Studies and Videos on Physical Attractiveness

Beauty of Symmetry. In the study depicted in the video, eight out of every ten participants in the study preferred the symmetrical face of either the man or the woman. The researcher believes that the responses to symmetry are largely subconscious, and that they are related to physical and genetic health because of the fact that symmetry is determined in the womb. In Is your Face Attractive? the researchers show that 81%of men prefer "feminine" faces; and the majority of women prefer manly faces.

It is suggested that the diff in face preference is caused by sex hormones. Shapely Figures. The researcher uses software that scans with an eye tracker to see where the person is looking at the images and for how long at each spot. The researcher found that there is a part of the brain that is activated when looking at the human body in particular, and mainly to the hip and waist areas when judging whether figure is male or female.

In Sexy Swaying Bodies, both the "hip sway" for women and the masculine "swagger" for men were perceived to be attractive. When people change the way they walk, it is to conform to the extremes of their gender. The researcher concludes that the preferences are not necessarily about health and fertility but also about easy to process categories of gender perception. The researcher also wanted to understand when young children start to recognize differences between male and female bodies.

It appears that by the age of six, children make judgments and classifications on gender because the four-year-old subjects see the differences in the bodies but does not place those bodies into gendered categories. The six-year-olds, on the other hand, do. 3. Signals of the Flesh. This study examines patches of skin on peoples' cheeks and asks participants to rate the attractiveness of the person who the skin belongs to.

The people base their reactions on factors like complexion, whether or not there are blemishes and what times, tone of skin, and smoothness. The responses to skin patches are "deeply rooted in human evolution" because skin signals health. In particular, testosterone production can inhibit immune system and resistance to parasites. The skin signals overall health. 4. Sexy Voices. In this study, the participants rate voices for sex appeal.

The researchers found that men prefer higher, softer voices that are more "feminine" to them; whereas women prefer men with deeper more "masculine" voices. It is believed that young women and women with high estrogen have higher pitched voices and that men prefer these women for reproductive attractiveness. Similarly, the female participants preferred the deeper voices in males as being men who are "stronger" or "bigger" because pitch is related to testosterone at puberty and testosterone levels with being a good sexual partner. 5. Incestuous Instincts and Unsexy Scents.

These studies show that there are biological and genetically programmed markers that make people averse to their own gene pool. In Unsexy Scents, the researchers show that individuals may be biologically predisposed to find the smells of their relatives aversive, likely as a means of protecting against incest. The smells are perceived of as being "unsexy." This is because closely related individuals have similar scents. Moreover, incest leads to problems in a genetic line such as compromised immune system.

Incest avoidance is therefore built into human genetics as a protective function. It may have evolved over time because the human scent of smell is largely unconscious, which is why aversion to incest is instinctual as much as it is socially sanctioned. In Incestuous Instincts, the emphasis is on appearance in the face and the same results were found in that the people did not find their "sibling" attractive. People are programmed to avoid mating with those who would give them "unhealthy offspring." 6.

Summary of 1-5: These videos show that perceptions of attractiveness and gender are biologically driven and unconscious. People are drawn naturally to mates who are healthy, and we perceive health through subtle cues that are generally subconscious but that can be made conscious. The brain perceives things like voice, skin, and facial symmetry before the conscious mind processes what is going on. Unfortunately, the researchers in this study focus only on heterosexual attractiveness and it would be interesting to know what the results would be for homosexual attraction too. 7.

Testosterone vs. Dopamine and Sex vs. Love. In "Sex vs. Love," the researcher wants to find out if there is actual physical evidence of love, such as neurobiological markers of the "brain in love." Using an MRI scanner, the researchers showed photos to the person and look at brain and found that the dopamine area of brain and a primitive part of brain (the desire/crave section) both were activated when a photo of the sex partner were shown.

The study shows that sex and love exist in different brain systems. In the text with dopamine, the researchers discuss the "elation and euphoria" factor to show that after an adrenaline rush like bungee jumping, people perceive members of the opposite sex as being even more attractive because they are seeking more dopamine. It is like an addiction. 8. Attractive Man Funk and Female Copulance. In these videos, the researchers examine preferences according to smell alone. One focuses on male responses and the other female.

It was found that there are distinct emotional responses to odors, and genetic responses to odor too. The researchers discuss the "histocompatibility complex," embedded in DNA, in which people with similar immune systems might be attracted to one another. Women also change their responses to smells based on what period of their monthly cycle they are in, with ovulating women being less averse to "man funk." The immune system is present in body odor because it determines what bacteria live on the skin and what makes sweat smell. 9.

The Dating and Mating Pool and Out of Your League. These studies show that people initially aim high, but later realize that they "settle" into a lower number. The study showed that interestingly,.