@kumarchandan6d69·5dPsychologists paired strangers for a conversation. Afterwards, each person rated how much they liked their partner, and how much they thought their partner liked them.
How accurate were they? Vote, then open the comments for the answer.
For men 18 and over.
The answer is in the reply below. Vote first, then open it for the research.
@kumarchandan6d69·5dIf you could work on only one thing for the next 30 days, which would it be?
Vote, then reply with one thing you've already tried that didn't work, so the next man can skip it.
Not sure which to pick? The leverage map in the free Ascend Manual shows what moves your looks most, and how soon you'll see it.
For men 18 and over. General education, not medical advice.
@kumarchandan6d69·5dWhen researchers asked people to rate men's bodies, how strong a man looked explained more than 70% of the differences in attractiveness. Strength and leanness are the biggest levers you control, so a glow up starts with your body, not with a jawline trend.
Where to start this week
Find your numbers. Estimate your calorie needs with the Mifflin-St Jeor equation, then correct the estimate with your own weekly weigh-ins.
Train the V-taper. Three sessions a week built on shoulders, back and chest, adding weight or reps as you get stronger.
Get enough protein to keep your muscle while you lose fat.
Then fix what people notice next: skin, hair, style and photos.
The Looks Protocol turns all of this into a 12-week plan, with your targets, the training programme and a home version. The free Ascend Manual shows where your looks stand today.
The Looks Protocol · Get The Ascend Manual
Source: Sell, Lukaszewski and Townsley, Proceedings of the Royal Society B, 2017. For men 18 and over. General education, not medical advice.
@kumarchandan6d69·5dMost looksmax advice online is useless, dangerous, or both. The Ascend Manual is the honest version: what actually moves your looks and your love life, with the research behind every claim.
Start with your Ascend Score: ten questions, a hundred points, and every point is a habit you can change this month. Then the leverage map, the myth autopsy, the height truth, what attraction research says, and a 7-day start.
It's free.
For men 18 and over. General education, not medical advice.
Starting with a ten-question score is clever, because people act on a number way faster than on a long guide. Does the score update as you make changes, so you can track progress?
@kumarchandan6d69·5dThree looksmax trends with millions of views, against the evidence.
Mewing. The American Association of Orthodontists says it "lacks scientific backing" and lists risks including loosened teeth, a misaligned bite and speech problems. The British Orthodontic Society says there is "no scientific evidence" that it changes the shape of the face.
Bone smashing. A 2026 study counted 2,518 social-media mentions, with an estimated reach of about 32 million people. We found no study showing it improves a face. Hitting your own face is how faces get injured.
Height pills. Growth plates usually close by about 18, and any growth after that is usually an inch or less. Once they close, you stop growing taller.
What works is less exciting and far more visible: losing facial fat, heavy stubble, photos taken from at least 5 feet away, and standing at your full height. You're tallest in the morning: over a day, people lose about 19 mm of height as the spine is loaded, and 54% of that loss happens in the first hour after getting up.
The free Ascend Manual takes apart five trends like these and gives you what to do instead of each one. Get The Ascend Manual
Sources: American Association of Orthodontists, January 2024; British Orthodontic Society, May 2025; Grillo et al., Journal of Stomatology, Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery, 2026; Cleveland Clinic; Tyrrell et al., Spine, 1985. General education, not medical advice.
@kumarchandan6d69·5dSearch "dark psychology" and you'll find negging, push-pull, love-bombing and "making her chase". The pitch: be cold, unpredictable and a little cruel, and she'll be hooked. Here's what the research found.
Dark traits help with flings, not relationships. In a study of 224 people, narcissism, psychopathy and Machiavellianism went with short-term mating, not long-term relationships.
Playing hard to get backfires. It made people want someone more but like them less, and only when they were already committed to that person. Otherwise it lowered both.
Warmth works. A partner's responsiveness (understanding, validating, caring) increased desire, more so for women.
Manipulation needs a mask, and nobody can keep one on for months. It filters for the wrong people, and every tactic is a lie about who you are that you then have to keep up.
Chapter VII of the free Ascend Manual explains why it fails. The Attraction Playbook has a field guide to seven tactics (love-bombing, negging, hot and cold, breadcrumbing, jealousy games, guilt trips and gaslighting) so you can spot them when they're used on you, with the honest move that beats each one.
Get The Ascend Manual · The Attraction Playbook
Sources: Jonason et al., European Journal of Personality, 2009; Dai et al., Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 2014; Birnbaum et al., Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 2016.
@kumarchandan6d69·5dAmong recent online daters, 54% of women felt overwhelmed by the number of messages they got, while 64% of men felt insecure because they got few or no messages. Women filter fast, and photos are the filter.
What Hinge found in its profile data
Men smiling without showing teeth got 43% more likes.
Sports photos got 75% more likes.
Sunglasses cut likes by 41%.
Selfies were 40% less likely to get a like.
There's a reason selfies lose. A photo taken 12 inches from the face makes a man's nose look about 30% wider than one taken from 5 feet away.
The fix costs nothing: a friend, outdoor shade, 5 feet of distance and no sunglasses. It's day 7 of the free Ascend Manual.
Sources: Pew Research Center, February 2023; Hinge profile data reported by Business Insider, April 2017; Ward et al., JAMA Facial Plastic Surgery, 2018.
