Perceived vulnerability to disease is positively related to the strength of preferences for apparent health in faces

Abstract

Abstract:People who are particularly vulnerable to disease may reduce their likelihood of contracting illnesses during social interactions by having particularly strong aversions to individuals who appear ill. Consistent with this proposal, here we show that men and women who perceive themselves to be particularly vulnerable to disease have stronger preferences for apparent health in dynamic faces than individuals who perceive themselves to be relatively less vulnerable to disease. This relationship was independent of possible effects of general disgust sensitivity. Furthermore, perceived vulnerability to disease was not related to preferences for other facial cues that are attractive but do not necessarily signal an individual's current health (i.e. perceiver-directed smiles). Our findings complement previous studies implicating perceived vulnerability to disease in attitudes to out-group individuals and those with physical abnormalities by implicating perceived vulnerability to disease as a factor in face preferences. Collectively, our findings reveal a relatively domain-specific association between perceived vulnerability to disease and the strength of aversions to facial cues associated with illness. Additionally, they are further evidence that variation in attractiveness judgments is not arbitrary, but rather reflects potentially adaptive individual differences in face preferences.

Further evidence for regional variation in women's masculinity preferences

“…Investigating how perceptions of pathogens and/or violence predict systematic variation in mate preferences among individual women within a given region or culture may also provide insight into these issues (e.g. [3,4]). Indeed, a recent study [5] demonstrated that women's preferences for masculinity in male faces, but not female faces, increased after viewing images with pathogen cues, but did not change after viewing matched images without pathogen cues.…”

How Disgust Affects Romantic Attraction: the Influence of Moods on Judgments of Attractiveness

“…Another limitation of the current study is that recent research has shown that an individual's perceived vulnerability to disease can affect their facial preferences. It has been shown that an individual will prefer healthy traits in a face if they believe they are more vulnerable to disease (Welling, Conway, DeBruine, and Jones 2007). Because of this fact, perceived vulnerability to disease measurements should be taken of each participant in future research.…”

Perceived vulnerability to disease and antifat attitudes in a sample of children and teenagers

“…With respect to an emotional level that perception activates a negative evaluation of the infected individuals [2]. For example, individuals with birth marks in their faces [3] or with different types of physical disabilities are usually judged very negatively by ''healthy'' people, even knowing that those individuals are not carriers of an infectious disease [4]. This is especially notorious among people with a high-perceived vulnerability to disease.…”

“…Additionally, a feeling related to the fact that obesity may be transmitted through contact with individuals that have weight problems has been reported [8]. If the mechanism that allows humans to detect pathogenic elements reacts with other type of physical diversions (such as facial marks [3] or disability [4]), in this case obesity could be also related to perceived vulnerability to disease. For example, it has been found that people who are more worried about infectious illnesses have worse antifat attitudes than those individuals that are not concerned about this type of diseases [9].…”