Your best side may be your left cheek,
according to a new study by Kelsey Blackburn and James Schirillo from Wake
Forest University in the US.
Their
work shows that images of the left side of the face are perceived and rated as
more pleasant than pictures of the right side of the face, possibly due to the
fact that we present a greater intensity of emotion on the left side of our
face. Their work is published online in Springer's journal Experimental Brain
Research.
Others
can judge human emotions in large part from facial expressions.
Our highly specialized facial muscles are
capable of expressing many unique emotions. Research suggests that the left
side of the face is more intense and active during emotional expression.
It is also noteworthy that Western artists' portraits predominantly present
subjects' left profile.
Blackburn
and Schirillo investigated whether there are differences in the perception of the
left and right sides of the face in real-life photographs of individuals.
The
authors explain: "Our results suggest that posers' left cheeks tend to
exhibit a greater intensity of emotion, which observers find more aesthetically
pleasing. Our findings provide support for a number of concepts – the notions
of lateralized emotion and right hemispheric dominance with the right side of
the brain controlling the left side of the face during emotional expression."
Participants
were asked to rate the pleasantness of both sides of male and female faces on
gray-scale photographs. The researchers presented both original photographs and
mirror-reversed images, so that an original right-cheek image appeared to be a
left-cheek image and vice versa.
They
found a strong preference for left-sided portraits, regardless of whether the
pictures were originally taken of the left side, or mirror-reversed. The left
side of the face was rated as more aesthetically pleasing for both male and
female posers.
These
aesthetic preferences were also confirmed by measurements of pupil size, a
reliable unconscious measurement of interest. Indeed, pupils dilate in response
to more interesting stimuli – here more pleasant-looking faces, and constrict
when looking at unpleasant images. In the experiment, pupil size increased with
pleasantness ratings.
More
information: Experimental
Brain Research; DOI
10.1007/s00221-012-3091-y
Provided
by Springer
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