Effects of the height of the internal features of faces on adults' aesthetic ratings and 5-month-olds' looking times

We examined the influence of the height of the internal features of faces on adults' ratings of attractiveness and on 5-month-olds' looking times. Subjects viewed drawings or coloured photographs of faces presented in pairs that were identical except that the internal features were at a low height, with a large forehead and small chin; at a high height, with a small forehead and large chin; or at a medium height. Adults rated faces with their features at the medium and low heights as more attractive than faces with their features at the high height, and, at least for drawings, rated faces with medium features as more attractive than faces with low features. Babies looked equally long at faces with their features at various heights except for looking slightly longer at faces with high rather than low features. The results suggest that the influence of feature height on reactions to faces is different for adults and 5-month-olds, and hence that it may be shaped by cultural learning and/or experience with faces sometime after early infancy.     

Attractiveness of own-race, other-race, and mixed-race faces

Averaged face composites, which represent the central tendency of a familiar population of faces, are attractive. If this prototypicality contributes to their appeal, then averaged composites should be more attractive when their component faces come from a familiar, own-race population than when they come from a less familiar, other-race population. We compared the attractiveness of own-race composites, other-race composites, and mixed-race composites (where the component faces were from both races). In experiment 1, Caucasian participants rated own-race composites as more attractive than other-race composites, but only for male faces. However, mixed-race (Caucasian/Japanese) composites were significantly more attractive than own-race composites, particularly for the opposite sex. In experiment 2, Caucasian and Japanese participants living in Australia and Japan, respectively, selected the most attractive face from a continuum with exaggerated Caucasian characteristics at one end and exaggerated Japanese characteristics at the other, with intervening images including a Caucasian averaged composite, a mixed-race averaged composite, and a Japanese averaged composite. The most attractive face was, again, a mixed-race composite, for both Caucasian and Japanese participants. In experiment 3, Caucasian participants rated individual Eurasian faces as significantly more attractive than either Caucasian or Asian faces. Similar results were obtained with composites. Eurasian faces and composites were also rated as healthier than Caucasian or Asian faces and composites, respectively. These results suggest that signs of health may be more important than prototypicality in making average faces attractive.     

Attractiveness as a Function of Skin Tone and Facial Features: Evidence from Categorization Studies

Participants rated the attractiveness and racial typicality of male faces varying in their facial features from Afrocentric to Eurocentric and in skin tone from dark to light in two experiments. Experiment 1 provided evidence that facial features and skin tone have an interactive effect on perceptions of attractiveness and mixed-race faces are perceived as more attractive than single-race faces. Experiment 2 further confirmed that faces with medium levels of skin tone and facial features are perceived as more attractive than faces with extreme levels of these factors. Black phenotypes (combinations of dark skin tone and Afrocentric facial features) were rated as more attractive than White phenotypes (combinations of light skin tone and Eurocentric facial features); ambiguous faces (combinations of Afrocentric and Eurocentric physiognomy) with medium levels of skin tone were rated as the most attractive in Experiment 2. Perceptions of attractiveness were relatively independent of racial categorization in both experiments.     

Developmental changes in perceptions of attractiveness: a role of experience?

In three experiments, we traced the development of the adult pattern of judgments of attractiveness for faces that have been altered to have internal features in low, average, or high positions. Twelve-year-olds and adults demonstrated identical patterns of results: they rated faces with features in an average location as significantly more attractive than faces with either low or high features. Although both 4-year-olds and 9-year-olds rated faces with high features as least attractive, unlike adults and 12-year-olds, they rated faces with low and average features as equally attractive. Three-year-olds with high levels of peer interaction, but not those with low levels of peer interaction, chose faces with low features as significantly more attractive than those with high-placed features, possibly as a result of their increased experience with the proportions of the faces of peers. Overall, the pattern of results is consistent with the hypothesis that experience influences perceptions of attractiveness, with the proportions of the faces participants see in their everyday lives influencing their perceptions of attractiveness.     

