Seeing is believing.

October 1, 2002 7:31 AM

Seeing is believing. Swapping glasses for contact lenses can dramatically increase success with the opposite sex, research on short-sighted students in a nightclub has found. Anyone else have similar experiences?
posted by edh (59 comments total)

I'd recommend not looking for a spouse in a bar.
posted by machaus at 7:38 AM on October 1, 2002

Unless you've lost her there.

This is silly. Anything you do that increases your own perception of your attractiveness will get the same result. Self-esteem and self-confidence are attractive traits.
posted by stupidsexyFlanders at 7:40 AM on October 1, 2002

Really? I always thought glasses on women were really sexy, but then again I'm weird. So these scientists can have all the contacts chicks, I'll take the rest.
posted by jonmc at 7:42 AM on October 1, 2002

I'm with stupidsexyFlanders. I hated myself with glasses. Now that I have contacts I'm a different person -- I feel much better about myself.
posted by kate_fairfax at 7:43 AM on October 1, 2002

I'm with jonmc (per usual); chicks with glasses are extra-double hot. Sorry kate.
posted by UncleFes at 7:51 AM on October 1, 2002

machaus: 'a spouse'? How many have you got?

jonmc: On preview I've deleted my 'jonmc says different' post ;-)
posted by i_cola at 7:51 AM on October 1, 2002

Since most people looking for mates at a night club are shallow and fake, I'd believe this.

Run the same test at a bookstore, an adult-ed class, a hiking club (where I met mine), or any other place where one can meet a real down-to-earth person and I guaranty you'd have different results.
posted by bondcliff at 7:51 AM on October 1, 2002

What about the converse - glasses on guys: sexy? (he said as he adjusted his wire-rims)
posted by UncleFes at 7:53 AM on October 1, 2002

glasses on guys: sexy?

That Jiminy Glick makes my knees weak.
posted by stupidsexyFlanders at 7:55 AM on October 1, 2002

And everybody knows converse are chick magnets, not sure why you brought footwear into it though.
posted by stupidsexyFlanders at 7:56 AM on October 1, 2002

gals with glasses, pwoifect. Must remeber next time I'm lathered and ready to hit a nightclub to bust down to my local hiking club instead.
posted by johnnyboy at 7:57 AM on October 1, 2002

not sure why you brought footwear into it

Low self esteem.
posted by UncleFes at 7:57 AM on October 1, 2002

p.s if they are good enough for superman then they are good enough for me.
posted by johnnyboy at 7:58 AM on October 1, 2002

...not sure why you brought footwear into it though.

Oh dear.
posted by armoured-ant at 7:59 AM on October 1, 2002

Anyone who believes that tripe is missing out on a wonderful world of women wearing glasses. I love them! I even made T-shirts that proclaim that I Make Passes At Girls Who Wear Glasses!

Oh well, let the teeming millions of meat-marketeers fondle their contact lens wearing bed-pals, while the rest of us romance women of style in glasses!

Though, this isn't to say I think contact lenses are unattractive, just that I don't think they make someone MORE attractive than they already are, or that glasses make someone less attractive.
posted by phidauex at 8:03 AM on October 1, 2002

Now I feel I need to clarify that I'm not some shallow bar-hopper. I'm not wearing contacts to look good for other people; I'm wearing contacts to look good for me.
posted by kate_fairfax at 8:06 AM on October 1, 2002

i believe the scientists are too narrow in their focus, as there is more to this than simply glasses versus contacts. often times the problem is not with the presence of glasses, but the presentation. so many of us, especially in grade school, suffered through what can only be called "bad glasses" -- frames that were too big for our face or just terribly gawky.

i know that in my case, i had a major change in self-perception through a simple investment in better frames. yeah, i tried contacts, but they didn't work out for me. what made all the difference was a pair of armani frames, though the brand name doesn't matter as much as the design and the shape (which now can be gotten for next to nothing). my new glasses were smaller, covered less of my face, and conformed to the line of my cheekbones. they allow people to see me first, not my glasses.

just my two cents.
posted by grabbingsand at 8:07 AM on October 1, 2002

I always thought glasses on women were really sexy, but then again I'm weird.

That's what I'm talking about!
posted by monju_bosatsu at 8:08 AM on October 1, 2002

This ranks as one of those "blindingly obvious things that blokes with glasses know all along (and women don't like to admit)".

No seriously. I wore glasses until I was 17, then I stopped and wore contact lenses. Now I'm not astoundingly attractive and not plain old pig ugly - but it's a damn sight easier to pull without glasses. Period.

