اثرات متقابل فرهنگی رنگ، اما نه مردسالاری مورفولوژیکی، بر جذابیت درک چهره های مردان

Much attractiveness research has focused on face shape. The role of masculinity (which for adults is thought to be a relatively stable shape cue to developmental testosterone levels) in male facial attractiveness has been examined, with mixed results. Recent work on the perception of skin color (a more variable cue to current health status) indicates that increased skin redness, yellowness, and lightness enhance apparent health. It has been suggested that stable cues such as masculinity may be less important to attractiveness judgments than short-term, more variable health cues. We examined associations between male facial attractiveness, masculinity, and skin color in African and Caucasian populations. Masculinity was not found to be associated with attractiveness in either ethnic group. However, skin color was found to be an important predictor of attractiveness judgments, particularly for own-ethnicity faces. Our results suggest that more plastic health cues, such as skin color, are more important than developmental cues such as masculinity. Further, unfamiliarity with natural skin color variation in other ethnic groups may limit observers' ability to utilize these color cues.

A number of researchers have examined the aspects of facial appearance that affect perceived attractiveness, focusing primarily on facial shape cues such as symmetry (Perrett et al., 1999) and averageness (Rhodes, Sumich, & Byatt, 1999). Sexual dimorphism in shape has also received much research interest, with studies finding that the femininity of women's faces is closely associated with their rated attractiveness (Perrett et al., 1998 and Rhodes, 2006). However, findings regarding the attractiveness of masculine features in male faces have been more mixed.

In line with the main part of the paper, these new analyses confirm that color is a stronger predictor of attractiveness than structural cues to masculinity in African and Caucasian men’s faces rated by own-ethnicity women. In line with the findings in the main part of this paper, neither masculinity nor color significantly predicted attractiveness of men’s faces rated by other-ethnicity women in the regression analyses.