Abstract
Guo et al. (2011) showed that attractiveness was detectable in peripheral vision. Since there are different types of attractiveness (Rhodes, 2006), we investigated how beauty and cuteness are detected in peripheral vision with a brief presentation. Participants (n = 45) observed two Japanese female faces for 100 ms, then were asked to respond which face was more beautiful (or cuter). The results indicated that both beauty and cuteness were detectable in peripheral vision, but not in the same manner. Discrimination rates for judging beauty were invariant in peripheral and central vision, while discrimination rates for judging cuteness declined in peripheral vision as compared with central vision. This was not explained by lower resolution in peripheral vision. In addition, for male participants, it was more difficult to judge cuteness than beauty in peripheral vision, thus suggesting that gender differences can have a certain effect when judging cuteness. Therefore, central vision might be suitable for judging cuteness while judging beauty might not be affected by either central or peripheral vision. This might be related with the functional difference between beauty and cuteness.
Highlights
It is well known that an attractive face captures attention (Shimojo et al, 2003; Leder et al, 2010) and Guo et al (2011) showed that attractiveness is even detectable in peripheral vision
Consistency of Rating Beauty and Cuteness In order to confirm the consistency for rating beauty and cuteness between the main and preliminary experiments, the facial images were ranked based on the results of the self-paced judgments by using paired comparison (Thurston’s method)
Our results showed that judging beauty is invariant in peripheral and central vision, while judging cuteness is degraded in peripheral vision
Summary
It is well known that an attractive face captures attention (Shimojo et al, 2003; Leder et al, 2010) and Guo et al (2011) showed that attractiveness is even detectable in peripheral vision They discussed that low spatial frequency information can be used for judging attractiveness. These findings have suggested that judging attractiveness is possible even though available visual information can be limited This is related to the idea that attractiveness is important for mate selection. The attractiveness as a lab partner in Franklin and Adams (2010) is considered to be social attractiveness It should be investigated how the different types of attractiveness are detected in peripheral vision
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