Women's competition with one another

Well, I had a tutorial all set and ready to go but when I published it all of my pictures went away and it's really not cooperating and I don't know how to fix it right now so I guess this is a good time for me to share an article from my Allure magazine that I thought was interesting.  It's from the February 2011 magazine (the one with Jennifer Aniston on the cover).  It's called "The Sexy-Clothes Urge" by Lois B. Morris (page 79).  Since I cannot find a link to this on their website, I'll type out what it says.

  "Women prefer to buy revealing, seductive clothes and accessories on the few days a month during which they are most likely to become pregnant.  At the University of Minnesota's Carlson School of Management in Minneapolis, Kristina M. Durante, a psychology researcher, and her colleagues tested 269 women (who were not taking oral contraceptives) both when they were ovulating and when they were not, asking them to select ten fashion items among several online.  During the fertile phase of the menstrual cycle, women chose more sexy items than when they weren't ovulating- and when they saw photographs of attractive women, sexy choices escalated among ovulating women, peaking when the beautiful women in the pictures were said to live nearby.  Attractive women in a fertile woman's immediate environment constitute an unconscious threat, the researchers explain.  In contrast, pictures of attractive men sparked interest in sexy pictures regardless of ovulation- indicating that fertile women's extra effort to enhance appearance is driven by competition with women rather than simply the seduction of men, Durante says."

If you didn't feel like reading all of that, basically it says that when a woman is ovulating, she is likely to dress sexier if she knows an attractive woman lives nearby, suggesting that perhaps women are more driven by competition with one another as opposed to just getting a man's attention.

So what do you think??  Do you think women put in extra effort when there are other women around even if there aren't any men?  Do you find yourself competing with other women if there aren't any men around?

I think there's always a certain competition between women.  I haven't ever had problems with women but I know a lot of women complain about not getting along with other women "because they're jealous" (ahem... Bad Girl's Club).  But I think that we, as women, should be able to appreciate the beauty in one another and be able to tell one another when we think they are beautiful without feeling threatened by that beauty.  I know when I walk through the mall, I see women and think, "if only I looked like her..." and I'll start comparing myself to them, which does nothing good for me and it can almost start to create jealousy in me and I'll find myself starting to dislike this girl who I don't even know just because she's prettier, or skinnier, or funnier than I am.  I just take a step back and appreciate whatever that quality is about her that I find attractive as opposed to feeling jealous about it and that makes a WORLD of difference.  I think that's part of the reason that I don't have hard time with women because I take the step back and if I think you're pretty, I'm going to tell you.  If I like your hair, or your nails, or your eyelashes, I'll tell you because I know how nice it is when a random person gives you a compliment, how that can make your day.

I challenge you to compliment a random woman on something that you find beautiful about her.  Let me know how it goes!