





●Introduction

I watched a Japanese drama called Switched on Netflix the other day. The story of drama and the concept of switching body were interesting. I think that a lot of people have imagined what would happen to them if they could switch their body with somebody else. I liked that the main characters were high school students. High school days are usually a formative period of adolescence and the drama gave me a nostalgic feeling about my own high school days in Japan.

One of the reasons why the drama became popular is the drama makes people think about the importance of looks and personality in human society. For instance, the drama makes you ask yourself the questions like, which is more important, appearance or personality for your date?, Is physical attractiveness more important than personality to have a happy life?, how important is looks for dating? and so on.

After all, the show sends a strong message of realizing you can take over any body you want, but it’s the personality that makes the person. But, the show made me wonder which is more important, physical attractiveness or personality, in reality.

I looked for some statistics and psychological studies about mate preference and analyzed them below. When I was searching the info about mate preference, I realized that the mate preferences vary with whether it’s male or female and whether it’s for marriage or dating. So, I divided my article into 2 sections. One section is about marriage partner and the other section is about dating partner.

Which is more important, physical attractiveness or personality, for your MARRIAGE partner?

National Institute of Population and Social Security Research in Japan did the Japanese national fertility survey in 2015. The research institution asked over 2,000 Japanese singles nationwide whose ages are 18 to 49 the question on how important each aspect from the following choices is for their potential marriage partner. The aspects are ①Personality, ②Skills for housework and childcare, ③Understanding for work, ④Physical attractiveness, ⑤Common interest, ⑥Occupation, ⑦Economic resources, and ⑧Academic background. Please see this page if you are interested in more details regarding the survey.

The figure below illustrates the survey result and personality is selected as the most important aspect for both men and women. Physical attractiveness is in the 4th most important aspect for men while it’s low at the 7th for women.











The table below shows a different questionnaire result for the important traits for your future marriage partner. The survey was done by a Japanese wedding company called Anniversaire in 2015 and asked 600 singles in Japan whose ages are 23 to 39 about what traits they want for their potential spouse. Multiple answers were allowed in the questionnaire. Please see this page if you’re interested in more details on the survey.

Similarly to the survey result of National Institute of Population and Social Security Research, personality is more essential than physical attractiveness for both men and women. There is no physical appearance trait within the top 10 in the table for women.

Which is more important, physical attractiveness or personality, for your DATE ?

The Anniversaire that I mentioned above did a questionnaire survey for dating partner as well in 2015. They asked 600 singles in Japan whose ages are 23 to 39 about what traits they want for their potential date. Multiple answers were allowed in the questionnaire.

The table “Important traits for dating” above is different from the table “Important traits for marriage partner”. Physical attractiveness, especially whether the date is beautiful/cute or not, is the most important factor in choosing date for men. Personality aspect such as kindness or similar sense of value is relatively important, but they are not the No1 thing that men think about in choosing a date according to the table of “Important traits for dating”.

On the other hand, the table “Important traits for dating” shows that women consider kindness and similar sense of value as the most important things for mate preference. But, whether the date is handsome or not seems also very meaningful since it’s at the 4th place in the table.

Also, a different survey done by IBJ, a Japanese wedding company, shows a little different result for choosing a date. The company did a questionnaire survey for 692 singles and asked the most important standard in choosing a date in 2013. Only one standard was answered in the survey per respondent. Please see this page if you are interested in the survey in more details. The survey results are shown below.

Personality appears the most significant trait in choosing a date for both men and women from the table “The most important aspect in choosing your date” above. Interestingly, both personality and physical attractiveness are very important for male and the numbers are very close at over 30%, but the personality at 46% in female table is significantly higher than the other aspects. Physical attractiveness is only 11% for female in choosing her date.

Summary

・Personality is significantly more important than physical attractiveness in choosing a potential marriage partner in Japan. It does not matter for men or women; personality is always the No1 factor in choosing a marriage partner.

・Whether it’s for a marriage partner or a date, the mate preference of women tends to be mainly based on the man’s personality. For men, female physical attractiveness can be more essential to choosing his date than personality.







Also, I have other articles about dating and marriage below. If you are interested, please take a look at them.