Skin blood perfusion and oxygenation colour affect perceived human health
Abstract
Skin blood perfusion and oxygenation depends upon cardiovascular, hormonal and circulatory health in humans and provides socio-sexual signals of underlying physiology, dominance and reproductive status in some primates. We allowed participants to manipulate colour calibrated facial photographs along empirically-measured oxygenated and deoxygenated blood colour axes both separately and simultaneously, to optimise healthy appearance. Participants increased skin blood colour, particularly oxygenated, above basal levels to optimise healthy appearance. We show, therefore, that skin blood perfusion and oxygenation influence perceived health in a way that may be important to mate choice.
Citation
Stephen , I D , Coetzee , V , Law Smith , M J & Perrett , D I 2009 , ' Skin blood perfusion and oxygenation colour affect perceived human health ' , PLoS One , vol. 4 , no. 4 , e5083 . https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0005083
Publication
PLoS One
Status
Peer reviewed
ISSN
1932-6203Type
Journal article
Rights
© 2009 Stephen et al. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
Description
I Stephen was funded by a BBSRC Studentship.Collections
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