The authors convincingly argue that romantic relationships are more desired by men than by women. A testable implication of their account is that women should be more demanding than men when specifying the minimal characteristics of a satisfactory mate: if men benefit more than women from a relationship, then men would reasonably be quicker than women to accept a mate with fewer desirable features.

Results from existing studies support this possibility. For example, a classic 37-culture study of more than 9,000 individuals found that women were more prone than men to characterize elements of the 18-item list of features of a mate as “indispensable” (Buss et al., Reference Buss, Abbott, Angleitner, Asherian, Blaggio, Blanco-Villasenor and Yang1990). One potential interpretation of this result is that, because females derive less benefit from heterosexual relationships than males do, they may be more inclined to seek aspirational matches – what we refer to as “female pickiness.” An alternative explanation is that females are, on average, simply better romantic partners than are males. Here, females insisting on higher standards than males may reflect instead that, for example, the median female is a better relationship partner than is the median male, and thus that females seeking partners of equal quality will need to reject a disproportionately high proportion of the male population.

We see both of these possibilities as equally consistent with the target article: Wahring and colleagues compellingly argue that males derive more benefit from romantic relationships than females, but this could plausibly reflect extra-relationship circumstances of males (e.g., fewer close friends), within-relationship dynamics (superior average female performance as a relationship partner), or some combination of the two.

To the best of our knowledge, thorough explorations of the “female superiority” possibility remain to be performed. Existing research suggests that any plausible version of this account is unlikely to be simple. For example, while the elevated average female scores on agreeableness points to them being comparatively desirable as romantic partners relative to men, the elevated female scores on neuroticism point in the opposite direction (Weisberg et al., Reference Weisberg, DeYoung and Hirsh2011). Future work might attempt a comprehensive integration across the various characteristics that make one a desirable partner alongside studies of existing gender differences in those characteristics to evaluate how average gender differences across various traits do or do not help to explain the general observations of the target article. Barring this, however, studies of existing couples may be informative: previous research has found that whereas men and women showed similar standards in their relationships, women were better at meeting the man’s standards than men were at meeting the woman’s (Vangelisti & Daly, Reference Vangelisti and Daly1997). This points to “female superiority” as a live possibility accounting for elevated female standards.

However, “female pickiness” has its own line of support from studies of ideal partner personality. Heterosexual singles of both genders seek partners with superior traits – that is, higher scores in socially desirable directions – relative to their own self-reported personality traits. But a recent four-culture study found this tendency to be roughly twice as pronounced in females as in males (Liu et al., Reference Liu, Ludeke, Haubrich, Gondan-Rochon and Zettler2018).

One interpretive challenge is that genders plausibly differ in their degree of overstating their own positive qualities. Such differences appear unlikely to be large and are likely nuanced by features of the traits in question (such as their reflection of agentic or communal themes; Paulhus & John, Reference Paulhus and John1998). Nevertheless, men and women engaging in the same degree of aspirational mating with respect to personality will still plausibly differ, due to gender differences in self-enhancement, in the size of the discrepancy between their self-rating and their characterization of their ideal partner’s characteristics. Specifically, this discrepancy may appear smaller in men if they are more prone than women to overstate their levels of the characteristics in question.

However, studies whose methods escape this particular concern still point to elevated female pickiness: women have been observed to engage in comparatively more aspirational mating with respect to personality than men even when the participant’s own personality is indicated not by self-report but by ratings provided by their partner or by independent observers (Botwin et al., Reference Botwin, Buss and Shackelford1997).

In sum, studies of existing couples and of ideal partner preferences suggest that women may impose higher thresholds for partner acceptability due to both of the channels suggested above: females are, on average, plausibly superior relationship partners to males, and the lesser benefits females derive from heterosexual relationships mean females are, beyond their superiority as partners, plausibly pickier than males. This dual-path account aligns with the core claim of the target article: that men are more motivated to enter and maintain romantic relationships. If women require more from a relationship to justify their investment, then the observed gender gap in relationship motivation discussed by the target article may stem in part from these heightened thresholds.

These themes also point the way to promising extensions of the target article’s framework. Wahring and colleagues note that their theory may not fully generalize beyond heterosexual relationships. Indeed, a large international study including participants of diverse sexual orientations found that while heterosexual women had higher expectations for their ideal partner’s personality than heterosexual men did, this pattern did not hold across all groups: non-heterosexual women were not as uniformly demanding, and in some domains, non-heterosexual men had higher standards than heterosexual men (Valentova et al., Reference Valentova, Štěrbová, Bártová and Corrêa Varella2016). These results suggest that gendered patterns of relationship motivation may interact with sexual orientation – and that ideal partner preferences may serve as a productive lens for both testing and refining the explanatory power of the target article’s thesis across relational subtypes.