Are average and symmetric faces attractive to infants? Discrimination and looking preferences

Young infants prefer to look at faces that adults find attractive, suggesting a biological basis for some face preferences. However, the basis for infant preferences is not known. Adults find average and symmetric faces attractive. We examined whether 5-8-month-old infants discriminate between different levels of averageness and symmetry in faces, and whether they prefer to look at faces with higher levels of these traits. Each infant saw 24 pairs of female faces. Each pair consisted of two versions of the same face differing either in averageness (12 pairs) or symmetry (12 pairs). Data from the mothers confirmed that adults preferred the more average and more symmetric versions in each pair. The infants were sensitive to differences in both averageness and symmetry, but showed no looking preference for the more average or more symmetric versions. On the contrary, longest looks were significantly longer for the less average versions, and both longest looks and first looks were marginally longer for the less symmetric versions. Mean looking times were also longer for the less average and less symmetric versions, but those differences were not significant. We suggest that the infant looking behaviour may reflect a novelty preference rather than an aesthetic preference.     

Effects of eye size on adults' aesthetic ratings of faces and 5-month-olds' looking times

In two experiments, we investigated the influence of eye size on adults' ratings of faces' attractiveness and 5-month-olds' looking times. Subjects viewed four pairs of female faces that were identical except for the size of the eyes. Whether they saw black-and-white drawings (experiment 1) or coloured photographs (experiment 2), adults rated the faces with larger eyes as more attractive than the faces with smaller eyes. Babies looked equally long at the drawn faces with larger and smaller eyes (experiment 1), but with the more realistic photographed faces, they looked slightly but significantly longer at the versions with larger eyes (experiment 2). Overall, our results suggest that a modest preference for larger eyes that has emerged by 5 months of age may contribute to the development of adult aesthetic preferences.     

A formal analysis of ratings of physical attractiveness: Successive contrast and simultaneous assimilation

Photographs of faces were presented in a series, either singly or in pairs, for ratings of physical attractiveness. In Experiment 1, faces were presented singly, and both the range and relative frequencies of physical attractiveness (on baseline scaling) were manipulated experimentally. The same face elicited higher ratings when less attractive faces predominated in the experimental series, successive contrast. Increasing the number of available categories resulted in higher ratings but did not reduce the amount of successive contrast. Both range and skewing effects were in accordance with a range-frequency model that permits the subjective range to vary with number of categories. In Experiment 2, faces were presented in pairs. The same face now elicited lower ratings when presented simultaneously with a less attractive face, simultaneous assimilation. Successive contrast was again observed between pairs and was greater for 5- than for 101-point rating scales. A model that uses the judgments resulting from a range-frequency compromise as the stimulus values for integration within pairs provides the best account of how both contrast and assimilation occur within the same experimental session. Alternative interpretations of the observed contrast and assimilation were discussed.     

The two sides of beauty: Laterality and the duality of facial attractiveness

We hypothesized that facial attractiveness represents a dual judgment, a combination of reward-based, sexual processes, and aesthetic, cognitive processes. Herein we describe a study that demonstrates that sexual and nonsexual processes both contribute to attractiveness judgments and that these processes can be dissociated. Female participants rated the general attractiveness of faces presented in either their left or right visual field. In order to examine sexual and nonsexual components of these judgments, general attractiveness ratings were correlated with ratings of these same faces made by two independent groups of raters in two specific contexts, one sexual and one nonsexual. Based on an items analysis, partial correlation coefficients were computed for each individual and used as the dependent variable of interest in a 2 (laterality: right, left) by 2 (context: sexual, nonsexual) ANOVA. This analysis revealed an interaction such that faces rated in a sexual context better predicted attractiveness ratings of faces shown in the left than right visual field, whereas faces rated in a nonsexual context better predicted attractiveness of faces shown in the right than left visual field. This finding is consistent with the assertion that sexual and nonsexual preferences involve predominantly lateralized processing routes that independently contribute to what is perceived to be attractive.     

Demonstrating how unfamiliar faces become familiar using a face matching task

Two experiments examine a novel method of assessing face familiarity that does not require explicit identification of presented faces. Earlier research (Clutterbuck & Johnston, 2002; Young, Hay, McWeeny, Flude, & Ellis, 1985) has shown that different views of the same face can be matched more quickly for familiar than for unfamiliar faces. This study examines whether exposure to previously novel faces allows the speed with which they can be matched to be increased, thus allowing a means of assessing how faces become familiar. In Experiment 1, participants viewed two sets of unfamiliar faces presented for either many, short intervals or for few, long intervals. At test, previously familiar (famous) faces were matched more quickly than novel faces or learned faces. In addition, learned faces seen on many, brief occasions were matched more quickly than the novel faces or faces seen on fewer, longer occasions. However, this was only observed when participants performed “different” decision matches. In Experiment 2, the similarity between face pairs was controlled more strictly. Once again, matches were performed on familiar faces more quickly than on unfamiliar or learned items. However, matches made to learned faces were significantly faster than those made to completely novel faces. This was now observed for both same and different match decisions. The use of this matching task as a means of tracking how unfamiliar faces become familiar is discussed.     

