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.     

Face likeability mediates the memory-enhancing effect of face attractiveness in young but not older adults

Evidence of effects of face attractiveness on memory is mixed and little is known about the underlying mechanisms of this relationship. Previous work suggests a possible mediating role of affective responding to faces (i.e., face likeability) on the relationship between face attractiveness and memory. Age-related change in social motivation may reduce the relevance of face attractiveness in older adults, with downstream effects on memory. In the present study, 50 young and 51 older participants were presented with face-trait pairs. Faces varied in attractiveness. Participants then completed a face-trait associative recognition memory task and provided likeability ratings for each face. There was a memory-enhancing effect of face attractiveness in young (but not older) participants, which was partially mediated by face likeability. In addition, more attractive and less attractive (compared to moderately attractive) faces were more likely remembered by both young and older participants. This quadratic effect of face attractiveness on memory was not mediated by face likeability. Findings are discussed in the context of motivational influences on memory that vary with age.     

男性对女性面孔吸引力的认知偏好: 来自ERP的证据

运用事件相关电位(ERPs)技术, 采用学习-再认实验任务, 探讨了男性对有、无吸引力女性面孔图片进行判断和再认时脑内时程的动态变化。行为数据结果表明, 男性对有吸引力女性面孔的反应时更长, 再认正确率更高。ERP结果发现, 有、无吸引力面孔诱发的ERP早成分和晚成分都存在显著差异, 最强效应出现在大脑皮层的中前部。在判断任务和再认任务中, 有吸引力的女性面孔都比无吸引力的女性面孔诱发出更大的ERP成分(分别为N300、P350~550ms和P160、N300~500ms、P500~700ms)。结果表明, 男性对有吸引力的女性面孔的判断和再认存在偏好。     

Beauty is better pursued: Effects of attractiveness in multiple-face tracking

Using the multiple-object tracking paradigm, this study examines how spontaneous appraisal for facial beauty affects distributed attention to multiple faces in dynamic displays. Observers tracked attractive faces more effectively than unattractive faces in this task. Tracking performance was only affected by target attractiveness, suggesting an absence of appraisal for distractor attractiveness. Attractive male faces also produced stronger binding of face identity and location for female participants. Together, the results suggest that facial attractiveness was appraised during tracking even though this was task irrelevant. Contrary to the theory that multiple-object tracking is driven by encapsulated low-level vision, our results show that the content of target representation is not only penetrable by social cognition but also modulates the course of tracking operations.     

Beauty is better pursued: effects of attractiveness in multiple-face tracking

Using the multiple-object tracking paradigm, this study examines how spontaneous appraisal for facial beauty affects distributed attention to multiple faces in dynamic displays. Observers tracked attractive faces more effectively than unattractive faces in this task. Tracking performance was only affected by target attractiveness, suggesting an absence of appraisal for distractor attractiveness. Attractive male faces also produced stronger binding of face identity and location for female participants. Together, the results suggest that facial attractiveness was appraised during tracking even though this was task irrelevant. Contrary to the theory that multiple-object tracking is driven by encapsulated low-level vision, our results show that the content of target representation is not only penetrable by social cognition but also modulates the course of tracking operations.     

Testosterone-to-oestradiol ratio is associated with female facial attractiveness

The relationship between facial shape and attractiveness has been extensively studied, yet few studies have investigated the underlying biological factors of an attractive face. Many researchers have proposed a link between female attractiveness and sex hormones, but there is little empirical evidence in support of this assumption. In the present study we investigated the relationship between circulating sex hormones and attractiveness. We created prototypes by separately averaging photographs of 15 women with high and low levels of testosterone, oestradiol, and testosterone-to-oestradiol ratio levels, respectively. An independent set of facial images was then shape transformed toward these prototypes. We paired the resulting images in such a way that one face depicted a female with high hormone level and the other one with a low hormone level. Fifty participants were asked to choose the more attractive face of each pair. We found that low testosterone-to-oestradiol ratio and low testosterone were positively associated with female facial attractiveness. There was no preference for faces with high oestradiol levels. In an additional experiment with 36 participants we confirmed that a low testosterone-to-oestradiol ratio plays a larger role than low testosterone alone. These results provide empirical evidence that an attractive female face is shaped by interacting effects of testosterone and oestradiol.     

