An international team including HSE researchers has conducted the largest ever cross-cultural study of appearance-enhancing behaviors. They have found that people worldwide spend an average of four hours a day on enhancing their beauty. Caring for one’s appearance does not depend on gender, and older people worry as much about looking their best as the young do. The strongest predictor of attractiveness-enhancing behaviors appears to be social media usage. The study findings have been published in Evolution and Human Behavior.
An international team including HSE researchers has conducted the largest ever cross-cultural study of appearance-enhancing behaviors. They have found that people worldwide spend an average of four hours a day on enhancing their beauty. Caring for one’s appearance does not depend on gender, and older people worry as much about looking their best as the young do. The strongest predictor of attractiveness-enhancing behaviors appears to be social media usage. The study findings have been published in Evolution and Human Behavior.
People have always valued beauty. Throughout history, we have gone to great lengths to enhance our physical appearance. Early Homo sapiens are known to have applied pigment to decorate their bodies, and ancient civilizations widely used cosmetics, ornate clothing, and jewelry. According to some scholars, our tendency for appearance enhancement might have originated from primate self-grooming behaviors.
But what exactly motivates us to spend time trying to look more physically attractive? From an evolutionary perspective, this may be part of mating behavior, since good looks indicate good health and good genetics, maximizing the chances of having healthy offspring; therefore, physical appearance is one of the key criteria in selecting a mate. From this perspective, women are assumed to be more interested in enhancing their physical attractiveness than men, and younger unmarried women are thought to be particularly concerned with their appearance.