Perception and Expressing Habits of Smiling and Angry Expressions Modulated by Facial Physical Attractiveness in Asian Female Persons

In this study, we investigated the effects of facial physical attractiveness on perception and expressing habit of smiling and angry expressions. In experiment 1, 20 participants rated 60 photo subjects’ smiling and angry expressions of uncontrolled physical expression configuration. The results showed that for the angry faces, the perceived expression intensity and the expression naturalness in the attractive group were significantly stronger than those in the unattractive group; for the smiling faces, this attractiveness bias was not observed. In experiment 2, using artificial expressions made by an identical expression template, interestingly, the perceived expression intensity and the expression naturalness of the smiling faces in the attractive group were stronger than those in the unattractive group, while the impression strength of anger between the two groups was approximately the same. A comparison of the two observations suggests that facial physical attractiveness can enhance the perceived intensity of a smiling expression but not an angry expression, and that the inconsistencies between the two experiments are due to the difference of expressing habits between unattractive and attractive persons. These results have implications as regards the effect of facial attractiveness on the expressing habits of expression senders and the person’s development of social skills.     

Adult age and gender differences in perceptions of facial attractiveness: beauty is in the eye of the older beholder

The authors examined ratings of facial attractiveness, rankings of faces and reasons given by young, middle-aged, and older men and women for young, middle-aged, and older male and female face attractiveness. No support for predictions derived from similarity, interest, and cohort hypotheses was obtained. In support of the expertise hypothesis, young and middle-aged adults rated younger faces as more attractive than old faces, whereas older adults rated all aged faces equally. In support of the crone hypothesis, older female faces were rated the lowest of all faces. Theoretical implications and real-world applications are discussed.     

Adult Age and Gender Differences in Perceptions of Facial Attractiveness: Beauty is in the Eye of the Older Beholder

The authors examined ratings of facial attractiveness, rankings of faces, and reasons given by young, middle-aged, and older men and women for young, middle-aged, and older male and female face attractiveness. No support for predictions derived from similarity, interest, and cohort hypotheses was obtained. In support of the expertise hypothesis, young and middle-aged adults rated younger faces as more attractive than old faces, whereas older adults rated all aged faces equally. In support of the crone hypothesis, older female faces were rated the lowest of all faces. Theoretical implications and real-world applications are discussed.     

Concurrent processes: The affect-cognition relationship within the context of the “mere exposure” phenomenon

The affect-cognition relationship and Zajonc’s (1968) “mere exposure” hypothesis were examined in two studies that involved ratings of: (1) preference and familiarity for geometric forms previously scaled for complexity and (2) preference or height and familiarity for male yearbook pictures previously scaled for attractiveness or height. Two exceptions to his hypothesis were noted: simple geometric forms and unattractive faces showed satiation, and faces seen once before were rated more attractive than both novel faces and faces seen twice before. Moreover, mere exposure effects were noted with a nonaffective dimension (height). The major finding was that presentation frequency generally manifested independent relations to affect and rated familiarity, as well as to height and rated familiarity, therefore evoking a concurrent response process Eriksen, 1960).     

The effect of rotation on configural encoding in a face-matching task

Inversion disrupts encoding of faces because of the disruption of configural encoding as evident in the Thatcher illusion (Thompson 1980, Perception 9 483-484). Here we consider the effect of rotation on the loss of configural encoding in a same/different matching paradigm. Participants decided whether two faces were of the same type (both normal or both Thatcherised) or not, at five angles of rotation (0 degrees, 45 degrees , 90 degrees, 135 degrees, 180 degrees). When the faces were both of the same person, the disruption due to rotation for 'same-type' judgments was linear and approximately equal for normal and Thatcherised face pairs. In experiment 2, with different-person face pairs, the effect of rotation was much greater for Thatcherised face pairs than for normal face pairs. These findings are in contrast to those reported by Boutsen and Humphreys (2003, Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology A 56 955-975), and reasons for these differences, along with implications, are discussed.     

