Sex differences in misperceptions of sexual interest have been well documented; however, it is unclear whether this cognitive bias could be explained by other factors. In the current study, 1,226 participants (586 men, 640 women) participated in a speed-dating task in which they rated their sexual interest in each other as well as the sexual interest they perceived from their partners. Consistent with previous findings, results showed that men tended to overperceive sexual interest from their partners, whereas women tended to underperceive sexual interest. However, this sex difference became negligible when we considered potential mediators, such as the raters’ sociosexual orientation and raters’ tendency to project their own levels of sexual interest onto their partners. These findings challenge the popular notion that sex differences in misperceptions of sexual interest have evolved as a specialized adaptation to different selection pressures in men and women.

中文翻译：

---

社会性取向和男性将自己的兴趣投射到女性身上可以解释性兴趣误解的性别差异

对性兴趣的误解中的性别差异已被充分证明；然而，尚不清楚这种认知偏差是否可以用其他因素来解释。在当前的研究中，1,226 名参与者（586 名男性，640 名女性）参与了一项速配任务，他们评估了彼此的性兴趣以及他们从伴侣那里感受到的性兴趣。与之前的研究结果一致，结果显示男性倾向于过度感知伴侣的性兴趣，而女性倾向于低估性兴趣。然而，当我们考虑潜在的中介因素时，这种性别差异变得可以忽略不计，例如评估者的社会性取向和评估者将自己的性兴趣水平投射到他们的伴侣身上的倾向。