Yes, things like confidence come into it. But i'm just as confident with or without glasses. The fact of the matter is that there are far too many people who subsconsciously "discriminate" against those who wear glasses.

I'm not a sole case, I know plenty of blokes who ditched the glasses and found it easier to get dates with women. Yes, some of them had frames that sucked, looked stupid or made them look like a mad professor but not all.

Having studied in a male dominated course at Uni and then worked in a male dominated profession for the past couple of years, I've seen it first hand.

As for women wearing glasses, I don't think I would discriminate - but having said that, all the women i've been out with either have 20/20 vision or contact lenses so maybe I do after all (and, like the women, just don't like to admit it).
posted by ralawrence at 8:16 AM on October 1, 2002

Uncle Fes: What about the converse - glasses on guys: sexy? (he said as he adjusted his wire-rims)

Definitely. I am a reader. Any guy looking bookish turns me to jelly.

Stupidsexyflanders: And everybody knows converse are chick magnets

And apparently male magnets, as well. The first pair of shoes my significant other bought me weren't high heels (though he does love those) they were red converse.
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 8:19 AM on October 1, 2002

i gotta count myself among the guys who think glasses are sexy on girls. (no offense to those who'd rather have done with them.) is this due to the fact that frame design has had a renaissance (it seems) in the past decade? probably, but hey.
posted by moz at 8:21 AM on October 1, 2002

I wear both contacts and glasses. Stylish, flattering glasses are an accessory. Unlike kate_fairfax, I'm not a different person when I wear glasses, but it's rather fun to play with ones look. They make a person seem more serious. They impose a certain distance, physically and psychologically, between the wearer and others, which distance can be useful personally and professionally.
Also nice is the moment when a man gently removes my glasses as a prelude to bridging that distance.

Oh barefaced ones, how much you miss!
posted by orange swan at 8:22 AM on October 1, 2002

Glasses on girls are very sexy. It gives them that "I could take these off, let down my hair, and ravage you" look. Librarian to whore in two seconds flat.

Gotta love that.
posted by bondcliff at 8:24 AM on October 1, 2002

Perhaps it is that while glasses CAN detract from someone's appearance (if the glasses are cheap, ugly or just wrong for the person's face) contacts rarely make someone look worse because, well, you can't really see them. My husband will wear his contacts when he thinks it is important to look "good". I think he looks good either way-- but when I look at old pictures of him, he had these weird, huge glasses that would look dorky on anyone. Now he has some nice, stylish, small oval wire-rims. they look kind of like Ben Franklin's glasses. But I think his "I look better in contacts" opinion was formed when he had giant dorko glasses.
posted by CoFenchurch at 8:26 AM on October 1, 2002

Contacts at clubs that use black lights are disturbing...they tend to glow milky white.

Ever since my first crush (Peter Wilkins, 1st grade) I have thought guys with glasses were cute.
posted by JoanArkham at 8:32 AM on October 1, 2002

Ok, I didn't read the article but the headline mentions the research was related to nightclubs. "..dramatically increase success with the opposite sex" is what most people are gonig to see. It's just not correct, period. I can't stand going to nightclubs. I wonder what the percentage of people in world do.

I don't have glasses, but I tell you, I don't mind women who do have glasses. I can see how really bad (style) glasses could turn someone off. I'm tired of seeing "research" being so short sighted (pun intended). Recently I've seen quite a few headlines about research that isn't comprehensive.
posted by tomplus2 at 8:34 AM on October 1, 2002

I wore contacts for about 7 years until I got fed up with all the maintainence and other annoyances that come with them. It's really hard to look sexy when your one of your contacts suddenly folds up inside your eye therefore making your face look like it's being squashed by a vice and strong winds are just painful. If someone thinks I look unsexy because I wear glasses - good! Those people are the superficial kind I try to avoid. Less work and stress for me in the long run.
posted by spungfoo at 8:37 AM on October 1, 2002

The team... took 38 male and female students aged between 18 and 25 to a London nightclub, with strict instructions to go and "pull".

No offense to the University of Warwick, but my middle school science projects had more science than this. (They also had more pie charts.)

This reminds me a lot of those "scientific" expeditions you see on Discovery, where they investigate the "eating habits" of Great White Sharks by throwing big chunks of meat into the water and then filming the sharks going apeshit. Nobody learns anything, except that sharks have lifeless eyes, black eyes, like a doll's eye, and when he comes at ya, he doesn't seem to be livin'... until he bites ya and his eyes roll over white and you hear that high-pitched screamin and the ocean turns red and he rips ya to pieces.

