Men wearing masks turned out to look good-looking, and what kind of mask is most highly rated by women?



The pandemic of the new coronavirus infection has made it commonplace for everyone to wear a mask. Therefore, as a result of an experiment in which a psychology expert asked a woman to judge the face of a man wearing a mask, the mask has the effect of making the man look attractive, and the effect depends on the type of mask. It turned out to be different.

Beyond the beauty of occlusion: medical masks increase facial attractiveness more than other face coverings | Cognitive Research: Principles and Implications | Full Text

https://cognitiveresearchjournal.springeropen.com/articles/10.1186/s41235-021-00351-9

Face masks'make wearers look more attractive', study suggests --News --Cardiff University
https://www.cardiff.ac.uk/news/view/2595728-face-masks-make-wearers-look-more-attractive,-study-suggests

While masks have the effect of preventing infectious diseases, they are also an element that makes us imagine illness and unhealthyness, so it is a study by Professor Junichiro Kawahara of Hokkaido University that especially blue hygiene masks make the face less attractive. by turns out it is.



To find out if this phenomenon, called the 'sanitary-mask effect,' was influenced by the widespread use of masks by pandemics, Dr. Michael Lewis and Oliver, psychologists at Cardiff University in the United Kingdom.・ Heath's research team conducted an experiment in which a woman could see the face of a man wearing a mask.

Seven months after the mandatory mask wearing in the United Kingdom, the experiment was conducted in February 2021 with the participation of a female undergraduate student in the Department of Psychology, Cardiff University. Of the 43 women who responded to the recruitment, 40 were 18 to 24 years old, and 40 of the 43 were white women. In addition,

among the male facial photographs recorded in the Chicago Face Database in the experiment, 20 photographs of males with high 'appearance attractiveness' quantitatively evaluated by an outside judge, and low attractiveness. A total of 40 photographs of 20 male faces were used.

Dr. Lewis and others have totaled the images of 'real face (upper left)', 'face with the lower half hidden by a book (upper right)', 'wearing a cloth mask (lower left)' and 'wearing a hygiene mask (lower right)' from each man's face photo. We created 160 sheets, presented them to the participants, and asked them to rate their attractiveness on a scale of 1 to 10. The order was 'sanitary mask,' 'cloth mask,' 'face with the lower half hidden by a book,' and 'real face.' The result is that it is highly attractive. In other words, men wearing hygiene masks were rated by women as having the most attractive faces. This tendency was the same for men who were judged to be attractive by prior evaluation of their real faces and men who were not.



Participants responded to the post-questionnaire that 'masks have become a part of daily life in the past year' and 'wearing masks is effective in preventing new coronavirus infections.'

Regarding the opposite result of the previous study that 'wearing a hygiene mask makes it less attractive,' Dr. Lewis said, 'This study reveals that the pandemic has changed the psychology of people wearing masks. This has to do with evolutionary psychology that influences our partner selection. '' Previously, the signs of a mask-like illness were a major disadvantage, but today they wear masks. I didn't think, 'He's sick, so keep away from him.' Rather, he's used to a medical worker wearing a surgical mask, so wearing a blue hygiene mask is an expert. It may have been linked to the uniqueness and led to a sense of security and good feeling. '

Dr. Lewis is planning further research with male participants to see if the results apply to both men and women.

in Science, Posted by log1l_ks