New Study Reveals Interesting Link Between Men's Height And Divorce

Tall or short may affect more than just a man's suit size -- according to a new study it may also impact the success of his marriage.

Sociologists from NYU combed through data using the Panel Study of Income Dynamics (PSID) -- which has collected information on the same 4,500 families since 1968.

For the study, researchers analyzed data from 1986 -- the first year height was recorded -- through 2011 to determine if a man's height affected relationship dynamics. Men were classified as short (less than 66” in 1986; less than 67” in 2009), average, or tall (more than 73” in 1986; more than 74” in 2009).

Researchers also measured income, education and the height difference between spouses once the men were actually married. For example, in 1986, 92.7 percent of men were taller than their spouses; in 2009, 92.2 percent were taller.

From the data, researchers found major differences in relationship patterns between short and tall men.

Love lives of short men:

Short men were found to marry later in life than average or tall men, but were 32 percent less likely to divorce. They were also more likely to marry less educated and younger women. Once married, they did less of the housework and earned a much higher income than their spouse.

Why? The researchers hypothesize that because height is related to masculinity, short men may use other aspects of the relationship -- income, housework -- to demonstrate their manliness. "Short men may exchange their breadwinner status for less housework ... because a lower share of housework or a higher share of relative earnings allow short men to enact traditional gender ideals, thereby performing their masculinity in the absence of symbolic anthropomorphic differences," the researchers write in the paper.

Love lives of tall men:

Tall men were found to marry sooner in life, but were more at risk for divorce later on, as shorter men had more stable marriages. However, researchers note that the link between short men and stable marriages could be because they chose to marry later (or didn't have the option until later).

Tall men were also more likely to marry women closer to their age, and who were better-educated.

Why? "From the perspective of relationship exchange models, this indicates that the tallest men exchange their attractive attribute (height) for better-educated spouses, while short men are unable to do so," the researchers write.

It should be noted that this data suggests a trend which occurred from 1986 to 2011, and of course does not apply to all couples. However, it does shed light on an interesting topic.

As the researchers explain in the paper, "Marriage and divorce have implications for socioeconomic stratification and asset accumulation, our observed effects suggest that men’s height may indirectly affect their economic status and socioeconomic mobility through these demographic processes."

What do you think of the findings? Sound off below!

Why Tall Men Win

MensHealth.com

Napoleon was right to have a complex: We like our leaders tall. People prefer bosses and political leaders to be physically imposing, which is one reason why tall people push for leadership positions more often than their shorter counterparts, according to a pair of studies in Social Science Quarterly.

The two studies interviewed 467 college students about leadership abilities and asked them to draw an ideal leader next to an average citizen. Sixty-four percent of the students drew the leader as taller than the citizen. The second study quizzed students about their effectiveness as leaders and asked if they would ever seek out a leadership position. As height of the male respondent increased, so did his confidence in his leadership abilities.

It's OK, man - Tom Cruise is short, too, and he's a millionaire.

"People tend to ally themselves in groups with certain taller individuals," said study co-author Prof. Gregg R. Murray, professor of political science at Texas Tech University. "The taller individual then tends to dominate the group, which builds the taller person's confidence further down the road."

So what does that mean for the rest of us? The key is to mimic the confidence of tall people. Here's how:

Keep the tone of your voice steady. Murray advises watching a Larry King interview with a famous celebrity or politician. King often manipulated the tone of his voice to match that of his powerful subjects. The key is to keep your tone constant. Lowering it conveys embarrassment and meekness.

Stay on top of your workout. Evolutionary theory suggests that tall people earn our trust because their physical dominance makes us feel protected, Murray says. If you don't have the natural height advantage, you can still convey the illusion of height by making a simple adjustment to your posture. Follow these tips on how to carry your body.

Don't underdress. Appearance is everything. One way to gain the benefit of physical dominance is to look like you matter, says Murray. Easier said than done? Get the Men's Health Color Advantage and gravitate toward the shoes, pants and shirts that will help you naturally exude confidence.

