It is all in the face: carotenoid skin coloration loses attractiveness outside the face

Lefevre, Carmen E.; Ewbank, Michael P.; Calder, Andrew J.; Hagen, Elisabeth von dem; Perrett, David I.

doi:10.1098/rsbl.2013.0633

Cited by 50 publications

(51 citation statements)

References 25 publications

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“…Given the assumption that levels of sex hormones remain relatively stable between puberty and menopause, current sex hormone levels can be seen as a proxy for pubertal hormone levels, mirroring the hormonal state of the critical pubertal period. Similar assumptions have been made in research looking at associations between hormone levels and facial appearance in men (e.g., Lefevre, Ewbank, Calder, von dem Hagen, & Perrett, 2013;Penton-Voak & Chen, 2004;Pound, Penton-Voak, & Surridge, 2009 A c c e p t e d M a n u s c r i p t 16 We note that in the present study we focused only on shape information. Several studies suggest that other information, such as for example facial surface information (skin colour or texture) also influences perceptions of attractiveness (Fink et al, 2001;Lefevre et al, 2013).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 71%

“…Similar assumptions have been made in research looking at associations between hormone levels and facial appearance in men (e.g., Lefevre, Ewbank, Calder, von dem Hagen, & Perrett, 2013;Penton-Voak & Chen, 2004;Pound, Penton-Voak, & Surridge, 2009 A c c e p t e d M a n u s c r i p t 16 We note that in the present study we focused only on shape information. Several studies suggest that other information, such as for example facial surface information (skin colour or texture) also influences perceptions of attractiveness (Fink et al, 2001;Lefevre et al, 2013). It seems that, particularly in women, both shape and surface information are relevant for an attractive appearance (Torrance, Wincenciak, Hahn, DeBruine, & Jones, 2014).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 71%

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

Probst

Bobst

Lobmaier

2016

Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology

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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.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 71%

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 71%

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

Probst

Bobst

Lobmaier

2016

Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology

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“…Hagen, & Perrett, 2013;Re, Whitehead, Xiao, & Perrett, 2011;Tan & Stephen, 2013). This suggests that skin color plays an important role in social communication.…”

Section: Emotion-color Associationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Emotion-color associations in the context of the face.

Thorstenson

Elliot

Pazda

et al. 2018

Emotion

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Facial expressions of emotion contain important information that is perceived and used by observers to understand others' emotional state. While there has been considerable research into perceptions of facial musculature and emotion, less work has been conducted to understand perceptions of facial coloration and emotion. The current research examined emotion-color associations in the context of the face. Across four experiments, participants were asked to manipulate the color of face, or shape, stimuli along two color axes (i.e., red-green, yellow-blue) for six target emotions (i.e., anger, disgust, fear, happiness, sadness, surprise). The results yielded a pattern that is consistent with physiological and psychological models of emotion.Keywords: Emotion, Color, Face, Association EMOTION-COLOR ASSOCIATIONS 3Outward expressions of emotion convey information about an individual's internal physiological and psychological state. Perceptual expectations regarding emotion are generated and reinforced through continued interactions with others. Specifically, perceivable characteristics of emotion are detected and stored as information, which is later used to effectively predict and understand others' emotion (Jack, Garrod, & Schyns, 2013;Yuille & Kersten, 2006). These expectations therefore reflect deeply engrained emotion-perception associations. By studying these associations, we can understand how emotion information is transmitted and interpreted as social information.An important, yet understudied property of emotion expression is facial coloration. While a substantial amount of research on emotion expression has been dedicated to investigating facial musculature (Ekman, 1993), very little empirical work has been conducted to examine the role of facial coloration changes in emotion communication. However, facial coloration reflects physiological and psychological processes that are biologically and socially relevant. For example, facial color has been shown to influence perceptions of health (Stephen, Coetzee, Law Smith, & Perrett, 2009;Young, Thorstenson, & Pazda, 2016), attractiveness (Jones, Little, Burt, & Perrett, 2004;Thorstenson, Pazda, Elliot, & Perrett, 2016), and personality (Stephen, Oldham, Perrett, & Barton, 2012). Further, because the expression of emotion cues is an important component of emotion communication (Keltner & Haidt, 1999), we should expect to find cognitive and perceptual mechanisms that facilitate detecting such cues to emotion in others (Phelps, Ling, & Carrasco, 2006). In line with this, there is evidence that trichromatic color vision in humans is well suited, even optimized, for detecting subtle skin color changes resulting from physiological processes (Changizi, Zhang, & Shimojo, 2006; Lefevre, Ewbank, Calder, EMOTION-COLOR ASSOCIATIONS 4Hagen, & Perrett, 2013;Re, Whitehead, Xiao, & Perrett, 2011;Tan & Stephen, 2013). This suggests that skin color plays an important role in social communication. The current research aims to investigate observers' emotion-color associatio...

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“…The task was completed individually online through the university intranet (virtual classroom). Previous research on face perception has demonstrated that laboratory and online studies produce equivalent results (e.g., DeBruine, Jones, Unger, Little, & Feinberg, 2007;Lefevre, Ewbank, Calder, von dem Hagen, & Perrett, 2013).…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Perception of Sexual Orientation from Facial Structure: A Study with Artificial Face Models

González-Álvarez

2017

Arch Sex Behav

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Research has shown that lay people can perceive sexual orientation better than chance from face stimuli. However, the relation between facial structure and sexual orientation has been scarcely examined. Recently, an extensive morphometric study on a large sample of Canadian people (Skorska, Geniole, Vrysen, McCormick, & Bogaert, 2015) identified three (in men) and four (in women) facial features as unique multivariate predictors of sexual orientation in each sex group. The present study tested the perceptual validity of these facial traits with two experiments based on realistic artificial 3D face models created by manipulating the key parameters and presented to Spanish participants. Experiment 1 included 200 White and Black face models of both sexes. The results showed an overall accuracy (0.74) clearly above chance in a binary hetero/homosexual judgment task and significant differences depending on the race and sex of the face models. Experiment 2 produced five versions of 24 artificial faces of both sexes varying the key parameters in equal steps, and participants had to rate on a 1-7 scale how likely they thought that the depicted person had a homosexual sexual orientation. Rating scores displayed an almost perfect linear regression as a function of the parameter steps. In summary, both experiments demonstrated the perceptual validity of the seven multivariate predictors identified by Skorska et al. and open up new avenues for further research on this issue with artificial face models.

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It is all in the face: carotenoid skin coloration loses attractiveness outside the face

Cited by 50 publications

References 25 publications

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

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

Emotion-color associations in the context of the face.

Perception of Sexual Orientation from Facial Structure: A Study with Artificial Face Models

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