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- Why do we fall in love? It,s a tough question to answer,
but research is now offering new insights into our sexual chemistry.
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- Scientists are discovering that who we fall in love with
has less to do with a pretty face and more to do with a primitive biological
understanding of who is best to have children with. "Males are being
attracted to fertility clues, signs that this is a fertile woman, said
Victor Johnston, a professor of psychology at New Mexico State University,
where researchers are conducting experiments with volunteers who rate the
attractiveness of certain faces. These experiments are beginning to reveal
that what we think of as beautiful is remarkably the same from person to
person " even from culture to culture. And it has a lot to do with
hormones.
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- So, what do women look for in a man?
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- "She,s looking for a male that has a broad lower
jaw, broader than average. She,s looking for sunken eyes, bushy eyebrows,
more cues to higher levels of testosterone, Johnston said.
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- And what does a man see as beautiful?
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- "A short lower jaw, full lips, large eyes, these
are indicating high levels of estrogen, low levels of testosterone "
fertility, he said.
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- But it is not always so straightforward. At St. Andrews
University in Scotland, researchers worked together with scientists in
Japan to find out what faces appealed to people in both countries. No surprise
" both men and women preferred the most feminine female faces.
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- But when women looked at men,s faces, the researchers
found something unexpected. The women liked guys who are a little bit feminine
" you might say vulnerable.
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- "We expected women to prefer the kind of rugged
looking guy, the typical rugged masculine looking guy. But then we realized
that these masculine faces just didn,t look as friendly or as nice or as
pleasant as the feminine looking guys, said Ian Penton-Voak, a psychologist
at St. Andrews University.
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- A big question is, "Do our notions of attractiveness
come from what we see in the mirror " or in magazines and on TV? The
answer seems to be far more ingrained than that.
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- Judith Langlois, a professor of psychology at the University
of Texas, finds that infants as young as three months respond better to
faces that meet the cultural standards for beauty.
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- "Now, these 3-month-olds have not seen much TV.
They have not read Vogue magazine. So it,s very unlikely that they have
acquired these preferences through socialization, Langlois said.
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- So, it seems that we are born with concepts of beauty,
but scientists emphasize that beauty is only one of many factors that influence
the way we find the one we love.
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