Status plays a significant role in how people feel about one another. For men, their status highly influences their attractiveness to women. This post explains what status is, how your behavior largely defines your status, and how men can use this knowledge to recognize and improve their status in a way that allows them to become more attractive to their partner.

No matter how physically attractive a man is, or how much money or fame he has, in the long run, consistent low status behavior will cause their partner to lose attraction for them.

In relationships, there are many factors unrelated to status that affect a man’s attractiveness to women. But none of those factors matter if a man’s status is lower than their partner’s. Women’s attraction for men cannot be sustained if they feel the man needs them more than they do.

Men can easily create this impression by playing out too many low status behaviors, making women feel like they’re on a pedestal. Women are evolutionarily programmed to lose attraction for men who make them feel this way.

That’s why men who want to know how to be attractive to women should know it’s:

…important to understand how their behaviors affect their status in a relationship and how they could modify their behaviors to avoid being too low status.

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Status Defined

Your social status, or just “status”, is your perceived power to get what you want. It’s the shared belief that others have about your power, and that you have about your own power.

Perception of power fundamentally defines your status. Many assume status is tightly bound to your physical attributes, wealth, or resources. And while all those things correlate with your status, your interactions with people can easily change their perception of your status.

In the ancestral time, a powerful person could, on a whim, provide you with a world of opportunity and pleasure or cause you endless pain and suffering. Your genetic future was at the mercy of powerful people. You had everything to gain as their ally and everything to lose as their enemy. Emotions, thoughts and behaviors in reaction to status were designed to maximize your genetic fitness.

Today, the playing field has changed and perceived power has a greater influence on your overall success. The power you perceive people to have, i.e. status, determines how you react to them. Your actual power doesn’t cause people to react differently toward you; only your perceived power does. If you can modify people’s perception of your power – by definition, modifying your status – then you can intelligently influence how people feel and behave toward you.

Once you see status, you cannot unsee it.

Reactivity

When people interact with you, the type of behavior that highly affect your status is your reactivity.

When you feel reactive in an interaction, your brain is saying, “this person is interesting and important; give them your undivided attention”. Your behaviors will have the characteristic signs of low status: anxiety, discomfort, excitement, eagerness, anger, curiosity.

The higher a person’s status is relative to yours, the more you react in an interaction with them. The lower the status, the less you react – or maybe you don’t react at all.

# Here are reactive behaviors that communicate higher or lower status in an interaction.

Higher Status, Unreactive Behavior

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Holding eye contact

Extending limbs, taking up a lot of space

Exposing vulnerable body parts: throat, abdomen and groin

Succinct and monotone speech

Disclosing little information

Comfortable and relaxed body language

Emotionally and physically composed

Indifferent attitude

Long pauses in speech

Ignoring questions or requests

Interrupting

Breaking rapport

Smiling/laughing in self-amusement

Still body positions

Slow movements

Delayed reactions

Lower Status, Reactive Behavior

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Obeying demands

Passive (aggressive) language

Defensive in disagreements

Contorting body to take up little space

Speaking verbosely or mostly silent

Darting eyes

Disclosing a lot of information

Overly loud or quiet voice

Avoiding eye contact

Being the first to laugh after making a joke

Apologizing

Begging

Indirect questioning

Losing composure, or tries to

Avoiding confrontational subjects

Trying to impress

Explaining something redundantly

Showing emotion

Asking for forgiveness

Accommodating

Going against values/morals for short-term attention

Repeating movements like wringing hands or bouncing legs

Stuttering

Frequent short pauses when speaking

Fidgeting

Nodding and smiling in conversation

Showing symptoms of anxiety

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To sustain attraction in a relationship, men must avoid being lower status than their partner. If the man is, say, the breadwinner in the relationship, it bumps up his status slightly. But wealth, physical appearance, or any other non-behavior related status signals won’t prevent a man from being lower status if he’s consistently displaying low status behaviors.

Status Transactions

At this point, you should know that your behaviors imply a certain status level. Again, this is because humans evolved the software to evaluate a person’s status level according to certain behaviors. People constantly engage in status transactions: asserting or challenging status through action. A person can assert their own status or challenge someone else’s. The result of such actions may cause either person’s status to go up or down. In relationships, this happens all the time.

Asserting Status

You assert your status by the way you dress, what you say, how you say things, how congruent you are, how you react to status challenges… everything you do defines your status.

Asserting higher status

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Dressing in a way that makes you stand out Being congruent Dominant behavior Not complying to people’s demands Never submitting to a status attack Holding eye contact Demand a lot of space Succinct Withhold information Apathetic Concise Relaxed Not losing composure Challenges other’s status and his own Showing indifference Ignoring

Asserting lower status

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Incongruent Blending in Complimenting people Asking for forgiveness Submissive behavior Defensive body language Take up little space Wordy Disclose information Shouting Apologetic Indirect Uptight Responds to threats by losing composure Say things that are safe, makes sure not to challenge other’s status or his own. Showing emotion Engaged Avoiding confrontation

In a relationship, men should aim for a combination of high and low status assertions. Too many low status ones will make them lose their partner’s attraction.

