Faces with Light Makeup Are Better Recognized than Faces with Heavy Makeup
Open accessAbstract
Many women wear facial makeup to accentuate their appeal and attractiveness. Makeup may vary from natural (light) to glamorous (heavy), depending of the context of interpersonal situations, an emphasis on femininity, and current societal makeup trends. This study examined how light makeup and heavy makeup influenced attractiveness ratings and facial recognition. In a rating task, 38 Japanese women assigned attractiveness ratings to 36 Japanese female faces with no makeup, light makeup, and heavy makeup (12 each). In a subsequent recognition task, the participants were presented with 36 old and 36 new faces. Results indicated that attractiveness was rated highest for the light makeup faces and lowest for the no makeup faces. In contrast, recognition performance was higher for the no makeup and light make up faces than for the heavy makeup faces. Faces with heavy makeup produced a higher rate of false recognition than did other faces, possibly because heavy makeup creates an impression of the style of makeup itself, rather than the individual wearing the makeup. The present study suggests that light makeup is preferable to heavy makeup in that light makeup does not interfere with individual recognition and gives beholders positive impressions.
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The use of cosmetics has been shown to increase perceptions of attractiveness.
“Cosmetics are a popular tool to alter appearance and their use has been shown to increase perceptions of attractiveness [29–36].”
From What is beautiful is still good: the attractiveness halo effect in the era of beauty filters (2024) · cites this paper as [34]
Faces with make-up applied are consistently rated as more attractive than those without make-up.
“faces with make-up applied to them were consistently rated as more attractive than those without make-up.”
From What is beautiful is still good: the attractiveness halo effect in the era of beauty filters (2024) · cites this paper as [34]
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What is beautiful is still good: the attractiveness halo effect in the era of beauty filters
Gulati, A., Martínez-Garcia, M., Fernández, D., Lozano, M. A., Lepri, B., & Oliver, N. (2024) · Royal Society Open Science · doi:10.1098/rsos.240882 · Cited by 21 · see citing works
- Authors
- Tagai, K., Ohtaka, H., & Nittono, H.
- Affiliations
- Shiseido Group (Japan) (JP)
- Hiroshima University (JP)
- Corresponding author
- Tagai, Keiko
- Venue
- Frontiers in Psychology
- Publisher
- Frontiers Media SA
- Published
- 2016-03-01
- Volume
- 7
- Pages
- 226-226
- ISSN
- 1664-1078 (ISSN-L)
- PMC
- PMC4771839
- OpenAlex
- W2296612498
- Cited by
- 39
- References
- 0
- Citations by year
- 2026: 3 · 2025: 1 · 2024: 8 · 2023: 4 · 2022: 3 · 2021: 8 · 2020: 4 · 2019: 2 · 2018: 3 · 2017: 2 · 2016: 1
- FWCI
- 1.46
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- gold
- doi.org
- Licence
- cc-by
- Locations
- Frontiers in Psychology (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- Europe PMC (PubMed Central) (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- PubMed Central (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- DOAJ (DOAJ: Directory of Open Access Journals) (submittedVersion, cc-by-sa)
- Topics
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Face Recognition and Perception
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Experimental and Cognitive Psychology › Evolutionary Psychology and Human Behavior
- Physical Sciences › Computer Science › Computer Vision and Pattern Recognition › Face recognition and analysis
- Keywords
- facial makeup, attractiveness ratings, face recognition (cognition), false recognition, women's appearance, femininity, impression formation, Japanese women
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