The idea of the “trophy wife” – when a rich man marries someone younger and more attractive – is seen as old-fashioned.
But new research suggests these days those rules of attraction work both ways, as wealthier women also tend to have more attractive husbands, according to some measures.
And such forces continue long into the marriage. In fact, when either person’s income rises, their partner is more likely to stay slim, a US study has found.
“The beauty-status exchange lives on – but it has evolved and now it is equal,” said Dr Joanna Syrda, an assistant professor at the University of Bath, who carried out the research.
Other studies have previously supported the idea that men with money or status can marry women who are more attractive than them.
The new study is the first to investigate if a link between money and attractiveness persists after people have got married.
Dr Syrda used data from a long-running US household study, where figures were collected on married couples’ individual incomes, as well as their height, weight and other lifestyle aspects.
They were used to calculate people’s body mass index (BMI), a measure of weight in relation to height, and whether they were classed as overweight, obese or a healthy weight.
“BMI is an imperfect proxy for attractiveness. It cannot capture the whole complexity of how we see another person. But research shows that it does correlate,” said Dr Syrda.
Using data from nearly 3,700 straight couples tracked for 20 years, the analysis showed that if a man’s income rose in relation to his wife’s, she was likely to stay slimmer.
And if a woman’s income compared with her husband’s rose, he was also likely to avoid weight gain.
The effects were small but significant. A 10-percentage-point increase in the husband’s income share was linked to a 20 per cent fall in his wife’s odds of being overweight.
The link was slightly weaker for the husbands’ weight. A 10-percentage-point increase in a wife’s share of the household income was linked to a 13 per cent drop in her husband’s odds of being overweight.
It is unclear whether people were putting more effort into staying slim consciously or unconsciously. But the analysis also found people were more likely to be physically active if their partner’s income was higher.
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“It may be about feeling some kind of pressure [if your income] is either above or below your spouse,” said Dr Demid Getik, an economist at Durham University, who was not involved in the study.
He added: “The fact that you find this general pattern doesn’t mean that it’s going to apply to everyone all the time.”
The study was published in the journal, Economics & Human Biology.
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