But I suppose every scientist is half B.F. Skinner, half P.T. Barnum.
posted by Ljubljana at 8:40 AM on October 1, 2002

I'm not a fashionista, but what I'm about to say might make me sound like one. If so, forgive me.

When buying glasses, please take a few minutes and really look for something that is flattering and appropriate to your face. Let the clerk help. A poorly chosen set of frames can really detract from your lovely features. If you spend an hour or two trying to find the right pair of shoes, then pay that much attention to something that's on your face every day.

That being said; my husband wears glasses, did when I met him, and they didn't get in the way of me making a pass at him. (Friends may claim that I threw myself at him. I prefer to keep some amount of dignity here.)
posted by onhazier at 8:43 AM on October 1, 2002

Guys with glasses=sexy (generally speaking) Too bad my eyesight is perfect, as is my husband's.
posted by allpaws at 8:45 AM on October 1, 2002

I'll stick with my glasses. They help me maintain the facade that I'm moderately educated, and that I have something intelligent to say.
posted by Dark Messiah at 8:47 AM on October 1, 2002

I'm just enjoying a new scientist article that uses the phrase "pulling power". heh.
posted by netsirk at 8:51 AM on October 1, 2002

I flip between contacts and specs pretty much 50/50 (20/20?). Glasses, along with shoes, are 2 great accessories because they each have the power, in and of themselves, to completely transform an outfit. I can be in a bland corporate-y casual get up, but by putting on my thick, black-framed-1950s-high-school-teacher-glasses (whether they're ugly or not is beside the point), I can say to people, "I fancy myself an 'alterna hipster Jeff Tweedy-ish maybe I'm the bass player from Weezer-kinda guy...'"

You may respond that I'm just a complete loser, but hey, this is about my perceptions, dig? Same thing with shoes. I enjoy taking an otherwise unremarkable ensemble and jazzing it up with, say, a pair of Fluevogs. And I LOVE gals with glasses, by the by. My wife claims she has perfect vision but I notice her squinting to read far away text at times....hmmm.
posted by jalexei at 8:52 AM on October 1, 2002

In other news;
copious amounts of alcohol greatly increase your chances with the opposite sex; researchers studying behaviors at a fraternity party found that the men were more likely to go after the women who were drunk, rather than those who had the sense to stay clear of their fraternity house altogether.

Seriously, this is a study about habits in a nightclub! Are these truly a core sampling of the population?

If you are not attracted to someone because they wear glasses, then I feel sorry for you.
posted by hotdoughnutsnow at 8:52 AM on October 1, 2002

A quick concurrence with allpaws. Guys with glasses, mrrrawwwr! I just hope my 20/20 fiance grows nearsighted with age.... (sigh).

BTW, am I the only one noticing that the big, clunky glasses that gave everyone fits of self-hatred when they were young have become kinda fashionable? There seems to be a, "Hey, I'm so confident that I can even wear these" vibe going on out there. Which again reinforces that at the base of it, in many cases it's about the attitude, not the eyewear.
posted by clever sheep at 8:55 AM on October 1, 2002

Of course MeFi's apparent love of the bespecacled ones could be down to the geek quotient herein...
;-)
posted by i_cola at 8:57 AM on October 1, 2002

This debate reminds me of the quote from (the very attractive) Tina Fey on SNL a few years back:

"MSNBC reporter Ashleigh Banfield, now in Pakistan covering events there, has cut her hair short and died it brown in order to go undercover in the male-dominated country. Take it from me, Ashley: If you think having brown hair and wearing glasses will keep men from noticing you.. you are right. "
posted by jonson at 8:57 AM on October 1, 2002

I think if these girls had nice glasses, it wouldn't matter so much. However, if they have huge plastic-rimmed glasses circa 1979, then perhaps. :D
posted by animoller at 8:59 AM on October 1, 2002

GirlswithGlasses and TwistedLens
~both via memepool~

As a guy that wore glasses for years that recently switched to contacts, I can attest to the fact that chicks dig either. It is a confidence thing. When I wear my Buddy Holly's chicks dig them because I wear them like I mean it.
posted by geekyguy at 9:04 AM on October 1, 2002

My husband swears he loves me in my glasses. which proves what I've always suspected: that glasses on women are hot, if the woman is hot to begin with.

Ahem--in the eye of the beholder, of course. My youth with four eyes was a lonely one, and the day I showed up to school with my first pair of contacts was the first time in my entire life that a male, not closely related to me, complimented my appearance. The impression that made on me could not have been stronger.

I suspect that a decade or so of experience at styling my hair and makeup and clothing to improve my appearance, combined with marriage in a community property state, has a huge influence on how attractive my husband finds me when I change into my glasses at night.
posted by padraigin at 9:21 AM on October 1, 2002

I can honestly say my wearing contacts has made absolutely no difference in my attractiveness. Maybe it's me.

