What do men wearing sandals, chasing after ping pong balls and having long finger nails have in common? They give many women ‘the ick.’
The ick is a modern slang term to describe a sudden feeling of disgust or repulsion toward someone you had previously been attracted to because of something they did or said.
Though it seems like an affliction of the modern women, scientists suggest the ick might be more than just a dating trend – it might be an evolutionary survival tactic.
A growing body of research, which shows female primates are more easily disgusted than their male counterparts by food, potential mates and even neighbors, suggests women evolved to be more easily grossed out to protect themselves.
In the wild, these female animals avoid mating with partners that show signs of syphilis and are less likely to eat food infected with common bacteria because they are ‘grossed out,’ which protects them from getting sick.
This helps them avoid illnesses during pregnancy and child rearing – times when both baby and mother’s immune systems are particularly susceptible to life-threatening illnesses.
Male animals are much less selective, Cécile Sarabian, a cognitive ecologist from the Institute for Advanced Study told National Geographic.
In the wild, she observed female macaques examining and cleaning their food before consuming it, and sometimes skipped a meal when their food was contaminated. Meanwhile, males ate without concern, whenever they could.
Though it might seem like disgust is all about pickiness, scientists think it evolved to keep people safe from things that might hurt them or make them sick.
For example, if people weren’t disgusted by poop, they might be less hygienic when it comes to their sanitation practices, which means more people would come into contact with pathogens found in feces like cholera and typhoid.
Tara Cepon Robins, a biological anthropologist at the University of Colorado, told National Geographic: ‘This is what disgust is all about- we’re hardwired to be grossed out by things that have harmed people in the past.’
All primates show some signs of disgust, but until recently, scientists weren’t aware there may be a gender gap.
Dr Sarabian’s observed differences in male and female macaques in the wild.
While preparing their foods, females would clean their morsels while males would eat without much consideration.
Later, when testing the animals, they found the girls were less likely to have parasites called geohelminth, which come primarily from poop.
Dr Sabrian highlighted older research, which she was not involved with, in Gorillas that illustrated similar sex differences.
Female western lowland gorillas, found in central Africa, are particularly sensitive to the visual signs of a bacteria called Treponema bacterium, which causes a rash on the face.
This is the same bacteria that causes syphilis.
And while people think being ghosted by their Tinder date at a bar is bad, when female gorillas see that a male within their pack has these facial rashes, they sometimes opt to leave their group behind entirely.
Then, they head out on the road to find a better pack to settle in with.
Similarly, in 2019, researchers at the Leibniz Institute for Primate Research, showed female olive baboons are more likely than male baboons to avoid sex when they or their partner show signs of syphilis.
So, the researchers concluded, the female baboons were exhibiting ‘overall higher choosiness’, and therefore were less likely to get sick with an STI.
And the ick extends beyond the animal kingdom. The disgust response has been demonstrated in humans.
In one study, researchers showed volunteers photos of dirty situations or asked them to imagine things like stepping in poop with bare feet or finding a bug in food. They then asked volunteers to rate their disgust on a numerical scale, Robins explained.
In western societies, women scored higher than men on their disgust ratings.
Dr Robins’ personal research focused on groups of indigenous people in Ecuador, and found those who responded with more disgust to a hypothetical situation were less likely to have bacterial or viral illnesses.
Put simply, being grossed out protected them from getting sick, whether they were male or female.
This could be especially important for women, since they are responsible for rearing children, whose fragile immune systems are particularly susceptible to food-borne illnesses.
Psychologists have suggested a number of reasons so many women seem to get the ick from potential partners.
Texas-based clinical psychologist Naomi Bernstein agreed evolution might play a role.
She said certain physical icks, like having chapped lips or poor coordination, could be subconscious signals that someone’s genes are less ideal than their competitors.
She told Time: ‘That feels embarrassing, which means it might not be acceptable by a larger social group — which, coming back to evolution, was essential for human survival’.
It’s also possible the ick is purely psychological – driven by a desire to protect yourself from being hurt, emotionally, New York-based clinical psychologist Phoebe Shepherd told Time.
It’s common, she explained, for people to react to unfamiliar things with fear or disgust, out of a sense of protecting oneself. Dr Shepard said: ‘I do wonder sometimes, if someone’s feeling like they have the ick, is it actually their body saying, “This is unfamiliar.”‘
If you’re feeling the ick, and you’re pretty certain it’s not for a biological reason, then Todd Baratz, a bi-coastal therapist told Time you can try to beat the feeling of disgust.
If you focus on other, more positive aspects of your date, and feel it in your heart to try again, then you might find the ick doesn’t matter as much to you.
He said: ‘Dating is an experiment, and sometimes you have to run experiments multiple times to see what happens.’
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