What do Jennifer Lopez, Serena Williams, and Fergie have in common? Each has voluptuous curves that men salivate over. Nowadays, through the utility of fMRIs, science has been able to measure that men are more attractive to women who have voluptuous curves, more mathematically being a hip to waist ratio of about 0.7, and more modernly being known as a badonkadonk. Before I comment on the science, here’s a crash course on the etymology of the work badonkadonk of which I’m “modestly” familiar with (I’ve na a 10 minute speech about the etymology of the word on two separate occasions; the first oration was a mandatory public speak assignment, the second oration was an optional exercise but necessary during the graduate-school orientation to impress my incredibly attractive, geologically-enthused orientation leader…..and it worked).

The term badonkadonk increased in frequency of use following Missy Elliot’s millennium hit “Work It” in which she boasts, “Keep your eyes on this ba bump a bump bump, and see if you can handle this badonkadonk…donk.”Five years after Missy’s hit single, some crappy country singer and his even crappier song “Honky Tonk Badonkadonk” popularized the use of the term. Interestingly enough, a pseudo-scientific British investigator (technically an observer) “evaluated” hundreds of women and used a subjective scaling system and an objective mathematical calculation to conclude that a ratio of 0.8 is equivocal to the most perfect badonkadonk. Unfortunately, I can no longer find this investigation since the Wikipedia entry of badonkadonk has considerably changed. Regardless of the lost of this coveted mathematical derivation, a balanced rating of bodacious butt curves, bouncability, and firmness is what make men incredibly attractive to JLo, Serena, and Fergie……and my ONTAP leader to me (I wonder if my derived formula is still hanging in his room and/or cellar, ask him for the formula).

ResearchBlogging.orgAs for science, this study is certainly more objective, through the use of actual body measurements and neuroimaging, and may catalyze the emergence of an entirely new subfield of human sexual behavior: What Men Want. I imagine S ‘s hairdo isn’t one of them (but I know S ‘s “hot, juiced, muscle guidos” are what women want. This reciprocal attraction is mentioned within the opening lines of the paper:

“Variations in men’s facial (e.g., symmetry, masculinity) and body (e.g., shoulder-to-hip ratio) morphology are related to women’s ratings of attractiveness. Specifically, women tend to rate more symmetrical and masculine faces , and higher SHR[1] as attractive during fertile phases of their menstrual cycle and for short-term mating partners[2,3,4,5,6,7,8]”

Work It!

Steven M. Platek, Devendra Singh (2010). Optimal Waist-to-Hip Ratios in Women Activate Neural
Reward Centers in Men PLOS One, 5 (2)