Why Women Compete With Each Other: The Science of Female Rivalry, Flirting, and Attraction
Thursday, October 9, 2025.
Every woman knows her. You’re at a party, scanning the room, when Zoe appears—leaning just a little too close to your date.
You don’t know if you want to throw your drink or ask her where she got her concealer.
A new study by Merrie, Krems, and Byrd-Craven (2025) says your instincts aren’t wrong.
Rivalry runs on two key ingredients: intent (flirting with your guy) and capacity (being hot enough to pull it off).
Evolutionary psychologists call this groundbreaking. Women call it Tuesday.
What Makes a Woman a Romantic Rival?
In the lab’s favorite fantasy, you’re at a wedding with a man named Jacob. (It’s always Jacob, never Gary.)
Enter Zoe. Sometimes she’s attractive, sometimes not. Sometimes she flirts with Jacob, sometimes she doesn’t.
Result? Flirting Zoe is a threat even if she looks like she fell out of a bargain bin at Target.
Attractive Zoe? Still threatening, but in a “keep your enemies closer” way. Women wanted her as a friend—if only to keep an eye on her.
When Zoe showed up in a short dress and red lipstick, everyone agreed: she had both intent and capacity.
Men rated her highest. Women rated her most dangerous. As PsyPost put it, Zoe’s wardrobe was basically a social alarm system.
Is Flirting More Threatening Than Beauty?
Here’s the twist: it’s not beauty that drives female aggression—it’s behavior. Intent (flirting) is the bigger red flag than lipstick.
Pretty women get suspicion and maybe cautious friendship. Flirty women, no matter how they look, get hostility. In other words: you don’t need good cheekbones to cause bad trouble.
Do Hormones Make Women More Competitive?
Before you blame Zoe’s heels, consider your hormones.
A 2023 study found women with high testosterone and low cortisol tend to trash rivals more viciously, while those with high testosterone and high cortisol are extra sensitive to rivals’ attractiveness and dominance.
Sometimes it’s not Zoe making you twitchy. It’s your endocrine system staging a coup.
Why Do Women Gossip About Each Other?
Direct aggression is kinda messy and low class.
Gossip is cleaner. Reynolds (2018) found women pass along negative info about rivals to damage reputations.
And Reynolds (2025) showed gossip phrased as “concern” (“Bless her heart, I just worry about her choices”) is even more effective.
Female rivalry runs less on catfights and more on social demolition disguised as empathy.
Do Women Compete and Cooperate at the Same Time?
Yes. Rivalry doesn’t erase friendship—it complicates it. Cassar, Rigdon, & Said (2022) argue women manage a constant tension: cooperation when alliances are useful, competition when mates are at stake. And Kark (2024) shows that in workplaces, women calculate when to compete based on context and backlash.
In other words, rivalry is chess, not a street brawl.
The Rivalry Playbook: Five Rules Women Already Know
Intent Trumps Beauty. Flirting is scarier than cheekbones.
Hormones are Sometimes Puppeteers. Sometimes your cortisol picks your rival for you.
Rivalry Escalates in Whispers. First lipstick, then gossip, then exile.
Allies Matter. Better a pretty friend than a pretty enemy.
Ambiguity is armor. Looking good without trying too hard keeps you under the radar.
FAQ: Female Rivalry, Attraction, and Competition
Do women always see attractive women as rivals?
Not always. Sometimes attractive women are useful—as allies, frenemies, or the one you call when you need help zipping up a dress. Beauty alone doesn’t guarantee rivalry. It’s beauty plus intent that makes the alarms go off.
Why do women gossip about rivals?
Because you can only throw so many martinis before security intervenes. Gossip is the socially acceptable Molotov cocktail. As Reynolds (2018) showed, it’s efficient. And the “bless her heart” version (Reynolds, 2025) lets you torch a reputation while looking compassionate.
Is flirting more threatening than beauty?
Yes. An average-looking flirt is more destabilizing than a silent supermodel. Beauty is tolerated if it behaves. Flirting is intolerable, even in sweatpants.
Do hormones really affect rivalry?
Absolutely. Hernández-López, Pita, & Ortiz (2023) found testosterone and cortisol decide whether you shrug Zoe off or plot her downfall in the group chat. Sometimes it’s not her lipstick—it’s your glands.
Does female rivalry exist in older women or other cultures?
Not in the same way. These studies were done on American undergrads—the same people who think boxed wine is acceptable. Rivalry looks different when the stakes involve mortgages or cultures where eye contact counts as foreplay. But the formula—intent + capacity—travels well.
Do men notice female competition?
Here’s what’s fascinating, almost never. Men often mistake rivalry for “bonding.” They’ll watch women calculating outfits, motives, and seating choices and think: they’re getting along great. Spoiler: they are not.
Is female rivalry always bad?
No. Rivalry also fuels motivation. Without it, there’d be no lipstick industry, no Pilates boom, no “hot girl walks.” Rivalry is unpaid labor in stilettos that helps keep Limbic Capitalism thriving.
Why Science Calls It Groundbreaking (and Women Call It Tuesday)
The study calls this a new model of rivalry.
But in practice? Women have been running this math since junior high: Does she want him, and can she get him?
Science may dress it up with cortisol assays and DOI numbers, but for most women it’s already a lived experience.
Rivalry isn’t irrational—it’s social calculus.
Groundbreaking? Please. It’s Tuesday.
Be Well, Stay Kind, and Godspeed.
REFERENCES:
Cassar, A., Rigdon, M., & Said, N. (2022). Competition and cooperation among women: A review. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, 377(1842), 20210132. https://doi.org/10.1098/rstb.2021.0132
Hernández-López, K., Pita, R., & Ortiz, F. (2023). Hormonal modulation of intrasexual competition and mate guarding in women. Adaptive Human Behavior and Physiology, 9(3), 311–326. https://doi.org/10.1007/s40750-023-00244-3
Kark, R. (2024). Competition among women: A review of organizational evidence. Journal of Organizational Behavior, 45(2), 152–169. https://doi.org/10.1002/job.2691
Merrie, L. A., Krems, J. A., & Byrd-Craven, J. (2025). Who is a mating rival? Women track other women’s intent and capacity to compete for mates. Evolutionary Behavioral Sciences. Advance online publication. https://doi.org/10.1037/ebs0000376
Reynolds, T. (2018). Gossip as a strategy in female competition. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 78, 195–206. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jesp.2018.04.008
Reynolds, T. (2025). “Bless her heart”: Gossip phrased with concern as reputational sabotage. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 112, 104460. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jesp.2024.104460