What is the Evolutionary Purpose for Male Pattern Baldness

[wookster]

Do most women of child-bearing age find balding men attractive in some way? If so, in what way?

What is the survival advantage of male pattern baldness?

Baldness seems to imply a lack of virility or a weakness of some sort. I don't see how that attribute of weakness could survive the evolutionary process. Sure, the impressions of weakness can be offset by a highly muscular physique or positive attitude but using the idea that first impressions are important, implies that the same muscular physique or positive attitude with a full head of hair would be even better still.

Other primates go bald so perhaps there is an elusive attractiveness about baldness that appeals to potential mates? The stability factor? Bald humans appear to be less threatening and less virile than their more hairy bretheren.

I suspect that there is no survival advantage to male pattern baldness like there is no survival advantage to heart disease or diabetes. male pattern baldness is a disease condition that humans have.

...hypotheically speaking, of course :ninja:

 

[heyitsthatguy]

Cavemen could run away from sabor tooth tigers quicker because there heads were more aerodynamic.

 

[Costanzo]

I don't think male pattern baldness was seen as a weakness in the past.
Perhaps it's our preoccupation of body image, and youth - that regards male pattern baldness as a weakness. I mean, my grandfather or even father never worried about having a six pack of abdominals.


I dont think "beauty" was that important before.
I mean, most guys arent good looking, we're ugly as f***.
And we settle with a normal-looking partner.

 

[wookster]

I don't think male pattern baldness was seen as a weakness in the past.
Perhaps it's our preoccupation of body image, and youth - that regards male pattern baldness as a weakness. I mean, my grandfather or even father never worried about having a six pack of abdominals.


I dont think "beauty" was that important before.
I mean, most guys arent good looking, we're ugly as f***.
And we settle with a normal-looking partner.

I see your point. When it comes down to the bare bones nitty gritty aspects of survival, hair no longer is that important to other people.

Still, baldness does not make someone look more healthy. So there does not appear to be a survival advantage to male pattern baldness. Baldness could be a side effect of some other condition though, like the necessity of cooling off a larger human brain...? consequently, too much hair would be a detriment...

 

[Fundi]

It was thought in the past that bald heads obviously get more sunlight, and produce more Vitamin D as a result. This turned out to be false.

 

[heyitsthatguy]

I don't think male pattern baldness was seen as a weakness in the past.
Perhaps it's our preoccupation of body image, and youth - that regards male pattern baldness as a weakness. I mean, my grandfather or even father never worried about having a six pack of abdominals.


I dont think "beauty" was that important before.
I mean, most guys arent good looking, we're ugly as f***.
And we settle with a normal-looking partner.

speak for yourself im beautiful

 

[Musician]

Why does everyone think that evolution has any type straight line followed purpose?

If you want my opinion, balding is just the continuing process of shedding not needed hair, just like the great amounts of hair that covered our bodies when we were nothing more than apes.

Hair protected us from climate, but we moved into caves and eventually houses.

 

[Boondock]

Wikipedia says:

One theory, advanced by Muscarella and Cunningham[4], suggests baldness evolved in males through sexual selection as an enhanced signal of aging and social maturity, whereby aggression and risk-taking decrease and nurturing behaviours increase. This may have conveyed a male with enhanced social status but reduced physical threat, which could enhance ability to secure reproductive partners and raise offspring to adulthood.

In a study by Muscarella and Cunnhingham [4], males and females viewed 6 male models with different levels of facial hair (beard and mustache or none) and cranial hair (full head of hair, receding and bald). Participants rated each combination on 32 adjectives related to social perceptions. Males with facial hair and those with bald or receding hair were rated as being older than those who were clean-shaven or had a full head of hair. Beards and a full head of hair were seen as being more aggressive and less socially mature, and baldness was associated with more social maturity. A review of social perceptions of male pattern baldness has been provided by Henss (2001) [5] .

Regardless of the cause, one thing to take heart from is that, evidently, people with male pattern baldness managed to successfully managed to mate throughout history. Otherwise it wouldn't be so bloody common anymore - it isn't some "freak" genetic trait. This might tell you that, as much as people care about hair, and say it's really important to them, there are other things that matter as well.

 

[vauxall]

What is the survival advantage of male pattern baldness?

To defend the and promote the American way of life, of course!

 

[s.a.f]

Its punishment for something done in a previous life.

 

[Bryan]

I think the "brain-cooling" theory of balding makes as much sense as any other theory I've heard.

