cheerleader effect 2.0

i don’t watch “how i met your mother” nor do i encourage it. it’s really not a good show. maybe because it’s too predictable; barney chases tail, marshall hates his life, ted is a loser. i do however somewhat subscribe to what barney calls the cheerleader effect. basically, it’s when a group of women are hot, but only as a group. when you look at them individually, their hotness dissipates dramatically.

i think there’s some truth to it and i’m sure that you’ve experienced it at some point in your life. you see a group of four girls and you think, man, they’re so hot! especially the girl in red. she’s a freaking nine! i must investigate further…

then you take a closer look and realize that the only reason your brain thinks the girl in red is hot is because her score comes from a tally of the entire group.

2 + 2 + 2 + 3 = 9

this phenomena is very discouraging, comparable to the monet effect (girl looks good from far away, but when you get up close…) and the asian girl syndrome (asian girls look good from behind because they are generally petite and have nice, flowing black hair. the syndrome is even more prominent in the winter since they all wear the same black wool, slim-cut, button-down coat).

today, i fell victim to the cheerleader effect. i was studying in the bookstore when a pack of girls walked in and took the table behind me. i was in a groove so i only caught them from the corner of my eye; pink shirt, yellow blouse, nice jeans, green skirt. that was all my brain needed to see.

immediately, my brain was telling me that a group of hot girls were sitting behind me. unfortunately, i picked a bad seat. my back was to them. so was i going to verify this? i can’t just turn around and blatantly check them out.

god bless technology.

specifically, god bless gchat and the geniuses at apple that brought you the imbedded webcam.

i checked my gchat buddy list to see who i could trust to survey the scene. i turned the camera on, changed the tab to my fantasy baseball team and “went to take a phone call.” yes, there’s the little green light that goes on when you use the camera, but that was a chance i was willing to take. i was just praying that i wouldn’t return my table to find that the gmail tab had come to the front and my friend would be staring right at the girls. worst. nightmare. ever.

luckily, it didn’t happen. what was even better was that my friend got such a good look that he offered to buy dinner and meet me at the bookstore to eat. all i had to do was guard the table and pray that the girls didn’t leave.

my buddy arrived with food in hand. giddy look on his face. i decided to change positions so that i could face the girls. now it’s my turn to take a good look. hell, i waited patiently and even outlined 100 pages of administrative law for this opportunity. i earned it.

i sat down and began my meal.

one word; disappointment. the chicken was ridiculously dry and the string beans were overcooked. the sauce was brown, cold, and tasteless. food trucks. never again. for now.

as for the girls, at first glance i was blown away. of course, nicest day of the year and the pretty girls come out to play, emerging fresh and lovely from the bowels of van pelt.

then i took a closer look…

nice jeans was truly a stunner. like backstreet boys - i don’t care who you are, where you’re from, don’t care what you did, as long as you love me - instant marriage proposal material. plus, nice jeans. good style.

her friends? they were ok at best.

pink shirt had a butterface. yellow blouse had ugly, clunky wedges and a forgettable face. green skirt had the opposite of clear skin.

that got me thinking, why at first glance did i think they were all hot? the only thing i could come up with was that maybe it’s not the sum total of the group being assigned to one girl, but rather the average score of the entire group.

in the group of four example above (2, 1 , 2, 3) the group total was 8. the idea is that your brain assigns that total to the prettiest girl in the group. but there’s no way that a self-respecting mind would trick its master into thinking that a 3 was an 8. i don’t care how you enron those numbers, it’s not happening.

what makes more sense is that an averaging of those scores occurs. thus, in order for your mind to think that the entire group was hot, you at least need one pretty girl.

in my bookstore case, nice jean’s super high score brought up the average of the group. by herself she was at least a 8.5, the rest of her group hovered around the 3-5 range.

8.5 + 3.75 + 4.25 + 4.5 = 21/4 = 5.25 (yes, i used a calculator because i haven’t taken a math class since junior year of high school. yes, that was more than a decade ago. yes, i am old)

5.25 is respectable. i think most people in the world fall between 4 and 5.5. very few are so ugly that you want to throw yourself off a building and the same goes for super pretty girls that you would propose to on the spot. 5.25 is worth a second look while a 2 is definitely not.

i submit this as cheerleader effect 2.0.

look, if they’re all ugly, you know it. there’s no way you’re going to trick yourself into thinking that they are pretty because they are in a group. you need at least one outstanding, or at least significantly above average girl to bring the average of the group up. Otherwise you won’t want a second look.

to girls: if you are within the 4-5.5 range of mediocrity, hang out with at least one pretty girl

to guys: if you’re chasing after the 7s, 8s and 9s, don’t be fooled by the 4-5.5s that stand next to them