According to a new psychological study, men may have a tendency to take the term “tramp stamp” literally. In the grand tradition of sexual signalling (think cleavage, bare collarbones, short skirts, and the colour red), the French study done by psychologist Nicolas Guéguen found that the majority of men believe that women with tattoos are more sexually promiscuous.
In France, a select 12 per cent of women sport ink somewhere on their bodies, and previous studies have found that men and women place many unjustified attributes on tattooed women. In one, test subjects were asked to judge two different versions of a photo of a 24 year old woman, one where she had a black dragon tattoo on her upper left arm, and one where she didn’t. When she had the tattoo, she was judged to be less honest, generous, intelligent, and artistic than when her skin was bare.
Even though most studies of this kind found that men considered tattooed women less attractive, Guéguen found they were also more likely to try to sleep with them. The question then was, is that because they are more promiscuous? Or were men barking up the wrong tree? Guéguen headed to the beach to find out.
In the first part of his experiment, a female research assistant was asked to lie on her stomach on the beach while reading a book or magazine, an activity chosen because roughly 85 per cent of women who hang out at the beach solo do exactly that.
All the different female assistants in the study wore the exact same red bikini, but in some trials they also displayed a temporary tattoo of a butterfly on their back. The tattoo was roughly ten and a half by five centimeters in size, and was chosen because it was deemed a common design for women to get.
Once the target was set, a male observer who was in on the study timed how long it took from the moment the woman laid down to when a man made contact with her, either by saying “hello” or asking her a question. The study carried out this interaction 220 times total; 110 with the tattoo, and 110 without.
In the end, the women who wore the tattoos were solicited by men 23.67 per cent of the time, while their bare counterparts were only approached 10 per cent of the time. Men at the beach were also quicker to come up to a woman with a tattoo, taking an average of only 23.61 minutes, versus 34.78 minutes to approach an uninked woman.
The second part of the experiment also involved the woman laying down, but targeted finding out what the men on the beach thought of her. Once she was in place, the male researcher who was observing would go up to a man within ten meters of the woman and ask what he thought his chances of getting a date with her, and the probability of having sex with her on the first date. In that test, male beachgoers thought their chances of going on a date or having sex with the woman were significantly higher when she had the tattoo.
From these results, Guéguen concluded that women get tattooed as a way to enhance their sexual appeal to men, and to attract more suitors. In the same vein, men are drawn to women who show more sexual receptivity; in this case, in the form of a tattoo.
For Dr. Elise Chenier, an SFU history professor whose focus is gender and sexuality in the 20th century, the answer to these findings is simple: it’s about class. “Tattoos, especially for women, are associated with being lower class . . . and women that are working class, lower class, are assumed to have fewer moral scruples than middle class, respectable women,” she explained.
Chenier likened the popularity of tattoos for showing an anti-establishment attitude to the long hair and loose cotton of the 70s, or lipstick in the early 20th century, which was only worn by prostitutes at the time. “It was Elizabeth Arden who sold lipstick and rouge as a health product,” said Chenier. “It was only by marketing it as a health product that it lost its stigma as being something only sex workers used.”
She was also quick to point to the fact that while tattoos may be a rarity in France, they are much more prevalent in North America, and may not convey the same sexual signal here. “Tattoos are becoming more and more normalized, it’s no longer just sailors and prisoners. Especially in Vancouver, it’s a very very trendy thing to do,” she noted. “[The study] only tells us about France. I wonder if the findings would be different in Vancouver.”