Status In Action

Now, let's put it all into practice. This section is about what men’s interaction with women should be like in order to sustain an attractive status level.

There’s a sweet spot in terms of how to combine low and high status behaviors. One way to know whether a man is playing the sweet spot is to consider whether he’s coming off as defensive. Being overly submissive or dominant is a defense against conflict. Men should keep their composure and not overdo submissive or dominant behavior unless warranted. The best way to summarize how to play the sweet spot is leading with grace. You can think of it like men being in a partner dance where they’re the lead. Men lead their partner in a graceful manner, without being too forceful or submissive.

Here are some ways men can lead women with grace:

Compliment things that are plausibly a way she distinguished herself in her partner’s mind other than looks. If men only complimented their partner on her looks, she’ll think she’s much higher status. Not complimenting her looks at all can make you seem too indifferent, occasionally complimenting her looks is appropriate, if not required.

Women like mysterious men because disclosing information is a low status behavior. Of course, this doesn’t mean you can’t disclose any information, instead disclose information in small chunks or playfully show reluctance.

information, instead disclose information in small chunks or playfully show reluctance. When men want to physically move their partner from one place to another, they can’t be too forceful or submissive. They want to be suggestive, but not pushy. Grabbing her hand works too, but again, not forcefully or hesitantly, just like in dance.

Walking alongside with her follows the same mantra. Men shouldn’t stick by her side every moment nor should they ignore her the whole time. They can walk ahead of her, and intermittently going by her side, creating the impression of leading the journey.

Being in the moment. Saying things relevant to the current situation, and doing things spontaneously. Planning, recalling information, talking about their past self and bringing up old conversation topics are all indicators of thinking hard—a low status move. This doesn’t mean men should always be living in the moment, that’s being too indifferent and doesn’t allow for discussions that can deepen the connection.

Pointing out things about her that risk a negative reaction. Like joking about a dress she’s trying out in a store with: “honey, you look like elmo in that dress”. There’s a risk she’ll respond negatively to such a comment, but occasionally treading the line shows her that her man isn’t so afraid of losing her.

Here's an example of how to do it wrong:

This is a picture of Caroline Wozniacki and Rory McIlroy a week before Caroline called off their engagement. You can see she's leading Rory as they walk and hold hands with her hand on top. She's looking in the direction she wants to walk in while he's looking at her for guidance.

Congruence

All your actions imply a certain status level about you. Your status level is defined by the pattern of high to low status assertions you convey (on average). You are congruent when all your channels of communication and actions are implying the same status level. Congruence makes your message believable, it makes YOU believable. An example of being congruent is you making a strong claim about a skill you possess while maintaining confident body language and tone of voice.

Incongruence

You are incongruent when your channels of communication are sending mixed signals about your status. For instance, a teacher trying to tell their students to quiet down, but they stutter or have a shaky voice saying it. This communicates to the students that the teacher may have less the authority on quieting them down than the teacher believes. In order to convey a certain status level, you must be congruent.

Causes of incongruence

Playing the status level you don’t think you belong to

Feeling like you’re invading someone’s space

Feeling you don’t deserve to do something

Have a lot of goals in an interaction

Not getting any intrinsic value from an interaction

Thinking the other person doesn’t care about you or what you have to say

Being busy, preoccupied, or having something better to do

Acting through someone else’s intentions

What incongruence implies

You must be lower status than you’re trying to play

Don’t care about the person you’re talking to

Only in the interaction to get something out of the person

Your normal self isn’t good enough

Thinking you have nothing to offer so you have to pretend to be higher status

Lying, deceiving, hidden agenda, insincere

Signs of incongruence

Nervousness

Stuttering

Pausing (not for dramatic effect)

Shaky/jittery

Flustered

Inconsistent tone of voice

Unpredictable (without a consistent status level, people won’t be able to reliably predict your behavior. Often associated with creepiness and uncomfortable to be around)

(without a consistent status level, people won’t be able to reliably predict your behavior. Often associated with creepiness and uncomfortable to be around) Unnatural body language

Final Thoughts

There are many highly useful ways to attract women; romantic gestures, humor, kindness are all pieces of the puzzle that help develop exciting and fulfilling connections. Status provides a powerful framework in which to better understand yourself and others. Knowing how to effectively influence your status offers an essential tool in your arsenal of powerful ways to attract women.

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Or check out my Ebook: Men's Guide To Attraction