Risk Factors Leading to Preference for Extreme Facial Retouching

Abstract

Young women posting their edited face photographs on social networking sites have become a popular phenomenon, but an excessively retouched face image sometimes gives a strange impression to its viewers. This study investigates what personal characteristics facilitate a bias toward an excessively edited face image. Thirty young Asian women evaluated the attractiveness and naturalness of their face images, which were edited in eight different levels-from mild to excessive-by expanding their eyes and thinning their chin. The mildly retouched face was evaluated as more attractive than the original face, but the excessively retouched face was evaluated as unattractive and unnatural in comparison with the original face. The preferred face edit level was higher for one's own face than for others. Moreover, participants with higher autism-spectrum quotient (AQ) scores were found to regard excessively edited face images as more attractive. The attention to detail subscale of the AQ showed a significant positive correlation with the preferred face edit level. The imagination subscale, on the contrary, showed a significant negative correlation with the preferred face edit level. The pupil response for self-face images was significantly larger than those for others' face images, but this difference decreased with higher AQ scores. This study suggests that an increased attractiveness in their mildly retouched face promotes this behavior of retouching one's own face, but autistic traits, which are insensitive to the creepiness of the excessively retouched face, might pose a potential risk to inducing retouch dependence.

Neural correlates of beauty retouching to enhance attractiveness of self-depictions in women

“…A previous study, which manipulated facial attractiveness by contrast effect, also reported that medial cortical regions and the VTA, the center of human dopaminergic reward system, exhibit greater activation when self-face looks more attractive than other-face (Oikawa et al, 2012). Consistently, our previous behavioral study has shown that young women prefer stronger beauty filters on their own face than on others' faces (Nakano & Uesugi, 2020). This suggests that the enhanced attractiveness of self-face has a higher reward value than that for otherface and that, as a result, the preference for using beauty filters on their own face is reinforced.…”

“…As described above, since positive modulation by beauty retouching activates the reward system, facial retouching behaviors using beauty filter app become reinforced. In fact, young women prefer to apply stronger beauty filters on their own face than on others' faces (Nakano & Uesugi, 2020). Conversely, the amygdala induces negative reactions towards excessively retouched faces, which helps suppress the reinforced behavior of retouching.…”

“…Moderate beauty retouching can increase facial attractiveness, but in cases of excessive use it can make a face appear unnatural and even creepy. Ironically, the facial attractiveness then becomes much lower than that of the original face (Nakano & Uesugi, 2020).…”

Neural correlates of beauty retouching to enhance attractiveness of self-depictions in women

“…A previous study, which manipulated facial attractiveness by contrast effect, also reported that medial cortical regions and the VTA, the center of human dopaminergic reward system, exhibit greater activation when self-face looks more attractive than other-face (Oikawa et al, 2012). Consistently, our previous behavioral study has shown that young women prefer stronger beauty filters on their own face than on others' faces (Nakano & Uesugi, 2020). This suggests that the enhanced attractiveness of self-face has a higher reward value than that for other-face and that, as a result, the preference for using beauty filters on their own face is reinforced.…”

“…Moderate beauty retouching can increase facial attractiveness, but in cases of excessive use, it can make a face appear unnatural and even creepy. Ironically, the facial attractiveness then becomes much lower than that of the original face (Nakano & Uesugi, 2020). Since extreme facial retouching creates a face whose balance between individual parts and overall structure deviates from the distribution of real humans (e.g., extremely big eyes and very thin chins), the negative impression toward the extremely retouched faces may be related to the "uncanny valley" phenomenon, in which eerie sensations are induced when viewing subjects with slight differences that cause them to look like false or unreal humans (Feng et al, 2018;Mori et al, 2012).…”