Age of face matters: Age-group differences in ratings of young and old faces

Young (n = 24) and old (n = 24) participants rated 160 faces of young and old individuals taken from the CAL/PAL Face Database (Minear & Park, 2004) with regard to attractiveness, likeability, distinctiveness, goal orientation, energy, mood, and age. Ratings are reported for each face separately. Further analyses showed that the age groups differed in their ratings of young and old faces. On average, old participants evaluated the faces as more positive (i.e., more attractive, more energetic) than did young participants. In line with research on a negative aging stereotype, old faces were judged as less positive than young faces. They were, for instance, seen as less attractive, less likeable, less distinctive, less growth-oriented, and less energetic. The findings of the present study can serve as a basis for the selection of appropriate facial stimuli in age-comparative studies of face perception, face processing, or memory for faces. All face-specific data are archived at www.psychonomic.org/archive.     

Effects of the beholder's age on the perception of facial attractiveness

Children have been shown to prefer faces rated as highly attractive by adults over faces rated as quite unattractive. We investigated to what extent this agreement holds not only for the general direction of preferences but for preference strengths as well. In a choice experiment, we presented 40 nine-year-old girls and their mothers and 40 twelve-year-old girls and their mothers with pairs of women's and girls' faces and asked the subjects to pick the face that appeared prettier to them. Preference frequencies and simple attractiveness scales derived from these preference frequencies by fitting the Bradley-Terry-Luce rule (Luce, D. R. (1959). Individual choice behavior: a theoretical analysis. New York: Wiley) were compared across subject groups. For the women's faces, we found no difference in preferences between nine-year-olds, twelve-year-olds, and adults, neither in direction nor in strength. For the girls' faces, we also found no major differences in preference direction, however, we did find reliable differences in preference strengths. To a considerable part these differences were due to the fact that the children showed less pronounced preferences between face stimuli than the adults. These results suggest a role of developmental factors in the perception of facial attractiveness.     

The effect of inversion on the encoding of normal and “thatcherized” faces

In the “Thatcher illusion” a face, in which the eyes and mouth are inverted relative to the rest of the face, looks grotesque when shown upright but not when inverted. In four experiments we investigated the contribution of local and global processing to this illusion in normal observers. We examined inversion effects (i.e., better performance for upright than for inverted faces) in a task requiring discrimination of whether faces were or were not “thatcherized”. Observers made same/different judgements to isolated face parts (Experiments 1-2) and to whole faces (Experiments 3-4). Face pairs had the same or different identity, allowing for different process- ing strategies using feature-based or configural information, respectively. In Experiment 1, feature-based matching of same-person face parts yielded only a small inversion effect for normal face parts. However, when feature-based matching was prevented by using the face parts of different people on all trials (Experiment 2) an inversion effect occurred for normal but not for thatcherized parts. In Experiments 3 and 4, inversion effects occurred with normal but not with thatcherized whole faces, on both same- and different-person matching tasks. This suggests that a common configural strategy was used with whole (normal) faces. Face context facilitated attention to misoriented parts in same-person but not in different-person matching. The results indicate that (1) face inversion disrupts local configural processing, but not the processing of image features, and (2) thatcherization disrupts local configural processing in upright faces.     

The dissociable influence of social context on judgements of facial attractiveness and trustworthiness

The cheerleader effect occurs when the same face is rated to be more attractive when it is seen in a group compared to when seen alone. We investigated whether this phenomenon also occurs for trustworthiness judgements, and examined how these effects are influenced by the characteristics of the individual being evaluated and those of the group they are seen in. Across three experiments, we reliably replicated the cheerleader effect. Most faces became more attractive in a group. Yet, the size of the cheerleader effect that each face experienced was not related to its own attractiveness, nor to the attractiveness of the group or the group’s digitally averaged face. We discuss the implications of our findings for the hierarchical encoding and contrast mechanisms that have previously been used to explain the cheerleader effect. Surprisingly, judgements of facial trustworthiness did not experience a ‘cheerleader effect’. Instead, we found that untrustworthy faces became significantly more trustworthy in all groups, while there was no change for faces that were already trustworthy alone. Taken together, our results demonstrate that social context can have a dissociable influence on our first impressions, depending on the trait being evaluated.     

Average faces are average faces

Photographs of faces of young adult male and female Scots were measured on nineteen frontal dimensions. Measures in each dimension were converted to z-scores and summed for each face. For each sex, the ten faces closest to the average summed z-score and the ten most distant from it were rated for attractiveness by white male and female New Zealand undergraduates. Raters agreed significantly in ordering the faces in attractiveness, but did not rate faces close to the “population” average differently from those distant from it. Tested for the first time with actual rather than contrived faces, the commonly reported hypothesis that faces representing the average of a population are attractive is not supported.