Trust your abilities. "What our study really shows," Murray says, "is that people who feel qualified are more likely to put themselves out there and take a risk." It sounds like a no-brainer, but knowing you're qualified and performing like it are two very different things. Just follow the lead of the World's Richest and Fittest Guys. They'll teach you that taking a big risk can lead to huge dividends—regardless of height.
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Why Tall People Are Happier Than Short People

Damn you, tall people. They block your view at the movie theater. They're a pain to shop for: Who really wants to drag themselves to the Big & Tall to buy Uncle Lurch a pair of extra-long pants? They're the ones with better chances of becoming pro basketball players, or supermodels.

Squirts probably don't need any more reasons to envy their longer-limbed neighbors. Unfortunately, a new study just added to the indignity of short people. According to a paper from the National Bureau of Economic Research, both men and women who are above average height — 5 ft. 10 in. for males, 5 ft. 4 in. for females — report higher levels of happiness than smaller people.

Why Tall People Are Happier Than Short People

In the study, men who call their lives the "worst possible" are nearly an inch shorter than the average man. The women most down in the dumps are half an inch smaller, on average, than the average woman. Taller people say they are more content, and are less likely to report a range of negative emotions like sadness and physical pain. "Happiness is just one more thing that taller people have going for them," says Angus Deaton, a Princeton economist and co-author of the study, who stands a smug 6 ft. 4 in. (Full disclosure: I, too, am about 6 ft. 4 in., but I will refrain from mocking shrimps in this story.)

Why are tall people happier? According to Deaton's analysis, the result is linked to education and income. The study found that taller people tend to have more education, and thus higher income levels, than shorter people. It follows that the smarter, richer tall people would be sunnier than their vertically challenged compatriots. "Money buys enjoyment and higher life evaluation," says Deaton. "It buys off stress, anger, worry and pain. Income is the thing!"

To gain some real-world insight into these stats, I called the first smart short person I could think of, a friend named Milton Lee. Despite what these studies indicate, smart short people do exist. Milt, a graduate of the University of Pennsylvania, made a killing as a Wall Street trader in the 1990s, but quit finance to chase his dream of becoming a basketball coach. He has trained many NBA players, including this year's top draft pick, Oklahoma's Blake Griffin, and even landed an assistant coaching gig for the Los Angeles Clippers' summer-league team.

Despite giving up an healthy Wall Street income, Lee, who claims he's 5 ft. 9 in. but admits to being 5 ft. 8 in. when pressed, considers himself content. "I'm not totally buying it," he says of the study. "I'm below average height, and have above-average happiness." In his basketball work, Lee spends a lot of time around well-compensated human trees, and doesn't always see smiling faces. "There are plenty of NBA players who are absolutely miserable," Lee says. "They want more playing time, they feel underappreciated. Only a dozen or so guys feel that they are truly loved."

In his Wall Street days, Lee saw plenty of rich, happy short people and wealthy, depressed tall people. He does offer one reason why taller men might be happier. "Whenever I'm out with tall guys, they tend to get more attention from women," says Lee. "You never hear girls say, 'Hey, I'm really into short guys.'"

Lee directed me to one of the players he coaches, Coleman Collins, for the smart, tall guy's perspective. When I told him Lee questioned the findings, Collins, who is 6 ft. 9 in., wasn't surprised. "Short people are always ready to disagree," says Collins, who graduated from Virginia Tech when he was 19, after just three years, and played for the school's basketball team. He points out that he has many short friends. "Generally speaking, I've found that they are more likely to have a chip on their shoulder, more likely to have something to prove," Collins says.

Collins, now 23, supports the study's results. "I'm generally in a good mood," he says. "And based on the anecdotal evidence I've seen, tall people have a more pleasant disposition and are more easygoing. They don't have to make an extra effort to command attention. When they walk into a room, it tends to come naturally to them." Such recognition surely helps your self-esteem. If only it wasn't too late for you short people to have a growth spurt.
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Tall people 'lead happier lives'

The Telegraph

Tall people lead happier lives than their more vertically challenged peers, according to a new study which found that most miserable men are almost an inch shorter than average.

According to the findings, people who were taller were more likely to be positive about their life and were more likely to judge themselves as happy

Researchers found that shorter people tended to be more dissatisfied with their lot in life.

The study interviewed more than 450,000 adults about how they viewed their life.

The volunteers were asked to place themselves somewhere on a “life ladder” and asked about their emotions.