 

[barcafan]

Wikipedia says:

One theory, advanced by Muscarella and Cunningham[4], suggests baldness evolved in males through sexual selection as an enhanced signal of aging and social maturity, whereby aggression and risk-taking decrease and nurturing behaviours increase. This may have conveyed a male with enhanced social status but reduced physical threat, which could enhance ability to secure reproductive partners and raise offspring to adulthood.

In a study by Muscarella and Cunnhingham [4], males and females viewed 6 male models with different levels of facial hair (beard and mustache or none) and cranial hair (full head of hair, receding and bald). Participants rated each combination on 32 adjectives related to social perceptions. Males with facial hair and those with bald or receding hair were rated as being older than those who were clean-shaven or had a full head of hair. Beards and a full head of hair were seen as being more aggressive and less socially mature, and baldness was associated with more social maturity. A review of social perceptions of male pattern baldness has been provided by Henss (2001) [5] .

Regardless of the cause, one thing to take heart from is that, evidently, people with male pattern baldness managed to successfully managed to mate throughout history. Otherwise it wouldn't be so bloody common anymore - it isn't some "freak" genetic trait. This might tell you that, as much as people care about hair, and say it's really important to them, there are other things that matter as well.

Well women can be carriers and not express the trait themselves, to put a wrench in your statement.

 

[OverMachoGrande]

"One theory, advanced by Muscarella and Cunningham[4], suggests baldness evolved in males through sexual selection as an enhanced signal of aging and social maturity, whereby aggression and risk-taking decrease and nurturing behaviours increase. This may have conveyed a male with enhanced social status but reduced physical threat, which could enhance ability to secure reproductive partners and raise offspring to adulthood.

In a study by Muscarella and Cunnhingham [4], males and females viewed 6 male models with different levels of facial hair (beard and mustache or none) and cranial hair (full head of hair, receding and bald). Participants rated each combination on 32 adjectives related to social perceptions. Males with facial hair and those with bald or receding hair were rated as being older than those who were clean-shaven or had a full head of hair. Beards and a full head of hair were seen as being more aggressive and less socially mature, and baldness was associated with more social maturity. A review of social perceptions of male pattern baldness has been provided by Henss (2001)"

This could explain the Estrogen Dominace theory. I also heard of a theory that male pattern baldness is caused by a Vitamin-D Defiency (your hair falls out in order for you to absorb more sunlight). Reminds me of a song called Solar Sex Panel by a band called Little Village.

 

[cuebald]

Why do migraines exist? Surely there's no survival advantage for them having passed down (how the f*** did anyone with bad ones survive at all?) yet they have passed down...
It has only passed down because enough bald people managed to reproduce (or, reproduced before they went bald) to keep the lineage going.

 

[Boondock]

Why do migraines exist? Surely there's no survival advantage for them having passed down (how the f*ck did anyone with bad ones survive at all?) yet they have passed down...

No, they're completely different. Migraines aren't a genetic trait in the same way that male pattern baldness is - even if some people may have more genetic susceptibility. They often result from causes such as TMJ, or chemical toxicities, deficiencies and so on, which once solve resolve the whole problem. Not to mention for most they're a once-in-a-month thing.

male pattern baldness is a trait which has consistently passed on through generations, and even seems to exist in some primates.

 

[ali777]

Bryan, someone else, and I already had this conversation.

I go with the "signaling maturity" thing. Hair thinning is a response to androgens, which are essential for sexual maturity. Thinning hair is a visual proof that we are sexually mature and that we are no longer unstable teenagers.

 

[Innermind]

I have some questions for anyone pondering this....


Up until about a hundred years, people got married teens or early 20's, which was considered late.
When does male pattern baldness really come about?

Up until about hundred years ago, people had children in their late teens early 20's...(20 was considered late).
When does male pattern baldness really come about?

Up until about a hundred years ago...
If a much older bald man married a younger girl, do you think she would really have any say in the matter?

male pattern baldness was never really selected for by women up until about somehwere in the fist half of the 20th century, sort of. It really has become an issue in the last couple decades. Before this modern era, people got married and had children young(teens, early 20's) because by the time they reached 30 their life was pretty much over.

If a man was older, it was because he could afford to be older, and families would marry off their daughters to these men for security reasons. If he was fat, bald, ugly, it didnt matter as long as he could support the family and increase status. The industrial evolution changed everything, and as living conditions improved and life span increased people could have children and select mates later, a luxury us balding men cant appreciate as much as others.

This is why male pattern baldness exists today.

When we were monkeys, those with larger forehads were considered dominant. I believe this is when male pattern baldness was actually selected for by females....but then time moved on.

 

[vauxall]

What is the Evolutionary Purpose for this thread?