Locating attractiveness in the face space: Faces are more attractive when closer to <Emphasis Type="Italic">their</Emphasis> group prototype

Face attractiveness relates positively to the mathematical averageness of a face, but how close attractive faces of varying groups are to their own and to other-group prototypes in the face space remains unclear. In two studies, we modeled the locations of attractive and unattractive Caucasian, Asian, and African faces in participants’ face space using multidimensional scaling analysis. In all three sets of faces, facial attractiveness significantly increased with the absolute proximity of a face to its group prototype. In the case of Caucasian and African faces (Study 1), facial attractiveness also tended to increase with the absolute proximity of a face to the other-group prototype. However, this association was at best marginal, and it became clearly nonsignificant when distance to the own-group prototype was controlled for. Thus, the present research provides original evidence that average features of faces contribute to increasing their attractiveness, but only when these features are average to the group to which a face belongs. The present research also offers further support to face space models of people’s mental representations of faces.     

Concentrating on beauty: sexual selection and sociospatial memory

In three experiments, location memory for faces was examined using a computer version of the matching game Concentration. Findings suggested that physical attractiveness led to more efficient matching for female faces but not for male faces. Study 3 revealed this interaction despite allowing participants to initially see, attend to, and match the attractive male faces in the first few turns. Analysis of matching errors suggested that, compared to other targets, attractive women were less confusable with one another. Results are discussed in terms of the different functions that attractiveness serves for men and women.     

Analyses of facial attractiveness on feminised and juvenilised faces

We conducted two experiments to investigate the psychological factors affecting the attractiveness of composite faces. Feminised or juvenilised Japanese faces were created by morphing between average male and female adult faces or between average male (female) adult and boy (girl) faces. In experiment 1, we asked the participants to rank the attractiveness of these faces. The results showed moderately juvenilised faces to be highly attractive. In experiment 2, we analysed the impressions the participants had of the composite faces by the semantic-differential method and determined the factors that largely affected attractiveness. On the basis of the factor scores, we plotted the faces in factor spaces and analysed the locations of attractive faces. We found that most of the attractive juvenilised faces involved impressions corresponding to an augmentation of femininity, characterised by the factors of 'elegance', 'mildness', and 'youthfulness', which the attractive faces potentially had.     

“Just another pretty face”: A multidimensional scaling approach to face attractiveness and variability

Findings on both attractiveness and memory for faces suggest that people should perceive more similarity among attractive than among unattractive faces. A multidimensional scaling approach was used to test this hypothesis in two studies. In Study 1, we derived a psychological face space from similarity ratings of attractive and unattractive Caucasian female faces. In Study 2, we derived a face space for attractive and unattractive male faces of Caucasians and non-Caucasians. Both studies confirm that attractive faces are indeed more tightly clustered than unattractive faces in people’s psychological face spaces. These studies provide direct and original support for theoretical assumptions previously made in the face space and face memory literatures.     

The influence of position and context on facial attractiveness

It has been shown that a person's position in a group influences how that person is evaluated, with people in the middle perceived as more important than people on the fringe of a group. Four experiments examined whether the position of a face, in a line of five faces, influenced facial attractiveness. The middle position influenced the perceived attractiveness of the target face but the direction of this effect depended on the attractiveness of the target and the surrounding faces. Attractive faces were perceived as less attractive when in the middle of unattractive faces, or faces of average attractiveness. Conversely, unattractive faces were perceived as more attractive when in the middle of other unattractive faces. These results have wide implications, suggesting that the more central a stimulus is in a context then the greater the influence of the context on the judgment of that stimulus.     

Preferences for sexual dimorphism on attractiveness levels: An eye-tracking study

Previous studies on sexual dimorphism showed feminine preferences in female faces and mixed findings in male faces by choosing which is more attractive in a pair of a masculine face and a feminine face. However, very little is known about how people make fine-grained visual assessments of such images and the attractiveness levels of faces are not received much attention. Recently a large number of androgynous stars appear in the media, which triggers a hot phenomenon of imitating them. Here we examine the influence of androgynous stars on people’s facial preferences for sexual dimorphism in male and female faces on different attractiveness levels using eye-tracking techniques. In male faces we found both male and female participants preferred masculine faces to androgynous faces in high attractiveness, but mixed results in low attractiveness. In female faces we found both male and female participants preferred feminine faces to androgynous faces in high attractiveness, but no preferences in low attractiveness. Results suggest that attractiveness levels of faces might be a factor causing inconsistency in sexual dimorphism preference for male faces and that androgynous faces are not preferred, which reveals that androgynous phenomenon might not be caused by facial attractiveness.     

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.     

