Issue 6, December 2002
Looking Good: The Psychology and Biology of Beauty
Human Biology, Stanford University
ancient Greece, Helen of Troy, the instigator of the Trojan War,
was the paragon of beauty, exuding a physical
Cindy Crawford, an example of symmetry
Image courtesy of www.cindy.com
that would put Cindy Crawford to shame. Indeed, she was the toast
of Athens, celebrated not for her kindness or her intellect, but
for her physical perfection. But why did the Greek men find Helen,
and other beautiful women, so intoxicating?
an attempt to answer this question, the philosophers of the day
devoted a great deal of time to this conundrum. Plato wrote of so-called
"golden proportions," in which, amongst other things,
the width of an ideal face would be two-thirds its length, while
a nose would be no longer than the distance between the eyes. Plato's
golden proportions, however, haven't quite held up to the rigors
of modern psychological and biological research -- though there
is credence in the ancient Greeks' attempts to determine a fundamental
symmetry that humans find attractive.
Symmetry is attractive to the human eye
this symmetry has been scientifically proven to be inherently attractive
to the human eye. It has been defined not with proportions, but
rather with similarity between the left and right sides of the face
Thus, the Greeks were only partially correct.
applying the stringent conditions of the scientific method, researchers
now believe symmetry is the answer the Greeks were looking for.
applying the stringent conditions of the scientific method,
researchers now believe symmetry is the answer the Greeks
were looking for.
spend more time staring at pictures of symmetric individuals than
they do at photos of asymmetric ones. Moreover, when several faces
are averaged to create a composite -- thus covering up the asymmetries
that any one individual may have -- a panel of judges deemed the
composite more attractive than the individual pictures.
Johnston of New Mexico State University, for example, utilizes a
program called FacePrints, which shows viewers facial images of
variable attractiveness. The viewers then rate the pictures on a
beauty scale from one to nine. In what is akin to digital Darwinism,
the pictures with the best ratings are merged together, while the
less attractive photos are weeded out. Each trial ends when a viewer
deems the composite a 10. All the perfect 10s are super-symmetric.
say that the preference for symmetry is a highly evolved trait seen
in many different animals. Female swallows, for example, prefer
males with longer and more symmetric tails, while female zebra finches
mate with males with symmetrically colored leg bands.
rationale behind symmetry preference in both humans and animals
is that symmetric individuals have a higher mate-value; scientists
believe that this symmetry is equated with a strong immune system.
Thus, beauty is indicative of more robust genes, improving the likelihood
that an individual's offspring will survive. This evolutionary theory
is supported by research showing that standards of attractiveness
are similar across cultures.
to a University of Louisville study, when shown pictures of different
individuals, Asians, Latinos, and whites from 13 different countries
all had the same general preferences when rating others as attractive
-- that is those that are the most symmetric.
Beauty beyond symmetry
John Manning of the University of Liverpool in England cautions
against over-generalization, especially by Western scientists. "Darwin
thought that there were few universals of physical beauty because
there was much variance in appearance and preference across human
groups," Manning explained in email interview. For example,
Chinese men used to prefer women with small feet. In Shakespearean
England, ankles were the rage. In some African tribal cultures,
men like women who insert large discs in their lips.
"we need more cross-cultural studies to show that what is true
in Westernized societies is also true in traditional groups,"
Manning said his 1999 article.
from symmetry, males in Western cultures generally prefer females
with a small jaw, a small nose, large eyes, and defined cheekbones
- features often described as "baby faced", that resemble
an infant's. Females, however, have a preference for males who look
more mature -- generally heart-shaped, small-chinned faces with
full lips and fair skin. But during menstruation, females prefer
a soft-featured male to a masculine one. Indeed, researchers found
that female perceptions of beauty actually change throughout the
up the wasit-to-hip ratio: In general, men prefer women
with a low WHR.
Image courtesy of health.discovery.com
viewing profiles, both males and females prefer a face in which
the forehead and jaw are in vertical alignment. Altogether, the
preference for youthful and even infant-like, features, especially
by menstruating women, suggest people with these features have more
long-term potential as mates as well as an increased level of reproductive
have also found that the body's proportions play an important role
in perceptions of beauty as well. In general, men have a preference
for women with low waist-to-hip ratios (WHRs), that is, more adipose
is deposited on the hips and buttocks than on the waist. Research
shows that women with high WHRs (whose bodies are more tube-shaped)
are more likely to suffer from health maladies, including infertility
and diabetes. However, as is often the case, there are exceptions
to the rule.
at Newcastle University in England have shown that an indigenous
people located in southeast Peru, who have had little contact with
the Western world, actually have a preference for high WHRs. These
psychologists assert that a general preference for low WHRs is a
byproduct of Western culture.
and choosing a mate
research suggests that people generally choose mates with a similar
level of attractiveness. The evolutionary theory is that by mating
with someone who has similar genes, one's own genes are conserved.
