<p>All that matters is your looks, OP. If you’re good looking, most women won’t care about your nerdy and or boring personality and you will be successful. Conversely, if you’re not, no amount of personality cane make up for that. Harsh truth, but it’s reality. I’ve known some pretty socially clueless and anti-social “nerds” that had no shortage of attention from the opposite sex because they were good looking. I’ve also known charismatic and socially adjusted unattractive men that still managed to repulse women. </p>
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Well, all you did was list an array of negatives, so I think you are going to be lonely for a while. Your discomfort around people minimizes your chances to meet women socially, your choice of professions minimizes your chance to meet women professionally, and your attitude and appearance makes it unlikely that your few chance encounters will lead to anything.</p>
<p>You need to decide what is important to you. You have created a life that you like but that makes it extraordinarily likely that you will live it alone. If you do NOT want to be alone, then you will either need to make some changes or else hope for that one-in-a-million kind of luck that you happen to bump into someone who likes you more than anyone else they meet. You CAN make those changes, but you have to choose to make it a priority.</p>
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Women generally do not focus on appearance to the extent that men do. Things like personality, creativity, and resources also often have a notable impact. This type of additional factors can impact perception of attractiveness. For example, in one study some groups of men were shown pictures of a woman in an expensive car, and some groups of men were shown pictures of women in a beater Ford. The men were then asked to rate the women’s attractiveness on a scale of 1-10. The type of car the women drove had no significant impact on the mens’ ratings. However, when the same experiment was done with women rating guys, the women rated the guys in the beater Ford as notably less attractive. Another study found that couples in which the woman was notably more attractive than the man had the best chance of happiness and a successful relationship. When the woman was less attractive, the man often felt like he settled and was unsatisfied. However, this effect did not occur with women. The author writes, “What’s interesting is that the wives’ own attractiveness didn’t seem to matter — they were more affected by their husbands’ satisfaction, When their husbands were happy, the wives were happy, and when their husbands were unhappy, they were unhappy. They didn’t seem as responsive, or sensitive, to how attractive their husbands were.” I expect the root of these differences relates to evolutionary biology differences. Women generally place greater emphasis on the factors that relate to a good long-term partner than men do, and men generally place a greater emphases on the factors related to a good genetics for a short-term partner.</p>
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<p>All this proves is that gold-diggers would date a man they had no attraction to. Most women are not gold-diggers, and the types of women who are will likely be cheating on their significant other with men they are actually attracted to. Personality means nothing, and there is no study you can link that can demonstrate women can be more forgiving of unattractive men with good personalities. Personality confers no evolutionary advantage to one’s offspring, and now that more and more women are becoming educated and earning salaries that either rival or exceed their significant others’, status and financial security are completely seen as useless qualities in men by most women these days.</p>
<p>I feel as engineers and scientists, we need to only consider those things that are quantifiable and useless abstractions such as “personality” should have no bearing in this conversation at all. You also fail to mention that one’s perceived personality is often a function of their relative attractiveness. For example, I’m sure you’re familiar with the overstated but generally true cliche of the charismatic but unattractive man being dismissed as a “creep”, while the attractive man who should be creepy by every definition of the word will come off as “confident” to most women. </p>
<p>Studies have shown that women may pick a lesser attractive man that provide more financial or emotional support over a more attractive man with lesser financial or emotional support for a long-term commitment. It is known women crave stability and security. </p>
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Do that and you will be throwing away useful data. Personality can be broken down into quantifiable terms: attentive, honest, loyal, providing, confident, etc. Define your terms your previously ambiguous term “ambiguous” is now defined. It has been done in studies. </p>
<p>When given men who have the levels of stability and security, women may pick the more attractive man. </p>
<p>Now…@bschoolwiz, I’m weird and masculine, aye? </p>
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The previously referenced study involved asking study participants to rate mens’ attractiveness on a scale of 1-10 based on a picture sitting in a car. They were not asking about dating, just rating how attractive the guys were.</p>
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There are hundreds of studies showing women desire particular personality traits in a partner, and males with those traits appear more attractive, many of which focus on the evolutionary basis for desiring those traits. One of many possible example studies is discussed at <a href=“BBC News - Dating study: women prefer 'men who are kind'”>http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/8505641.stm</a> . The author states,</p>
<p>*“We found that women showed a strong preference for relationships with altruistic men in this study, even though the clues to altruistic traits were fairly subtle. This suggests that women are attuned to generosity, and that altruism serves a purpose in mate selection. If a man is kind and generous towards others - even strangers - then there’s a good chance that he’d make a good and generous parent.” *</p>
<p>My engineering-student D doesn’t notice looks much. e.g., when she first got together with her BF I asked if he was taller than she is (5’10.5") and she didn’t know! But she can go on and on about the books they’ve been reading and discussing together. :x </p>
<p>Magma55: I would wish you good luck, but this thread has taken a somewhat trollish bent and I cannot help but notice that you seem to be lurking under a bridge.</p>
<p>If the OP does not return, I am not sure that there is anything else productive to be said.</p>
<p>Lol, mihcal1. Goes to show that engineering girls are different from each other. (Whodathunkit!) </p>
<p>If I tell my mom I saw a guy, I know plenty of details to paint her a picture. 
