Age, Health and Attractiveness Perception of Virtual (Rendered) Human Hair

Abstract

The social significance of physical appearance and beauty has been documented in many studies. It is known that even subtle manipulations of facial morphology and skin condition can alter people’s perception of a person’s age, health and attractiveness. While the variation in facial morphology and skin condition cues has been studied quite extensively, comparably little is known on the effect of hair on social perception. This has been partly caused by the technical difficulty of creating appropriate stimuli for investigations of people’s response to systematic variation of certain hair characteristics, such as color and style, while keeping other features constant. Here, we present a modeling approach to the investigation of human hair perception using computer-generated, virtual (rendered) human hair. In three experiments, we manipulated hair diameter (Experiment 1), hair density (Experiment 2), and hair style (Experiment 3) of human (female) head hair and studied perceptions of age, health and attractiveness. Our results show that even subtle changes in these features have an impact on hair perception. We discuss our findings with reference to previous studies on condition-dependent quality cues in women that influence human social perception, thereby suggesting that hair is a salient feature of human physical appearance, which contributes to the perception of beauty.

Hair colour and skin colour together influence perceptions of age, health and attractiveness in lightly pigmented young women

“…The outline of the hair was masked and L*a*b* colours of warm blonde, medium copper, medium brown, and dark brown stimuli as used in Fink et al . were applied using gradation curves, selective colour correction, and lightness/contrast manipulation in Photoshop.…”

“…This led to the suggestion that blonde hair could be regarded as an 'ideal' of feminine beauty. More recent studies, however, challenge this suggestion, as darker hair colours were perceived as more attractive than blonde shades [3][4][5].…”

“…In the Fink et al [5] study, the head models were presented to panellists in posterior view; thus, this study did not permit conclusions about possible interaction effects of hair colour and skin colour on perception. Saegusa et al [19] reported a 'leakage effect' of hair on face perception, that is the presence of hair affected face perception although it was task-irrelevant.…”

“…In the Fink et al . study, the head models were presented to panellists in posterior view; thus, this study did not permit conclusions about possible interaction effects of hair colour and skin colour on perception. Saegusa et al .…”

Types of hairline recession in androgenetic alopecia and perceptions of aging in Asian males

“…Previous study has always revealed that the cranial hair loss caused older appearance in Western males . Besides, one research also suggested that the color, shape, and density of hair can influence the PFA of females, regardless of skin tone …”