Abstract
Although many researchers have argued that facial traits evolved as honest cues to women’s current fertility (possibly via changes in facial femininity), evidence that women’s facial attractiveness is significantly, positively related to probability of conception throughout menstrual cycle is mixed. These mixed results could reflect differences among studies in the methods used to assess facial attractiveness (i.e., forced choice versus rating-scale methods), differences in how fertility was assessed, differences in perceiver characteristics (e.g., their own attractiveness), and facial preferences possibly being moderated by the characteristics of the living environment. Consequently, the current study investigated the putative effect of cyclical changes in fertility on women’s facial attractiveness and femininity (1) using forced choice and rating-scale method, (2) conducting both ovulation tests and repeated daily measures of estradiol assessing the conception probability, (3) based on a culturally diverse sample of perceivers, while (4) controlling for inter-individual variation. Although we found some limited evidence that women’s faces became more attractive when conception probability increased, these effects differed depending on the methods used to assess both attractiveness and fertility. Moreover, where statistically significant effects were observed, the effect sizes were extremely small. Similarly, there was little robust evidence that perceivers’ characteristics reliably predicted preferences for fertility cues. Collectively, these results suggest that mixed results in previous studies examining cyclical fluctuation in women’s facial attractiveness are unlikely to reflect inter-cultural differences and are more likely to reflect differences in the methods used to assess facial attractiveness and fertility.
Highlights
Many researchers have argued that facial traits evolved as honest cues to women’s current fertility, evidence that women’s facial attractiveness is significantly, positively related to probability of conception throughout menstrual cycle is mixed
Previous studies have suggested a correlation between changes in conception probability throughout the menstrual cycle and women’s facial attractiveness[4,5]
Levels of sex hormones fluctuate throughout menstrual cycle, and these pre-defined fluctuations are necessary for a successful conception[10]
Summary
Many researchers have argued that facial traits evolved as honest cues to women’s current fertility (possibly via changes in facial femininity), evidence that women’s facial attractiveness is significantly, positively related to probability of conception throughout menstrual cycle is mixed. Some evidence has been reported for a link between preferences for sexual dimorphism and changes in harshness of the environmental conditions[14], income inequality and homicide rate[15], national health indices[16,17], and the urbanization and developmental rate of the population[18] Most of these studies investigate women’s preference for sexual dimorphism in male faces—comparatively little work has investigated potential cross-national effects on preference for facial femininity in women
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have