Nah.
posted by tommasz at 9:21 AM on October 1, 2002

Glasses on girls are very sexy. It gives them that "I could take these off, let down my hair, and ravage you" look.

Thats what I'm talking about! I couldn't have phrased it better myself. The fact that in the past I've had women take off their glasses, let down their hair, and ravage me, has really left me with good psychological impressions of the whole situation.
posted by phidauex at 9:21 AM on October 1, 2002

"...but it's a damn sight easier to pull without glasses"

I wouldn't think it would be necessary to see it in order to pull it. I've often pulled it in the dark.

What?

Oh. Never mind.
posted by mr_crash_davis at 9:28 AM on October 1, 2002

I'm so goddamn sexy that I have to wear glasses. In fact, I wear gigantic black horrific glasses with awful fake painted-on googly eyes just to prevent women from launching themselves at me on the street in paroxysms of helpless lust. It's not an easy life.
posted by Skot at 9:29 AM on October 1, 2002

I lurrrve me a guy with glasses.
posted by triggerfinger at 9:31 AM on October 1, 2002

Glasses on girls are very sexy.

I definitely agree, in general--my last girlfriend wore glasses sometimes, and she looked great in them--but it depends on the glasses and it depends on the girl.

Now, women in hats, that's the good stuff.
posted by kirkaracha at 9:36 AM on October 1, 2002

Only hats, Kirkaracha?
posted by onhazier at 9:49 AM on October 1, 2002

kirkaracha: What about hats on beds?
posted by Ljubljana at 9:53 AM on October 1, 2002

I have only dated men with glasses, and married a man with glasses. But back when I was single, in a fit of rage over the apparent shallowness of the opposite sex (hey, I said APPARENT), I bought myself a pair of Better Living Through Chemistry frames. Big, black, plastic, square. I can't tell you how many compliments I have gotten in the last 6 years on these. I was a faithful contact wearer, but that did noooo good. I et my big, ugly glasses, I get married. Who knew?g
posted by oflinkey at 9:59 AM on October 1, 2002

My youth with four eyes was a lonely one, and the day I showed up to school with my first pair of contacts was the first time in my entire life that a male, not closely related to me, complimented my appearance. The impression that made on me could not have been stronger.

I had precisely the same experience, and even though it was 25 years ago, I still think I look "better" without glasses. And it doesn't matter that nothing in my adult life has ever justified that belief. Ah, how childhood lingers . . . .
posted by JanetLand at 10:15 AM on October 1, 2002

Who needs to find a mate out at a bar when we have the Internet!

/ sarcasm :)
posted by LinemanBear at 10:17 AM on October 1, 2002

If the removing glasses won't work, you can still try stealing her dad's cologne. (from the same website)
posted by falameufilho at 11:22 AM on October 1, 2002

And if the glasses don't work, I beam them flirty witticisms with my ipaq.
posted by gsteff at 11:34 AM on October 1, 2002

Count me among those who say this "study" is nonsense. Show me a similar study where they take a bunch of people who don't wear glasses and have low self-esteem, sit them down with someone who knows glasses, and have them get help selecting a pair that goes with their face and their personality. Then put them in a situation in which they're comfortable to begin with...who knows what kind of club this is, what kind of music, what kind of people go there? If it's the Viper Room, I may believe it; if it's the Hotel Cafe, I don't. I wear glasses, and most girls I go out with tell me that they actually look for guys with glasses. Put glasses on a guy who has never worn them before in his life, send him into a bar and tell him to pick up girls, and of course in most cases he's going to do worse, just because he hasn't had time to get comfortable with his new image. Geesh.
posted by bingo at 12:17 PM on October 1, 2002

Researchers also found that contact-wearers in bookstores, coffee houses, art galleries, and college philosophy classes suffer from a higer rate of having their eyes gouged out by passers-by.
posted by nathan_teske at 12:58 PM on October 1, 2002

That Jiminy Glick makes my knees weak.

I envy Jiminy Glick...and this is why...
posted by jonmc at 1:14 PM on October 1, 2002

Only hats, Kirkaracha?

Well, I was thinking of hats as accessories, but only hats is fine, too.

What about hats on beds?

Sure!
posted by kirkaracha at 1:21 PM on October 1, 2002

Late with this, but I always preferred Velma over Daphne.

I think the glasses were part of it.
posted by jmcmurry at 1:46 PM on October 1, 2002

chicks + glasses == sexy.
posted by delmoi at 9:07 PM on October 1, 2002