Broad Or Narrow, Which Choice Tonight?


Psychologists these days are heavily into measuring ratios of bits and pieces of our bodies. The digit ratios of our fingers are taken as a surefire guide to our success in life’s struggle to be the best. The latest ratio to come back to the surface is face ratios.

Never heard of it? It is the distance between your ears divided by the distance between your mouth and your eyes. Unlike your digit ratio, this is not being used as a surrogate for the testosterone level that you had to deal with while in utero. Your face ratio is a measure of how other people view your character.

A high face ratio and you will be seen as masculine. Low and it will be feminine. Geniole et al in this weeks Public Library of Science have asked a 100 people to glance at people pictures and rate them in terms of masculinity, femininity, aggressiveness, and nurturing nature (1).

Broad faces were (as previously) rated as more masculine and also as more potentially aggressive. This was true if the faces were male or female. Although the viewers were a mix of men and women, the more feminine the faces (low ratio), the higher they were rated on an attractiveness scale, regardless of whether they were of males or females.

Low ratio faces had the exclusive for a nurturing look. That is males with low face ratios have a higher paternal investment potential.

Can we soon expect to find a tape measure in every women’s bag when she is on a night out so she can quickly confirm whether he is the macho-man that will love her and leave her or if the impression that he has a high paternal investment potential isn’t clouded by alcohol?

  1. http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0030366


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