A study by a team of psychologists and scientists at University College London has found that men who drive sports cars are more likely to have small penises. “In this experiment, we manipulated what men believed about their own penis size and found out that, especially for older men, feeling that they have [a] relatively small penis caused them to increase their desire for luxury sports cars,” said the new study, published as a preprint in PsyArXiv, which aimed to see if there really was a link between sports car ownership and perceived penis size.
This study may be a little embarrassing for those who have luxury cars in their garage, as it is bound to create notions about men owning luxury cars and their penis size. Here are the numbers of samples taken for the research and inferences drawn.
Sample Size and Research
First off, the researchers started with a pool of 200 English-speaking males between the ages of 18 and 74 (five were eventually excluded from the study “for failing attention checks”), who were then made to believe the experiment was studying the ability to remember facts, while shopping for products. One of these “facts” was about the average size of a male penis: Some were given a smaller number, which would theoretically make them feel good about their number, such as that the average penis size was 10 cm (4 inches) or smaller than it truly is, leading them to place themselves in the “well endowed” category.
Others were given a higher number, which could make them feel less good about themselves. For example, if they were told that the average size of a man’s genitalia is 18 cm, which is 7 inches or bigger than it actually is, they would think that their unit is smaller than average.
After seeing this skewed statistic, the men were asked to use a sliding scale to rate how desirable one of six sports cars was, from not desirable to very desirable.
“We increased our male participants’ desire for sports cars when we made them feel they had a relatively small penis,” said Professor Richardson, University of London.
Inference
They found that participants were more likely to rate their interest in buying a sports car highly if they’d been presented with information intended to make them feel insecure about the relative size of their package. The effect was most noticeable in participants over the age of 29. Their positive responses to sports cars were more than the statistically expected variance, which suggests a link and not just a coincidence.
The Bottom line
Whether or not to draw a conclusion regarding this research, one thing is sure: this is going to create a lot of buzz and memes on social media, centering on male ego. The automotive industry will never acknowledge such a study as it will depreciate their income flow. This amusing and interesting discovery is bound to make some noise!