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• Does being attractive give you an advantage?

Does being attractive give you an advantage?

The evolution of beauty lies within this one statement.

Good-looking people enjoy social advantages unavailable to the average. Why should the so - called average individual have to live with these preconceived norms?

Attractive people many times are looked at with the 'what is beautiful is good' stereotype - a common belief that physically attractive people have positive characteristics such as intelligence, competence, and moral virtue.

It starts with when we are born...

In an experiment conducted developmental psychologist, Alan Slater, 100 newborn babies, an average of 2.5 days old, were shown photographs of pairs of faces which were matched in everything except attractiveness. The infants apparently gazed at the face the psychologists deemed as the more attractive face rather than the other one.

Research determines that while it has been suggested humans develop their concept of attractiveness based on the "averages" of all the faces seen, and that features which are close to the human average in size and shape - are the most attractive, it is interesting to note that newborn infants, with their limited exposure to human features will still chose to look at the more attractive of two faces.

Ancient history...

Helen of Troy, the epitome of beauty- philosophers tried to answer the question of what made Helen and other women beautiful. Plato contemplated and wrote of a so-called "golden proportion," which described in great detail the proportions of eyes to nose and the width and length of an actual face.

Researchers in the modern psychological and biological world have attributed this golden proportion rule to symmetry, perhaps this is the answer the Greeks were looking for.

What does this mean in the present...?

Cosmetic surgery is not new to the world- the earliest surgeries being practiced as early as 8th century BC, in the Far East and in Europe. The difference is they were developed for reconstructive purposes. In that development, modern day surgeons are now able to turn back the hands of time, and why not?

Today many psychologists and sociologists claim that the wide spread use of cosmetic surgery may hinder the emotional growth in developing teenagers, but the fact remains, even if plastic surgery corrects a physical attribute - when the patient feels good about themselves, that makes the surgery an undeniable success.

The evolution of beauty is imminent and ever changing, but patient expectations are where many questions remain. Patients are encouraged to take time to evaluate their expectations, make sure they are realistic and determine if their goals are realistic and achievable. Many times people come in with pictures of celebrities, and forget that they are an individual, and the procedure preformed will be to enhance their own natural beauty- not to be turned into someone else.

When the options are so many, and the results so beautiful, why wouldn't we take nature into our own hands and create the beauty we see for ourselves? The emotional pleasure derived from seeing the beautification of what once made us "average"- is priceless. It is only human nature.

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