Figuring out whether or not someone is interested in you is no easy task. Hell, sometimes it’s hard enough to figure out if you’re interested in them.
“Check to see if their pupils are dilated,” says one pick-up advice website. “If she doesn’t reply within the first 37 minutes, she’s not interested bro,” says another.
But next time you’re at a bar chatting up that cute brunette, forget the cheesy pick-up lines and the bro-science dating advice: psychologists say that if someone is attracted to you, they’re more likely to find you funny and laugh at your jokes (even if they’re terrible).
The study, published in the Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin journal, also confirmed that women who aren’t attracted to you (in other words they want you to leave them alone) won’t even crack a smile at anything you say, even if you’re funnier than Kevin Hart.
“Both sexes were more likely to initiate humour and to respond more positively and consider the other person to be funny when initially attracted to that person,” researchers say.
Just the thought of approaching a woman is enough to make some men quiver in fear, let alone having the pressure to crack a joke and attempt to make them laugh.
But what makes it such a successful technique is that you can gauge attraction in seconds and don’t have to spend a cent.