Perceived health contributes to the attractiveness of facial symmetry, averageness, and sexual dimorphism

Symmetry, averageness, and sexual dimorphism (femininity in female faces, masculinity in male faces) are attractive in faces. Many have suggested that preferences for these traits may be adaptations for identifying healthy mates. If they are, then the traits should be honest indicators of health and their attractiveness should result from their healthy appearance. Much research has focused on whether these traits honestly signal health. Here we focused on whether the appeal of these traits results from their healthy appearance. Specifically, we tested whether the attractiveness of symmetry, averageness, and sexual dimorphism is reduced or eliminated when perceived health is controlled, in two large samples of Western faces and a large sample of Japanese faces. The appeal of symmetric faces was largely due to their healthy appearance, with most associations between symmetry and attractiveness eliminated when perceived health was controlled. A healthy appearance also contributed to the appeal of averageness and femininity in female faces and masculinity in male faces, although it did not fully explain their appeal. These results show that perceptions of attractiveness are sensitive to a healthy appearance, and are consistent with the hypothesis that preferences may be adaptations for mate choice.     

Age estimation of faces: a review

Accurate age estimation is important in a variety of settings, particularly those in which age is a condition for access to a product such as alcohol or tobacco. The current paper reviews data on the estimation of age, focusing on changes that occur to the ageing face, methodology and findings. The accumulated data suggest that age estimation of unfamiliar faces can be quite accurate, is sensitive to cues at the local and global level and may vary on the basis of group membership. Potential directions for future research are highlighted and findings are discussed with respect to their implications for policies regarding the solicitation of age identification. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Contact and other‐race effects in configural and component processing of faces

Other‐race faces are generally recognized more poorly than own‐race faces. There has been a long‐standing interest in the extent to which differences in contact contribute to this other‐race effect (ORE). Here, we examined the effect of contact on two distinct aspects of face memory, memory for configuration and for components, both of which are better for own‐race than other‐race faces. Configural and component memory were measured using recognition memory tests with intact study faces and blurred (isolates memory for configuration) and scrambled (isolates memory for components) test faces, respectively. Our participants were a large group of ethnically Chinese individuals who had resided in Australia for varying lengths of time, from a few weeks to 26 years. We found that time in a Western country significantly (negatively) predicted the size of the ORE for configural, but not component, memory. There was also a trend for earlier age of arrival to predict smaller OREs in configural, but not component, memory. These results suggest that memory for configural information in other‐race faces improves with experience with such faces. However, as found for recognition memory generally, the contact effects were small, indicating that other factors must play a substantial role in cross‐race differences in face memory.     

EXTENDED SIMPLES AND QUALITATIVE HETEROGENEITY

The problem of qualitative heterogeneity is to explain how an extended simple can enjoy qualitative variation across its spatial or temporal axes, given that it lacks both spatial and temporal parts. I discuss how friends of extended simples should address the problem of qualitative heterogeneity. I present a series of arguments designed to show that rather than appealing to fundamental distributional properties one should appeal to tiny and short-lived tropes. Along the way, issues relevant to debates about material composition, persistence over time and existence monism are discussed.         

The societal and psycho-sociological background of football hooliganism

On October 11, 1985, the Belgian Council of Ministers ordered scientific research on violence on the football terraces. This research was conducted in the years 1986 and 1987 by the “Onderzoeksgroep Jeugdcriminologie” (Research group on Juvenile Criminology) of the K.U. Leuven in close relationship with the general police of the home office. (The report was submitted on December 23, 1987 [VAN LIMBERGEN, COLAERS en WALGRAVE, 1987].)     

AVERAGENESS, EXAGGERATION, AND FACIAL ATTRACTIVENESS

Abstract— Langlois and her colleagues reported in this journal that composite faces are more attractive than the component faces used to create them, and conjectured that averageness is attractive (Langlois & Roggman, 1990, Langlois, Roggman, & Musselman, 1994) However, extremes may also be attractive (Perrett, May, & Yoshikawa, 1994). We investigated the effect of averageness (proximity to a norm or average face) on attractiveness using a computerized caricature generator to very averageness. Attractiveness increased with averageness (Experiment 1) and was negatively correlated with distinctiveness, a subjective measure of the converse of averageness (Experiments 1 and 2) Extremes (caricatures) were not attractive Line-drawing composites, which avoid some of the problems associated with gray-level composites, were significantly more attractive and less distinctive (more average) than individual faces (Experiment 2) These results support the claim that averageness is attractive.     

Intraorganizational and interorganizational job change: A discriminant analysis

Using March and Simon's (1958) participation model as a framework, this study employs the 1973–77 Quality of Employment Survey panel data to compare the determinants of intraorganizational and interorganizational job change. Two discriminant functions were significant, the first distinguishing between intraorganizational changers and stayers and the second between interorganizational changers and stayers. Moreover, the variables that distinguished between intraorganizational changers and stayers were either different from or opposite in influence to those distinguishing between interorganizational changers and stayers.     

Effects of ethanol on reinforced variations and repetitions by rats under a multiple schedule.

Response sequences emitted by five Long-Evans rats were reinforced under a two-component multiple schedule. In the REPEAT component, food pellets were contingent upon completion of a left-left-right-right (LLRR) sequence on two levers. In the VARY component, pellets were contingent upon variable sequences (i.e., a sequence was reinforced only if it differed from each of the previous five sequences). The rats learned to emit LLRR sequences in the REPEAT component and variable sequences in VARY. Intraperitoneal injections of ethanol (1.25, 1.75, and 2.25 g/kg) significantly increased sequence variability in REPEAT, thereby lowering reinforcement probability, but had little effect on sequence variability in the VARY component. These results extend previous findings that alcohol impairs the performance of reinforced repetitions but not of reinforced variations in response sequences.     

Thinking critically in medicine and its ethics: relating applied science and applied ethics

ABSTRACT While interest in philosophy and medicine has burgeoned in the past two decades, there remains a need for an analysis of the intellectual activity embodied in good medical practice. In this setting, ethical and scientific decision-making are complexly interrelated. The following paper, collaboratively written by physicians and philosophers, presents a view of applied (clinical) science and applied ethics. Making extensive use of illustrations drawn from routine case material, we seek to indicate a variety of philosophic issues to be found in daily practice, elucidate various levels of critical reasoning within the medical setting, and demonstrate a remarkable similarity between medical and ethical decision-making.