When it comes to women’s footwear, men have high expectations. Research by Université de Bretagne-Sud in Lorient, France confirmed that men act in a women’s favor more if she’s wearing high heels.
The four-part study used various testing experiments. In one experiment, a 19-year-old woman wore the same clothing while asking males on the street to participate in a survey about gender inequality. The only difference is that in one part of the experiment she wore high heels, and in the other wore flats.
The experiment found that 83 percent of men stopped when the woman wore heels, but only 46.7% of men stopped when she was dressed in flats. When women were tested with the same experiment, they were about equally likely to stop regardless of what was on the surveyor’s feet.
In another experiment, a woman dropped her glove while in the street, once while in heels and once while in flats. Men were 50 percent more likely to pick the glove up if the woman were wearing heels.
Nicolas Guéguen, one of the study’s researchers said women’s heel height exerts a “powerful effect” on men’s behavior. He added, “Four times we observed that men more easily displayed social interaction with a woman wearing high heels. It was found that men, but not women, accepted a survey request more often as soon as the heels of the female interviewer increased. Simply put, they make women more beautiful.”