In almost all animals, the female puts forth more energy and effort into raising children than the male. The more effort she expends relative to the male, the pickier she is about mating with him. We see that female animals select males based on two sets of traits; good genetic indicators and a willingness to help her out with raising the offspring. For an example, some female birds select a mate based on who can build the best nest. It's unlikely that this is a conscious decision. Instead, evolution selected for females who were attracted to the best nest building males, since the resulting offspring had a better chance of survival. The mechanism of this attraction is most likely some form of sexual arousal, if we are going with the most straight forward explanation.

There is evidence that this is true in human females as well. For instance, few people would argue that women don't swoon over celebrities. But what exactly is appealing about celebrities? Sure most of them are attractive, but women are attracted to even the uglier ones. What's appealing about them is their status and access to resources, which doesn't have much to do with genetic quality. Instead, status and access to resources has everything to do with being a good provider. So it seems that women are sexually attracted to at least some provider traits, unless we are going to start thinking of men like Keith Richards as beta bux.

If women are sexually aroused by some provider traits, then why couldn't they be attracted to all such traits? Wouldn't it be strange for evolution to select for women who found only some of the traits that led to better survival for her offspring as sexually attractive? This seems to be a complicated solution to a problem with a much simpler answer. Occam's razor and all that. The simpler solution is that women are sexually attracted to both good genetic quality and good provider qualities, because both of these improve her offspring's chance of survival. Isn't this almost obvious?

I think that this would be true even if women's sexual strategy is dualistic. Her sexual attraction changes based on her environment. If she is looking for a casual fling she finds one type of guy sexually attractive. If she is looking for a relationship she find another type of guy sexually attractive. We already know that female arousal is highly responsive and dependent on context, so this wouldn't be much of a stretch. If you are lacking in one area, you have to make up for it in another, but it's best to have a little bit of both.

This seems to fit better with what some women actually experience too. I am actually sexually attracted to beta men. Honest to God I am. This is the only type of man I've ever dated. I've talked to other women and they feel the same way. What women aren't attracted to is men who have a big deficit in one category or the other. We aren't attracted to fat men who play video games all day, because these men aren't good providers or good genetic quality.