Oxygenated-blood colour change thresholds for perceived facial redness, health, and attractiveness
Abstract
Blood oxygenation level is associated with cardiovascular fitness, and raising oxygenated blood colouration in human faces increases perceived health. The current study used a two-alternative forced choice (2AFC) psychophysics design to quantify the oxygenated blood colour (redness) change threshold required to affect perception of facial colour, health and attractiveness. Detection thresholds for colour judgments were lower than those for health and attractiveness, which did not differ. The results suggest redness preferences do not reflect a sensory bias, rather preferences may be based on accurate indications of health status. Furthermore, results suggest perceived health and attractiveness may be perceptually equivalent when they are assessed based on facial redness. Appearance-based motivation for lifestyle change can be effective; thus future studies could assess the degree to which cardiovascular fitness increases face redness and could quantify changes in aerobic exercise needed to increase facial attractiveness.
Citation
Re , D E , Whitehead , R D , Xiao , D & Perrett , D I 2011 , ' Oxygenated-blood colour change thresholds for perceived facial redness, health, and attractiveness ' , PLoS ONE , vol. 6 , no. 3 , e17859 , pp. - . https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0017859
Publication
PLoS ONE
Status
Peer reviewed
ISSN
1932-6203Type
Journal article
Rights
© 2011 Re 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.
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