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The connection between being poorly endowed and loving sports cars (or big trucks) is a very common trope.
The first time I remember picking this up on screen was when the Genie (Robin Williams) in Aladdin made the joke about ‘phenomenal cosmic powers and eeetty bitty living space’. You know the trope, it’s everywhere.
A recent study published in PsyArXiv titled ‘Small Penises and FastCars: Evidence for a Psychological Link’ has picked up a lot of attention almost immediately. Here is the abstract:
In this experiment, we manipulated what men believed about their own penis size, relative to others. We gave them false information, stating that the average penis size was larger than it in fact is, reasoning that, on average, these males will feel that relatively and subjectively their own penis was smaller; compared to those told that the average penis size was smaller than true average. We then asked them to rate how much they would like to own a sports car. These facts and questions were buried amongst other items giving information and asking for product ratings, so that our hypothesis was masked from participants.
We found that males, and males over 30 in particular, rated sports cars as more desirable when they were made to feel that they had a small penis.
Sorry, fellas, if you’re into fast cars then there’s a chance you have a tiny dingdong. We know this because the scientists said so.
Over on Twitter, people are telling themselves and raging at the journal for publishing this…
Is this what we should study as a scientific discipline? Doesn't this kind of work contribute to the general dismissal of science? Aren't there better ways to use the tax payers' money?
— Yoav Kessler (@yoav_kessler) January 10, 2023
Guess body shaming is totally fine as long as you make sure to choose your targets carefully 🙄
— Sander Koole (@SLKoole) January 11, 2023
As pointed out on Barstool, this trial was diabolical. They really put these subjects through the psychological grinder. And honestly, I’m a bit confused how they got approval/funding for this study given the overt manipulation on display. Check this out:
In the key trial, they were given a fact about the average penis size and then asked to rate a sports car. In the small penis condition, they were told that the average size was 18cm, larger than the true average. We reasoned that this would make the average male feel that they are relatively poorly endowed, compared to the large penis condition, in which we told them that the average size of other penises was 10cm. They then rated the desirability of a sports car.
It really is remarkable how unabashedly cruel and manipulative this psychological experiment was. I studied Psychology for years and for the life of me I cannot recall reading about a study like this that intentionally misled participants in such a way.
This study is different from a survey from 2014 that also found a connection between sports cars and small penises. That study found that 42% of guys who drive sports cars have small dingalings.
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