女性面孔吸引力的加工及其对男性诚实道德行为的影响:一项ERP研究

研究考察了不同女性面孔吸引力情境对男性被试诚实道德决策行为的影响,同时采用ERP技术对社会情境中面孔吸引力的信息加工方式特点进行探究。结果发现,高面孔吸引力记录员情境中被试倾向更加真实地报告自己的预测结果而表现出更多诚实的道德决策;ERP结果则发现高吸引力记录员面孔较之于低吸引力记录员面孔在反应提示界面在大脑中后部诱发更大的早期N200成分。结果提示,在与面孔审美评价无关的社会情境中个体面孔的吸引力信息能够被快速识别与自动化加工,同时也会直接促进他人自身的道德行为水平。     

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.     

The effect of red on male perceptions of female attractiveness: Moderation by baseline attractiveness of female faces

Past research has demonstrated the importance of color in a variety of social contexts, including human mating. For example, red increases heterosexual men's feelings of attraction toward women. In the current work, this basic red‐attraction link is qualified by the initial attractiveness of female faces. In two experiments, red enhanced men's ratings of female attractiveness, but only for faces pre‐rated as attractive; red had no influence on perceptions of initially unattractive faces. Additionally, Experiment 1 manipulated how long participants viewed attractive and unattractive faces as an exploratory test of when color and face features are integrated. The findings show that initial female attractiveness moderates the influence of red on judgments of attractiveness even when the faces are viewed for extremely short exposures. The present findings identify an important boundary condition of the red‐attractiveness effect and provide an initial indication of where in the processing stream color impacts social judgments. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

基于合成平均刺激的平均表征机制——来自平均面孔吸引力的证据

人类能够快速提取集合中的统计信息, 形成平均表征。对于平均表征的产生机制, 研究者提出整合集合成员以合成平均刺激, 或计算集合成员特征值的平均值两种观点。以往研究中合成的平均刺激的特征值和计算成员特征值的平均值两种方式的结果相似, 难以区分两种观点。由于多个面孔的吸引力评分的均值与用这些面孔合成的平均面孔的吸引力评分存在差异, 本研究使用经典的平均辨别任务(实验1和2)和吸引力评价任务(实验3和4)为平均表征的产生来源于合成平均刺激的观点提供了支持证据。4个实验分别采用大容量面孔集合和小容量面孔集合探讨平均表征的形成机制, 结果发现大、小集合都形成了平均刺激, 并且平均表征的评定和加工可能更多依赖合成的平均刺激, 而非简单的对成员特征值进行平均; 此外, 集合吸引力出现了高评现象, 但小集合高评现象更少出现, 说明平均刺激的作用受到集合大小的影响。本研究为集合平均表征的形成机制和面孔集合吸引力高评现象的产生机制提供了新证据。     

Limitations of traditional morphometrics in research on the attractiveness of faces

The traditional morphometrics approach to shape comparisons involves computing multiple interlandmark distances without taking into account the geometric configuration of the landmarks. A recent example of this approach is a study by Potter and Corneille (2008). They had participants rate the attractiveness of computer-generated European, African, and Asian male faces, and they computed the Euclidean distances between each face and the group prototypes. They found that faces are rated more attractive when they are closer to their group prototype. This letter addresses differing conclusions in the literature, the methodological shortcomings of Potter and Corneille, and another study that explored a similar topic, with a special focus on guiding future researchers around the pitfalls of traditional morphometrics.     

Infant preferences for attractive faces: a cognitive explanation.

Research on infant face perception has shown that infants' preferences for attractive faces exist well before socialization from parents, peers, and the media can affect these preferences. Four studies assessed a cognitive explanation for the development of attractiveness preferences: cognitive averaging and infant preferences for mathematically averaged faces, or prototypes. Studies 1 and 2 demonstrated that both adults and 6-month-old infants prefer prototypical, mathematically averaged faces. Studies 3 and 4 demonstrated that 6-month-olds can abstract the central tendency from a group of naturalistic faces. Taken together, the studies suggest that infants' preferences for attractive faces can be explained by general information-processing mechanisms.     

本族和异族面孔的视觉工作记忆容量:面孔特征的影响

采用延迟探测刺激匹配再认任务,考察面孔种族和内外部特征是否会影响面孔视觉工作记忆容量。被试先识记2或4张中国人或白人的真实面孔图片,一半有内部特征(眼睛、鼻子和嘴巴),另一半有内部和外部特征(脸型、发型),再进行面孔再认判断。采用Cowan’s K值的分析显示,我国被试对本族和异族面孔的视觉工作记忆容量没有差异,但面孔数量与特征多少会影响面孔工作记忆容量,表明对本族和异族面孔的视觉加工不同。