According to the findings, people who were taller were also more likely to be positive about their life and were more likely to judge themselves a happy.

Tall people 'lead happier lives'

They were also less likely to feel a range of negative emotions, including sadness and physical pain, although they were more likely to experience stress and anger, and if they were women, to worry.

Men who reported that their lives were the "worst possible" were in general more than eight tenths of an inch, or two centimetres, shorter than the average height.

Women who viewed themselves as "on the bottom step" on the life ladder were shorter than the average woman by half an inch, or 1.3 centimetres.

There was also a link between height and education, the findings, published in the journal Economics and Human Biology, found.

Men who did not finish secondary school were found to be half an inch, or 1.27 centimetres, shorter than average and more than an inch, or 2.54 centimetres, shorter than the average height of those who had gone on to graduate from university.

However, there was no such clear link when it came to women, with just small differences in height.

The authors of the report, from Princeton University in New Jersey, conclude that the link between education, income and height mostly explained the link with happiness and life satisfaction.

The data was taken from the Gallup-Healthways Well-Being Index daily poll of the American population.

The survey interviewed adults aged 18 or between January 2008 and April 2009.
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Taller People More Intelligent Than Shorter People?

Why are taller people more intelligent than shorter people?

The Scientific Fundamentalist PsychologyToday.com

In my previous post, I explain that men on average are slightly but significantly more intelligent than women, not because they are men, but because they are taller. But why are taller people more intelligent than shorter people?

The real answer is we don’t know for sure, but there are two possible explanations. First, both height and intelligence may be indicators of underlying health. According to this view, people who are genetically and developmentally healthier simultaneously grow taller and become more intelligent than those who are less healthy, producing the positive correlation between height and intelligence.

Why are taller people more intelligent than shorter people?

This is a plausible theory. In our paper, however, Reyniers and I produce evidence against it.In the analysis of the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health, we control for the respondent’s health, by using four indicators of health and producing a latent variable for health using principal component analysis in order to eliminate random measurement error. The association between height and intelligence does not diminish at all when we control for health. In fact, once we control for other demographic and social variables, health is not significantly correlated with intelligence at all; it actually has a nonsignificantly negative association with intelligence. So, at least in our sample, health is unlikely to be the common cause for both height and intelligence.

In our paper, Reyniers and I propose a second possible explanation. It consists of three separate mechanisms.

1. Assortative mating of tall men and beautiful women. Because height is desirable in men and physical attractiveness is desirable in women, there should be assortative mating between tall men and beautiful women (and short men and less beautiful women). Because both height and physical attractiveness are heritable, this will create an extrinsic (non-causal) correlation among their children between height and physical attractiveness, where tall people (both men and women) are more beautiful than short people.

2. Assortative mating of intelligent men and beautiful women. Because intelligent men tend to attain higher status, at least in the evolutionarily novel environment in recent history, and high status is desirable in men, and because physical attractiveness is desirable in women, there should be assortative mating between intelligent (and thus high-status) men and beautiful women. Because both intelligence and physical attractiveness are heritable, this will create an extrinsic (non-causal) correlation among their children between intelligence and physical attractiveness, where more attractive people are more intelligent than less attractive people.

3. Extrinsic correlation between height and physical attractiveness (produced by Mechanism 1 above) and extrinsic correlation between intelligence and physical attractiveness (produced by Mechanism 2 above) will create a second-order extrinsic correlation between height and intelligence.

We believe that this may be why taller people are more intelligent than shorter people. Another factor contributing to the seeming male advantage in intelligence is that taller parents are more likely to have sons than shorter parents. So, over many generations, more sons will inherit their parent' genes inclining them to be taller and more intelligent, and more daughters will inherit their parents' genes inclining them to be shorter and less intelligent. But, once again, the crucial factor is height, not sex.

In our paper, we present evidence for all of the crucial mechanisms: Taller people are on average physically more attractive than shorter people; physically more attractive people are on average more intelligent than physically less attractive people; taller people are on average more intelligent than shorter people; and taller parents are more likely to have sons than shorter parents. But the issue is far from resolved. While there is no doubt that taller people are indeed more intelligent than shorter people, the question of why this is so is one of the remaining puzzles in evolutionary psychology.
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Short Man Syndrome is Not Just a Story

It is said they are prone to bouts of aggression, showing off and keeping a close eye on their wives or girlfriends at parties.

