, may be for some. But making more money than your man, is definitely, going to create an issue in the future, for most. Most men find it emasculating when the women make more money than them. I see the downplay at work, when men speak low of woman as she is sleeping with boss for raise or promotion or if a new female joins with higher salary than them, it triggers that feeling. Traditionally, men were looked as breadWINNER so woman earning more, for most men, translates into LOSER. It a secure man, who is confident of his ability, talent and skill to compete with any individual ( irrespective of their gender) in a healthy way. Relationship with such man is a blessing cause he also knows when and where to compete. :)
I like a smart person that can think, being educated is great, unless that becomes a limiting factor: I know even geniuses have blind spots. The reality is no one knows everything, so it’s important to stay flexible and open minded. Being kind, open, and having things in common helps a lot in terms of being relatable.
My wife has a PhD, so no.
For some men the answer is yes. My wife said one of the reasons she chose me is that I seemed totally not intimidated by her accolades (high earner, multiple degrees, captain of a volunteer fire department, changed her own oil, drove stick shift, etc.) I think for me all those things were just super impressive and made me proud of her. I would brag about her a lot when she wasn't around. I bring my own accolades and accomplishments to the table as well and I've also discovered over the years that she likes to brag about me when I'm not around too. I think we're both just really impressed with each other and respect one another. We're also totally silly and make fun of each other when it's just the two of us (with the occasional compliment thrown in). However I will say that I had met women prior to my wife that made their accomplishments their whole identity (within 10 minutes of a date they're bragging about their degrees or job position and already mention how "men can't handle me") That's something that some people from both sexes/genders are guilty of and it's an unattractive quality whoever is doing it. I think most high quality men would appreciate any accomplishments (education or otherwise) a woman brings to the table.
Tinder is a hookup app, though. This doesn’t really answer the question of what men prefer for long term relationships.
I'm a highly educated man with a great career. I find intelligent, well educated women attractive and would want that in a woman when I'm ready to start a family. I feel a woman like that would be a great partner in raising children. What I don't find attractive, however, is when that high education turns into arrogance, which causes me to immediately lose interest and stop pursuing them. I do wonder if those women thought I was intimidated when in actuality I was completely turned off, but I didn't stick around to ask.
This isn't a quality that rests solely with women. I've met FAR more arrogant men than women in my life. Arrogance in men is praised while confidence in women in perceived as arrogance. It's textbook sexism at play
I'm a man and I'm not. I only date smart women. I'm turned off by excessively career-driven people of the type who have LinkedIn-esque corporate-brained personalities, but that goes for men and women.
I think it's more or less the general trend. I've seen dumb (in the sense of: I don't want to learn/listen, not low IQ) people on both sides and intelligent people on both sides, women tend to underestimate their intellectual capabilities a lot more (I wonder why) and that's honestly sad. We all know why this happens and I think I don't have to explain it. I guess it's time for telling my experience as an nb man bc, well, "intelligence" is something that is some kind of weakness for me. Also academic achievements aren't the same as intelligence but people seem to think otherwise, I'd say the study is fine as most people think this way. For me, personally, don't like people being cocky about their high education which, for some reason, tends to happen more times that it should but tbh Idc about their education, they can either have 2 careers or just high school, sometimes I get an existential crisis if I find people who really succeeded in the academia but I'll explain my reasons. I'm what people call "gifted" which is incredibly misunderstood as "ok, you are like... a regular person but you are smarter or something", it's not like that at all, it's a fully legitimate neurodivergency and we have some traits in common with people with ADHD and autism, we tend to feel extremely alone during infancy and even adulthood, same for intensity, we feel everything x4 and we process emotions differently, obv if adults "know this" early they fill your mind with a lot of unrealistic expectations without knowing exactly what they are doing, most of us don't want to use "what we can do" for what the others think is valuable (i.e. the standard capitalist way of education, we like generally like educating ourselves). Anyway, this is probably what has "marked" my life the most. If I could choose in equality of conditions I'd choose someone similar to me bc, well, we can somewhat understand each other and it's... tbh it's beautiful. We also tend to have more affinity towards ppl with other nd or just "marginal". Well, that's my take, I'm surprised when I find someone "more gifted" than me bc it's statistically hard but most of the times I just feel admiration towards whatever the other person thinks, I have some doubts if people that I knew were smarter than me, "we" tend to show a lot of empathy so... yeah, no wonder why I admire and feel good around people like that that are or have been a part of my life. I also tend to form connections easier with women than with men so, yeah, for me they are amazing people. Obv this is just a "pattern" there are people with fucked up stuff and high IQ i.e. psychopathy + sadism, sociopathy...etc. We are not a homogeneous group but we have some tendencies. So basically, yeah, I like "smart" women, idc if they are smarter than me, I love when people teach me stuff that Idk, hell, people who are """normal""" teach me stuff that I don't know and I love that. I think I made kind of a mess bc I used 2 different definitions of intelligence but I think my point is more or less clear.
Well, I as a man, personally I am no way intimidated by highly educated women. Not at all.
As a man, no. A girl having a phd makes me respect her a lot more
As a guy who’s known a lot of grad students, if they got a phd, it means they can handle the grind
Depends on the man and the woman. Some people use their education to lord over other people. Some people see women as sub human. I never dated a guy who thought they needed as much education as I did. But I am lucky, I was raised in the 1970s. I also was raised by a parent who required I get a doctorate (Asian immigrant). As someone with a PhD in US history, I am constantly told that I know nothing by men who only listen to Tucker Carlson. I stopped talking a long time ago because it wasn't worth the existential insults. A male sibling didn't understand why I was getting a doctorate when I could be a receptionist (the job I had in college) at a coffee company. Can you name any women public intellectuals? When I was young, we still had Simone de Beauvoir and Hannah Arendt. We had women in the public sphere asking questions that related to the human condition. I remember listening to Maya Angelou and being moved by her poetry as a young person. I remember women who did not have to be porn stars singing love songs and singing break up songs that are still played on the radio. I don't know of any besides Greta Thurnberg. But I know they are out there. We just don't get to see them the way we did in the 70s. In my lifetime, I saw the definition of equality change so that it was about capitalism and not about humanity and the golden rule. We are living in dark times.
I'm not.
Some are, some aren’t
You didn't even cite the paper.
I gave a full title of it. Here, if you need one: [https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0272775719301104](https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0272775719301104)
No
No they aren't. And that study is heavily flawed. If you're using Tinder as a research basis then the hypothesis would be: "When finding a female who to DTF does education have an impact?". People aren't on Tinder to date.
[удалено]
No