Many women prefer to date men who are taller than they are.
Standing all of five foot three in my bare feet, I’m willing to admit that I’m short. In fact, I still use a stool to reach things on the top shelves of my kitchen cabinets.
Yet when it comes to dating, size does still matter: I want to date someone who has a few extra inches on me.
Apparently, I’m not alone.
Research by anthropologist Dr. Boguslaw Pawlowski of Poland’s Wroclaw University suggests women prefer to date men who are taller than they are. The ideal proportion, gleaned from a study of 600 participants between the ages of 19 to 50, is that the man should be 1.09 times (i.e. about four inches) taller than his partner. In other words, women want to be able to put on stilettos and still be a little shorter than their men.
But for some women four inches just isn’t enough. “Usually I date guys who are six feet, or taller,” says Anita, 31, who is five foot five. “I think it’s attractive when I have to look up at a guy.”
After much demand from women like Anita, FastLife speed dating service and Lavalife online dating service recently held a tall men speed-dating event, where all the men had to be six feet or taller. As for the women, there were no height restrictions. “If we hear from our customers that there is a demand for a particular physical preference (e.g tall men) we’ll create a speed-dating event that caters to that,” says Liv Judd, events manager for FastLife.
Over the course of the evening, a succession of tall guys spent eight-minute mini-dates with each of 10 women (including yours truly). As the men moved from one mini-date to the next, it gave us ladies the chance to check out their, um, vertical enhancement. By the end of the evening my jaw was tight from talking. but I’d met a few men with whom I’d go on a date lasting longer than eight minutes. Whether it leads to something more than just a sore neck is yet to be seen. FastLife will have another tall men event in Toronto on Oct. 24; visit www.fastlife.ca.