Moreover, a person's demeanor and personality also influences how
others perceive his or her beauty.
research suggests that people generally choose mates with a
similar level of attractiveness.
one study, 70% of college students deemed an instructor physically
attractive when he acted in a friendly manner, while only 30% found
him attractive when he was cold and distant. Indeed, when surveyed
for attributes in selecting a mate, both males and females felt
kindness and an exciting personality were more important in a mate
than good looks. Thus, to a certain degree, beauty truly is in the
eye of the beholder.
Yu of the University of East Anglia in Norwich, England, agrees.
"It's true by definition. Beauty is always judged by the receiver,"
he says. At the same time, he says in an email "there is inter-observer
concordance, a measure of objectivity," so that individual
perceptions of beauty, factoring in other characteristics such as
personality and intelligence, can often be aggregated to form a
consensus opinion. One of the offshoots of Yu's work in ethnobiology
was a piece in Nature in 1998 that showed that the hourglass-body
standard of beauty in women, previously thought to be `universally'
preferred, was in fact likely swayed by advertising.
The halo effect
attractive people tend to be more intelligent, better adjusted,
and more popular. This is described as the halo effect - due to
the perfection associated with angels. Research shows attractive
people also have more occupational success and more dating experience
than their unattractive counterparts. One theory behind this halo
effect is that it is accurate -- attractive people are indeed more
shows attractive people also have more occupational success
and more dating experience than their unattractive counterparts.
alternative explanation for attractive people achieving more in
life is that we automatically categorize others before having an
opportunity to evaluate their personalities, based on cultural stereotypes
which say attractive people must be intrinsically good, and ugly
people must be inherently bad. But Elliot Aronson, a social psychologist
at Stanford University, believes self-fulfilling prophecies - in
which a person't confident self-perception, further perpetuated
by healthy feedback from others - may play a role in success as
well. Aronson suggests, based on the self-fulfilling prophecy that
people who feel they are attractive - though not necessarily rated
as such - are just as successful as their counterparts who are judged
to be good-looking.
the reason, the notion that attractiveness correlates with success
still rings true. Yet beauty is not always advantageous, for beautiful
people, particularly attractive women, tend to be perceived as more
materialistic, snobbish, and vain.
better or worse, the bottom line is that research shows beauty matters;
it pervades society and affects how we choose loved ones. Thus,
striving to appear attractive may not be such a vain endeavor after
all. This isn't to say plastic surgery is necessarily the answer.
Instead, lead a healthy lifestyle that will in turn make you a happier
Elliot. 1999. The Social Animal. New York: Worth Publishers, Inc.
Cowley, Geoffrey. The biology of beauty. Newsweek. 1996 (127): 60-67.
Dion, Karen. 2002. Cultural perspectives on facial attractiveness.
Facial Attractiveness: Evolutionary, Cognitive, and Social Perspectives.
Eds. Rhodes, Gillian, Zebrowitz, Leslie. Westport, CT: Ablex Publishing.
Hill, C.T. et al. Breakups before marriage: the end of 103 affairs.
Journal of Social Issues. 1976 (32): 147-168.
Langlois, J.H. et al. Maxims or myths of beauty? A meta-analytic and
theoretical review. Psychological Bulletin. 2000 (126): 390-423.
Little, A and D. Perrett. Putting beauty back in the eye of the beholder.
Psychologist. 2002 (15): 28-32.
Manning, JT, RL Trivers, D Singh, R Thornhill. The mystery of female
beauty. Nature. 1999 (399): 214-215.
Moller, A.P. and R. Thornhill. Bilateral symmetry and sexual selection:
a meta-analysis. American Naturalist. 1998(151): 174-192.
Perrett, David et al. Symmetry and human facial attractiveness. Evolution
& Human Behavior. 1999 (20): 295-307.
Tovee, MJ and PL Cornelissen. Is beauty in the eye of the beholder?
Nature. 1998 (396): 321-322.
Zebrowitz, Leslie. 1997. Reading Faces: Window to the Soul? Boulder,
Colorado: Westview Press.
related to this topic
News: Faces Like Our Own are the most Attractive
News: Beauty is in the eye of the beerholder
Study Shows Difference Between Beauty, Desire
Journal of Young
Investigators. 2002. Volume Six.
Copyright © 2002 by Charles Feng and JYI. All rights reserved.