Telegraph

Have Your Say: Have you encountered short man syndrome?

Vertically challenged men may argue that the notion of a "short man syndrome" is an unfair, inaccurate stereotype. However, scientists have now proved small men do make more jealous husbands and lovers than their taller, more relaxed counterparts. The findings could help explain why diminutive males from Napoleon Bonaparte and Benito Mussolini to Tom Cruise and Dudley Moore have on occasion been accused of overcompensating for a lack of physical stature.

Researchers found men around 5ft 4in tall were around 50 per cent more likely to fall foul of the green-eyed monster than those measuring 6ft 6in.

Tall and short women also showed more signs of jealousy than those of average height.

Short Man Syndrome is Not Just a Story

Prof Abraham Buunk, of the University of Groningen in Holland, said the findings on short man syndrome - also known as the Napoleon complex - make evolutionary sense, as tall men and medium-height women have greater success with the opposite sex. Taller men have previously been shown to get more replies to lonely heart ads, have more physically attractive partners, have higher wages and are more likely to have children.

In the latest study, highlighted in this week's New Scientist magazine, researchers questioned 100 men and 100 women in relationships about their feelings of jealousy and how interested they believed their partners to be in other members of the opposite sex.

Among men they found a linear correlation, with 5ft 4in men being scored an average of 3.75 out of six on a jealousy scale, and the men around 6ft 6in getting 2.25. The results among women were more complex, with those of around average height (5ft 6in) scoring lowest for jealously, at around three out of six. The shortest women in the study, who measured around 5ft, scored five on the scale, while the tallest, at 6ft, got an average of four.

The researchers also examined the specific characteristics of rivals that would make them jealous. Short men were, as expected, most jealous in the presence of powerful, tall, strong and rich potential rivals. However, female participants of around average height were more vulnerable to jealousy than others when confronted, not with very beautiful women, but with socially or physically powerful rivals.

Prof Buunk said: "As women of average height tend to be more fertile and healthy they would be less jealous of women with features signalling fertility and health such as physical attractiveness, but more jealous of women possessing masculine features such as physical dominance and social status."

Throughout the animal kingdom, larger males are more likely to win fights, are more dominant and are more likely to reproduce. A series of studies have shown taller men enjoy a range of advantages. In the 1940s, psychologists found tall salesmen were more successful than their shorter colleagues. University students asked to rate the qualities of men of varying heights said short men were less mature, less secure and less capable than tall men.

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Shorter Men Live Two Years Longer than Taller Men

The long and the short of it: "Vertically challenged men live an average of two years more than taller ones"
Being taller may be useful for changing a lightbulb or seeing over a crowd, but when it comes to living longer shorter men measure up best.

A study on the island of Sardinia has found that on average shorter men live for two years longer than their taller counterparts. The research which involved tracking 500 males born between 1866 and 1915 on the small Italian island backs up the findings of 12 previous studies.

Sardinians are statistically known to live longer than people in the rest of Europe. The study led by professor Poulain from Belgium and Dr Salaris from the University of Cagliari in Italy also found that men live as long as women in the municipality of Villagrande which boast the shortest population of the island’s 14 municipalities.

Size matters: A new study of 500 men on the island of Sardinia found that shorter men live on average two years longer than taller men

Scientists have previously observed that within a species, the smaller individual tends to live longer than the bigger one. This is illustrated by smaller dogs who live longer than medium and large size dogs. Smaller mice, rats, ponies and monkeys generally live longer as well. The smaller Asian elephant also lives longer than the larger African elephant.

The study also offered a number of other explanations for why smaller bodies tend to keep going for longer. These include lower DNA damage, greater cell replacement potential, higher heart pumping efficiency, decreased C-reactive protein and higher sex hormone binding globulin.

The scientists concluded that height makes up 10 per cent of a person's longevity profile and that regardless of height, anyone can extend his or her longevity by having a good nutritional diet, low body weight, exercise, good medical care, a positive and happy spirit, and good social relations.

Therefore, tall people still have the potential to reach 100 years under the right conditions.

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