Several studies support the notion that interracial mate preferences are gendered. For example, white women are more likely than white men to state a white racial preference (Sakai and Johnson, 1997) and report more disapproval from family and friends than white males when they date nonwhites (Miller et al., 2004). White males are also more likely to date nonwhites than their female counterparts (Tucker and Mitchell-Kernan, 1995). In speed dating experiments, women have also been shown to place more emphasis on selecting a same-race partner than men (Fisman et al., 2006).This likely comes as surprise to exactly no one who doesn't base their worldview on what they see on television or in film. The stereotype of the "mudshark" is overweight white-trash, which is amply supported by the results of this study.
As previously mentioned, women are more likely than men to state a racial preference. Consistent with prior research, they are also more likely to prefer to date whites only; among those with an expressed preference, approximately 64% of white women prefer whites only compared to only about 29% of white men. Accordingly, white women are more likely then white men to exclude certain racial groups from dating consideration. Over 90% of white women who state a racial preference prefer not to date East Indians, [ sorry Razib!] Middle Easterners, Asians, and blacks. White men with stated racial preferences, in contrast, only prefer not to date one group at levels above 90%: black women.
Education is not a significant predictor of Asian exclusion, but college-educated females and males are more likely to exclude blacks than those with only high school degrees. This finding is consistent with racial–economic exchange theories predicting that less educated white women would be more open to minorities of lower racial status.
One of the most striking findings is that white women who describe themselves as slim, slender, athletic, fit or average are nearly seven times as likely to exclude black men as dates as women who describe themselves as thick, voluptuous, a few extra pounds, or large. This finding is consistent with racial–beauty exchange theories in that white women who do not meet conventional standards of beauty (in terms of having a thinner body type) are more open to dating black men, who may be considered a lower status group.
Slight detour: There are two types of stereotypes. The first is pushed by the mainstream media, particularly Hollywood, as a sort of social engineering. This is why your television and movie screens are filled with depictions of black doctors, black computer geniuses, and wise black female judges. Virtually every criminal is white, and mudsharks are attractive and intelligent.
But these artificial stereotypes run headlong into the second, natural form of stereotype. This is stereotype as pattern recognition. There was no secret, racist council that got together and arbitrarily decided that East Asians would be stereotyped as small, quiet, and studious. This is simply what one gathers after one has oberserved a number of Asians for any length of time. Likewise, there was no arbitrary decision to stereotype blacks as loud, unintelligent, and violent. These stereotypes formed naturally in the minds of keen observers, completely independent of each other. These stereotypes continue to exist despite the media's best attempts at stamping them out because we see them repeated time after time in our everyday lives.
Back to mudsharks. Living in a large city, I see a fair number of interracial couples. The overwhelming majority of the white women in these couples are fat. The ones who aren't fat appear to be "wiggers", and almost always look as if they are on their way to score some crank, or possibly crack. The interracial dating study above validates my pattern recognition: athletic, educated women refuse to date blacks at a much higher rate than do less-educated, less-fit women.
And here's more fuel for the stereotype fire: From James Edwards comes the story of a white woman accused of drugging her 13 year-old daughter so that the mother's black boyfriend could rape and impregnate the daughter.
Another attractive, intelligent, and morally upstanding mudshark.
