Day 3

http://find.galegroup.com/gtx/infomark.do?&contentSet=IAC-Documents&type=retrieve&tabID=T002&prodId=PPPC&docId=A19551972&source=gale&srcprod=PPPC&userGroupName=nysl_ro_web&version=1.0

The above article is an incredibly long report on how people of both genders percieve "average-ness." The conclusion that the article made was that people found an assortment of average faces to be more attractive than an assortment of less attractive and more attractive faces.

This procedure revealed that average faces were judged to be more physically
attractive than the individual faces that made up the average and, furthermore,
the attractiveness of a multi-face composite increased with the number of faces
comprising the average

I was interested at what the article defined as "average." Apparently, that just means that the face is...in every sense of the word...'average.' The proportions and sizes of each individual feature is strictly numerically average. Feature placement is determined by previous studies that sampled a large group of peoples' feature measurements.

http://www.faceresearch.org/demos/average

That's all for now- I'll keep looking up articles on the Psychology database.

The above link is fascinating. It allows you to select people and average together their faces.

I think one of the problems with this idea of "average" and "above average" is that people strive to become more beautiful- to have the "right" measurements through plastic surgery. This is one of the most ridiculous things I've ever seen- a calculator that tells you whether you need a nose job or not: http://www.calculatorslive.com/NoseSizeCalculator.aspx

Today, I want to focus on specific features that people find attractive. Eventually, I want to conduct a survey among my peers in which I gently manipulate one feature of a person's photograph while keeping the other variables constant. For example, I will show, side-by-side, a picture of an unmanipulated person and a picture of that same person with perhaps larger eyes or higher cheekbones. I would ask each surveyed person which photo is more attractive and possibly draw a conclusion if the results are skewed one way or other.

I found this article, which discusses possible attractive features: http://www.buzzle.com/articles/attractive-facial-features.html

I will be starting my survey on eyes. This is interesting because of the new "circle lens" fad. Circle lenses are contact lenses that create the illusion of larger irises, as shown in the above picture.

I started surveying 14 girls and 14 guys on two trials. I asked each person to look at two pictures of eyes- one with a circle lens and one without, and tell me which was more attractive. The two "trials" refer to two sets with two eyes each.

Results:

Girls Trial One:

-6 girls think the circle lens is more attractive

-8 girls think the regular eye is more attractive

Girls Trial Two:

-7 girls think the circle lens is more attractive
-7 girls think the regular eye is more attractive

Boys Trial One:

-10 boys think the circle lens in more attractive

-4 boys think the regular eye is more attractive

Boys Trial Two:
-7 boys think the circle lens in more attractive
-7 boys think the regular eye is more attractive

Since the sample selection was only 14 people, this data is inconclusive. I will continue to collect data throughout the week to see if I can find a more definitive pattern.

Psychology of Beauty

After playing around with project ideas like memory, perception of color, and "innate smartness," I've decided to do my 20% project on the psychology of beauty.





Questions:

• What specific features do men and women consider beautiful? Ex: Wide set eyes? Close set eyes? Large eyes? Round eyes?


• Do men and women perceieve beauty differently? Does one gender prefer a feature that the other does not?


• What do make-up companies take into consideration when formulating a product that enhances beauty?


• How does symmetry factor into the perception of beauty?


• Is there a "golden mean" or proportion facial features that most people will consider beautiful?


• What is the most attractive facial shape?


• Do circumstancial situations affect how a person defines beauty? Ex. If a person first views a beautiful woman and then views a more average one
• What are the most common plastic surgery enhancements, and why are they beautiful?

In beginning my research, I looked to the internet as a first source:

1) http://sirl.stanford.edu/~bob/teaching/pdf/arth202/Rhodes_AnnRevPsychol06.pdf

This is a thirty page research paper by Gillian Rhodes, a former student at the University of Western Australia. I read through the abstract and skimmed most of the paper. His information is very numbers-based, and I may revist this link to use data that I can not collect myself.

2) http://www.elle.com/Beauty/Beauty-Spotlight/Golden-Ratio-Perfect-Face

This next source is from Elle, a magazine that follows beauty and fashion trends. The article discusses the Greecian idea of a "golden ratio" and how it may play a role in dictating proportions for a perfect face. Here is an excerpt from that article that I found interesting:

One hundred subjects may not seem like that many when it comes to calculating
something as ephemeral as true beauty, but Leyvand contends that attractiveness
ratings are, in fact, universal—that the same numbers would hold true in any
country or race, barring a region’s specific cultural preferences for eye and
hair color (which, interestingly, he says weigh more heavily upon our perception
of someone’s attractiveness than skin tone). “Beauty is not in the eye of the
beholder,” Leyvand says. “If I took the same photo and showed it to people from
10 different regions with 10 different backgrounds, I would get roughly the same
results.”

3) http://discovermagazine.com/2007/jun/blinded-by-science

This is an article I found on Discover about a surgeon who first began his practice by fixing health issues such as cleft palletes and chins, but soon found that his patients were not aesthetically attractive after the operation. The article discusses plastic surgery.