The perceived attractiveness of preterm infants

Maier, Richard A.; Holmes, Deborah L.; Slaymaker, Frank L.; Reich, Jill N.

doi:10.1016/s0163-6383(84)80002-8

Cited by 56 publications

(36 citation statements)

References 10 publications

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“…This is in line with previous studies showing that ‘cuter’ infants are rated as more friendly, cheerful, and likeable [39], [47], [48], [49], [50] and are rated as more ‘adoptable’ [51].…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 93%

The Motivational Salience of Infant Faces Is Similar for Men and Women

et al. 2011

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Infant facial features are thought to be powerful elicitors of caregiving behaviour. It has been widely assumed that men and women respond in different ways to those features, such as a large forehead and eyes and round protruding cheeks, colloquially described as ‘cute’. We investigated experimentally potential differences using measures of both conscious appraisal (‘liking’) and behavioural responsivity (‘wanting’) to real world infant and adult faces in 71 non-parents. Overall, women gave significantly higher ‘liking’ ratings for infant faces (but not adult faces) compared to men. However, this difference was not seen in the ‘wanting’ task, where we measured the willingness of men and women to key-press to increase or decrease viewing duration of an infant face. Further analysis of sensitivity to cuteness, categorising infants by degree of infantile features, revealed that both men and women showed a graded significant increase in both positive attractiveness ratings and viewing times to the ‘cutest’ infants. We suggest that infant faces may have similar motivational salience to men and women, despite gender idiosyncrasies in their conscious appraisal.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 93%

The Motivational Salience of Infant Faces Is Similar for Men and Women

et al. 2011

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“…These behavioral outcomes would have obvious advantages for infant survival rates among species with high levels parental care, such as humans. Indeed, infant attractiveness or cuteness is linked to positive affective responses (Hildebrandt, 1978;Langlois, Ritter, Casey, & Sawin, 1995;Power, Hildebrandt, & Fitzgerald, 1982;Stephan & Langlois, 1984), motivation to care for the infant (Alley, 1983;Badr & Abdallah, 2001;Glocker et al, 2008;Maier, Holmes, Slaymaker, & Reich, 1984;Volk, Lukjanczuk, & Quinsey, 2005;Volk & Quinsey, 2002;Waller, Volk, & Quinsey, 2004;Weiss, 1994), and reduction in negative affective responses to infants (Frodi, 1978;Langlois et al, 1995). Exposure to cute infants and young animals has also been shown to stimulate increased carefulness or tenderness (Nittono, Fukushima, Yano, & Moriya, 2012;Sherman, Haidt, & Coan, 2009).…”

Section: Infant Cutenessmentioning

confidence: 99%

Neural and behavioral responses to attractiveness in adult and infant faces

Hahn

Perrett

2014

Neuroscience & Biobehavioral Reviews

137

106

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Facial attractiveness provides a very powerful motivation for sexual and parental behavior. We therefore review the importance of faces to the study of neurobiological control of human reproductive motivations. For heterosexual individuals there is a common brain circuit involving the nucleus accumbens, the medial prefrontal, dorsal anterior cingulate and the orbitofrontal cortices that is activated more by attractive than unattractive faces, particularly for faces of the opposite sex. Behavioral studies indicate parallel effects of attractiveness on incentive salience or willingness to work to see faces. Both work/effort and brain activation to the sight of opposite sex attractiveness is more pronounced in men than women, perhaps reflecting the greater importance assigned to physical attractiveness by men when evaluating a potential mate. Studies comparing heterosexual and homosexual observers indicate the orbitofrontal cortex and mediodorsal thalamus are more activated by faces of the desired sex than faces of the less preferred sex, independent of observer gender or sexual orientation. Infant faces activate brain regions that partially overlap with those responsive to adult faces. Infant faces provide a powerful stimulus, which also elicits sex differences in behavior and brain responses that appear dependent on sex hormones. There are many facial dimensions affecting perceptions of attractiveness that remain unexplored in neuroimaging, and we conclude by suggesting that future studies combining parametric manipulation of face images, brain imaging, hormone assays and genetic polymorphisms in receptor sensitivity are needed to understand the neural and hormonal mechanisms underlying reproductive drives.3

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“…Hildebrandt and Fitzgerald (1983) demonstrated that infants who are judged to be cuter by neutral evaluators actually receive more smiles and vocalizations from their parents in their daily lives. Several studies of child abuse suggested that weak baby schema might be one of the many factors contributing to child abuse; infants who have less babyish faces tend to elicit less nurturing from adults and inhibit adult aggression less effectively (e.g., Frodi et al 1978;Maier et al 1984). These findings lead to the hypothesis that baby schema intrinsically provoke nurturing behavior in adults.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Development of preference for baby faces across species in humans (Homo sapiens)

Sanefuji

Hidehiro

Hashiya

2006

J Ethol

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Previous studies have revealed that there is a close relationship between the strength of an infant's baby schema and the degree of its perceived cuteness. The present study investigated the development of preference for baby schema in humans by examining the recognition of the cuteness of baby faces; two studies were conducted to examine whether children's evaluation of cuteness differed from that of adults. Facial photographs not only of humans (Homo sapiens), but a chimpanzee (Pan troglodytes), rabbits (Oryctolagus cuniculus), dogs (Canis familiaris) and cats (Felis sylvestris catus) at different ages were used as stimuli. The volunteers were requested to rank these photographs in order of cuteness. Study 1 suggested that there was a range of period during which adults perceived the faces of these five species to be the cutest. Study 2 indicated that children's judgment of cuteness closely corresponded to that of the adults. In conclusion, the preference for baby schema is observed in humans even before they get to be sexually mature enough to reproduce. Childhood preference for baby schema might be the basis of social learning, including caretaking behaviors.

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The perceived attractiveness of preterm infants

Cited by 56 publications

References 10 publications

The Motivational Salience of Infant Faces Is Similar for Men and Women

The Motivational Salience of Infant Faces Is Similar for Men and Women

Neural and behavioral responses to attractiveness in adult and infant faces

Development of preference for baby faces across species in humans (Homo sapiens)

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