Frogs make irrational mating choices

It's not just you. It's your frog too.

Give a female frog two potential mating options, an attractive frog and an unattractive frog, and she’ll pick the attractive frog nearly every time, but if you throw in a third, less attractive frog, all bets are off.

In a study published Thursday in Science, researchers showed that the Central American túngara frogs can be tricked into picking "ugly" mates -- even when their prince charming is just within hopping distance.

The scenario, known as the “decoy effect,” is similar to the way in which a consumer might behave when purchasing a new car. A customer may opt to buy a cheap car with poor fuel efficiency instead of a more expensive car with good fuel efficiency. But the custumer might reconsider when a salesmen presents a third option that is the most expensive and also has good fuel efficiency. The customer won’t choose the third option, but he might instead choose the second most expensive.

For more information check out the published article at Science Magazine