An Introduction to Misattribution of Arousal: the Case with Females

Misattribution of arousal is a term used in psychology which describes the process where people make a mistake in assuming what is causing them to feel aroused.

The classic example: To test the causation of misattribution of arousal, Donald Dutton and Arthur Aron (1974) assigned a young and sexy woman to survey men for her psychology project on the effects of scenic attractions on people's creativity in a visiting park located in British Columbia. The experiment was intended to help determine whether one's arousal levels were caused be specific events (i.e. the approach from the attractive woman or the experienced by the subjects).

Blah blah blah, continue the rest of the story on Wikipedia's article, "Misattribution of arousal."

Since this is in the blog section of my site, (rather than the article), it is going to be about my experiences rather than others.

The case with females:

The issue here isn't so much that I wrongly misinterpret that a female likes me when she doesn't, but, but when it happens the other way around. That is, when females interpret that I'm "hitting on them" when I'm not.

And so it follows, I have to do certain things to avoid those things from ever happening.

This page was created on September 29, 2009, and there are 2 wordfiles I have already written on this subject.

9/17/2009.

A person is not just good or bad by the things he *does* do, but also good/bad by the things he *doesn't* do.

The better safe than sorry policy.

If you combine those 2 policies of mine, you get a synthesis.

The case with females:

From the better safe than sorry philosophy, I believe all females are conscious about their surroundings regarding guys. Conscious about guys. That if the more and more attractive she is or the more and more cleavage she shows, and if a guy randomly talks to her, the more she won't believe he's authentic. That whatever he's talking to her about, was just a starter conversation just for the sake of talking to her.

And since I don't randomly talks to females *just* *for* *the* *sake* of talking, that doesn't apply to me.

But there are awfully a lot of things that do apply to me, besides talking, if you take the a person is not just good or bad by the things he does do philosophy.

1.I'm really conscious of where I sit on public buses and trains.

I will never sit right next to a female on the public bus or train. If I do so, I could be giving the wrong message (from the better safe than sorry philosophy).

If I am already seated by myself, and a female sits next to me, that's fine, I won't get up and leave because of that, but I still wouldn't sit next to her if she sat there 1st.

(You can tell I often stand on crowded buses and trains, yep.).

For seats that face the aisle in a row, it's possible I can sit 2 seats from a female, but not right next to her.

1b.At the same time, I'm also putting females to the test.

While I will not sit right next to a female, for the seats that face the aisle on both sides, I'm not against sitting across the aisle from her (where seats face the center of the bus or train).

So if she were showing cleavage, then I'm testing her. If she covers up that I've sat across from her, then I know (or pretend to know) why she did that. If she doesn't cover up, then I know she's comfortable (or fine) still showing the cleavage (or I pretend to know).

-

Not only do I never sit right next to females I don't know on the public bus or train, but I also don't sit right next to guys either.

Why? Because the guys would prefer a hot female sitting next to them rather than me sitting next to them, duhh.

Or in other words, I don't sit next to humans, of any gender, on the public buses or trains, since I must love standing.

If I'm sitting on the public bus or train and it starts getting crowded and I start seeing people stand, I feel bad, for sitting.

Even though I don't sit right next to people on public buses and trains regardless of their gender, the reason for it could differ by their gender. :/

Hopefully, nobody considers me a bigot by gender for that.

Besides gender, we can also break it down by age group.

-I wouldn't sit right next to young children because then the children may be scared out of me sitting right next to them.
-I wouldn't sit right next to old people since I may not look so friendly, but it depends on what I look like and how I dress.

If I were, for example, Orthodox Jewish and wearing the black hats and suit, then I have no problem sitting next to other Orthodox Jews also wearing the black hats and black suits, since then I assume that they are more comfortable being seated with Orthodox Jews rather than non-Jews, k.

2.If I'm at some grocery store and there's 2 cashiers vacant, 1's a hot female and the other is a Muslim woman wearing a hijab covering her face, if I picked the hot cashier, they both know what bigots I am, right?

3.This happened 4 days ago, on September 13, 2009.

Around 5:50 p.m., a girl hollers at me. I've seen her and a guy together several times over the past several weeks, but we never spoke. They often come in and out of their van together.

So I go over and she asks if I can spare her 5 bucks for some pizza cuz she's hungry. She's sitting on a park bench. She's of 2 guys and 2 girls. The other girl and guy I've seen together several times.

After she's done asking me for money, the 2nd girl supports her, making the "she's hungry," argument.

This is not a complete story. So as I dig into my pocket and pull cash out, she gets ready to accept it but I turn around, and instead, go to the guy (he has tattoos and wearing a wife beater), I give him the cash and say "Here you go."

And he laughs and giggles now that I gave him the cash.

Then I walk off. Then the girl, now behind me, asks for another 2 dollars, so I walk back to the guy and hand him the 2 dollars and he laughs and giggles some more.

By the way, I was correct that he was her boyfriend, of course I was. ;)

As I wrote the above, I realize that almost a year ago, I written a very similar article. The next 1 below was written almost a year earlier.

10/1/2008.

I believe in treating humans as humans. I don't believe in discriminating them by gender. All humans should be equal, regardless of gender. But I have observed that people do not give the equal opportunity to genders like I have.

It's hard to find someone that really acts no different to someone by their gender.

In any event, for this wonderful bigoted society we live, I find it almost impossible to observe people treat genders equally. In some cases, this could affect how I treat females.

This is especially the case when people discriminate me against my gender. I had a teacher in high school, whom was very much like that. He had a couch in his classroom, and guess which gender was allowed to sit on it...

Here are some of the things society has somehow affected in how I do things.

1.When I am in a grocery store, and all the lines are empty, I pick the ugly cashiers instead of the pretty cashiers. I mean, come on, if I picked the pretty cashier, both cashiers will know how biased I am (especially on a continuance pattern).

Imagine how creepy it would be if a guy like me always went to the hot cashiers and not the ugly ones?

If I were at a grocery store, I pick the uglier ones just so the pretty ones don't get the message. (If they're all pretty girls, that's fine. I'll just make sure I don't go to the same ones over and over again.)

The only way that would justify me going to a hot cashier than an uglier 1 is if the line is much shorter, of course.

2.Suppose I was at a restaurant or some place, and I had a question regarding the place or company or something. If it was a guy I'd straight forward ask. If it's a girl, then it would depend. If it's a plain girl and such I'd ask.

But if it's a girl that shows cleavage, then I *definitely* would *not* ask. I'd bet that 100% of the time, not 1 of her brain cells would rationalize and that I'm only talking to her and using the subject as a pick-up line because of the cleavage.

But the girls without cleavage probably won't think that way.

The more uglier she is the less likely she will think I was hitting on her (and less strongly think it).