I’m extremely observant. </p>
<p>When D was looking at schools to attend for engineering where the guy/girl ratio was around 80/20. She was talking to one of the girls at the school. The girl quipped when it comes to dating it can be rough for the guys, for girls the odds are good but the goods are odd. :-)</p>
<p>Self confidence + not fixating on finding a girl = increased chances finding a girlfriend</p>
<p>Generally speaking, the guys who had the least success finding women in college almost always had low self confidence, and tended to dwell too much on not having a girlfriend. If you tell yourself you don’t need one and that you can live without one (that it’s a luxury, not a need), you actually stand a better chance of finding a girl… reducing the anxiety is key to building your confidence. </p>
<p>Just go out and talk to them like they are guy friends. Try and shut out the fact that they are females. Fix up your appearance as well… find out what makes you comfortable with yourself and roll with it (at the very least, be clean!)</p>
<p>Try to address your weight issue with better diet and exercise. That will almost certainly help with the girls and even if it doesn’t it’s important for your lifelong health. A perception that someone doesn’t take care of themselves can be a turnoff for many people. Seeing that someone is taking charge of this would make a more favorable impression, I think.</p>
<p>What is a girl?</p>
<p>Most engineering guys don’t go for engineering girls. Engineering girls are the last resort for engineering guys.</p>
<p>[Insert more random arbitrary statements]</p>
<p>“I find most Engineering girls to be weird.” - How funny. I’ve sometimes heard female engineering students comment, “The odds are good, but the goods are odd”. </p>
<p>Really… the bottom line is that engineering students include a variety of students… just like most other majors. On average, engineers tend to lean more toward being studious and introverted… But lots of variety in the mix. Enjoy meeting students (in engineering and other departments too) from both genders. Maybe you will date, maybe not… but better than just sulking. </p>
<p>Great ideas: Look for the future nurses, get physically healthy, get involved in activities outside your major… I’m thinking activities like fun improv theater and exciting sailing might suit you (good to meet people, sailing has a technical element, smart people tend to be involved in both…). Even if there’s no immediate girlfriend, in the long run, if you develop your life well, you’ll have good pickin’s in your early 30s. </p>
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I’ve heard the following saying about Engineering/SV women: “The goods are odd and the odds are worse.”</p>
<p>I find it hard to believe that smart women are intrinsically ugly or strange. </p>
<p>I think American society on the whole does a lot to pull social and/or attractive people into activities and groups that emphasize those traits, with a result that the “average” STEM major is going to be a little less attractive and a little less social than the average non-STEM major.</p>
<p>BUT…</p>
<p>Those are averages and the difference is not really that huge. There are some unattractive and unsocial people in other fields, and some beautiful and charming people in STEM fields. Because some of those people who are attractive will say “I don’t WANT to be a cheerleader!” or “I DO want to be a cheerleader, but I have to fit it in around math club!” Anyway, you aren’t able to even consider ALL engineering girls, there are just too many, and the distribution at any one school can skew better or worse than the mean.</p>
<p>And all this is subjective anyway, so why get flipped out? Realistically, you, by dint of appearance, personality, habits, and proximity, are romantically attractive to a certain population of other people. Maybe it is a large group, maybe it is quite small. You do things that change the size and composition of that group - hit the gym, go out more, perhaps stop making generalizations about engineering women, etc. There are things you can do. And they better be real, long term changes if you want that other person to stay with YOU for a real long time.</p>
<p>And your romantic prospects are the intersection of that dynamic group with another one: the group of people to whom you yourself are attracted. In many ways, this group is not up to you - I certainly never found a way to change what I like - but you still have to be aware that you are looking at this intersection and can try pushing your boundaries a little. The OP has indicated that he is going to be attractive to a VERY small group of people, and that he himself is attracted to a VERY small group of people, and is then upset that these two miniscule groups don’t overlap! You need to do something - waiting for someone to just come along does NOT work.</p>