Survival of the wittiest

Forget the big car, the big heart, or even the big house. The quickest way to a woman's heart is the ability to poke fun at yourself.

... "Many studies show that a sense of humour is sexually attractive, especially to women, but we've found that self-deprecating humour is the most attractive of all," said Greengross, whose Dissing Oneself: The Sexual Attractiveness of Self-Deprecating Humour, will be published later this month in Evolutionary Psychology.

But this kind of humour is not to be confused with lacking in confidence, he warns. "It is a risky form of humour because it can draw attention to one's real faults, thereby diminishing the self-deprecator's status in the eyes of others," the New Mexico University scientist said. So what we want is a man who can poke fun at himself, but who knows his own mind, too.

... "Self-deprecating humour can be an especially reliable indicator, not only of general intelligence and verbal creativity, but also of moral virtues such as humility," according to Mr Greengross.

Source: The Irish Independent