It's almost Valentine's Day, and for many, the pressure is on to find that special someone.
Whether you're simply looking for a date or hoping to find something that lasts, you could benefit from the decades of psychological research on the qualities that women find most attractive in a male partner.
We've rounded up some of the most compelling scientific insights, so you can step up your game.
SEE ALSO: 13 science-backed ways to appear more attractive
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Look for the universal signals of flirtation.
Rutgers University anthropologist and best-selling author Helen E. Fisher says that from the depth of the Amazons to the cafés of Paris, women signal interest with a remarkably similar sequence of expressions.
As she shared at Psychology Today, it goes like this:
First the woman smiles at her admirer and lifts her eyebrows in a swift, jerky motion as she opens her eyes wide to gaze at him. Then she drops her eyelids, tilts her head down and to the side, and looks away. Frequently she also covers her face with her hands, giggling nervously as she retreats behind her palms.
This sequential flirting gesture is so distinctive that [German ethologist Irenaus] Eibl-Eibesfeldt was convinced it is innate, a human female courtship ploy that evolved eons ago to signal sexual interest.
Look for someone "in your league."
Men — and women — are attracted to people who are as attractive as they are.
In one study, for example, researchers at the University of California at Berkeley looked at the behavior of 60 male and 60 female users on an online dating site. While the majority of users were inclined to reach out to highly attractive people, they were most likely to get a response if that person was about as attractive as they were (as judged by independent raters).
"If you go for someone roughly [equal] to you in attractiveness, it avoids two things,"Nottingham Trent University psychologist Mark Sergeant, who was not involved with the study, tells The Independent. "If they are much better-looking than you, you are worried about them going off and having affairs. If they are much less attractive, you are worried that you could do better."
Present yourself as high status.
In 1969, University of North Carolina sociologist Glen Elder found that looks and wealth tend to find one another — namely, good-looking women tended to settle down with less attractive but wealthier men.
Since then, it's become a well-confirmed finding in the social sciences.
Most recently, a 2010 study found that men pictured with a Silver Bentley Continental GT were perceived as way more attractive than those pictures with a Red Ford Fiesta ST, and a 2014 study found that men pictured in a luxury apartment were rated more attractive than those in a control group.
Why the attraction to resources? Evolutionary psychologists speculate it's because women want a mate who can provide for them.
See the rest of the story at Business Insider