Men's love affair with leggy women is a myth - research

Men don't lust after long-legged women after all, according to new research. While many women would do anything to have a supermodel physique, those of more average proportions can take heart. Men, apparently, don't hanker after girls with legs that go on forever.

Or at least new research suggests that men's love affair with lengthy ladies is just a myth and that they actually prefer them a little less leggy,the Herald Sun reports.

To pin down the most attractive legs, UK researchers asked more than 1000 men and women to rate a series of images of female bodies.

Sorry Elle but men don't find your perfect pins all that appealing, or so they say / Supplied

In each case the females' legs were lengthened or shortened to alter their leg-to-body ratio but their overall height stayed the same.

While most women surveyed thought men lusted after longer legs, the University of Westminster research found men preferred women of average height - where their legs accounted for half of their overall height.

The findings back up research earlier this year that showed men preferred the shape of ordinary women, equivalent to dress size 14, than fashion models and Playboy centrefolds.

Tall women were seen by men as abnormal while extremely short women were surprisingly seen as unhealthy.

Men also said women with short bodies and very long legs were unattractive because they believed they might have trouble carrying a baby.

The men, by and large, preferred mid-length legs - that is legs that accounted for half of overall height.

The researchers found leg-to-body ratio was a crucial factor in determining how attracted men were to women, while men and women had very differing ideas of what was hot and what was not.

They also concluded clothes interfered with a woman's leg-to-body ratio, changing how attractive they were to men. ( news.com.au )