Is beauty in the eye of the beholder?

The old saying Beauty is in the eye of the beholder implies that we are all attracted to different things. But is it true?

We probably do differ when it comes to things like music and art, but what about sexual attraction to a fellow human?

When it comes to female beauty at least, one argument against subjective preferences is the fact that modelling can be a profitable career for some women. That's only possible because everyone likes looking at them. If beauty were truly in the eye of the beholder, no individual model would appeal to enough people be successful, and the word supermodel would not exist.

Does it vary by culture?

Some supporters of subjective beauty preferences argue that they are shaped by culture, and will thus vary from place to place. Opponents, on the other hand, argue that preferences have been shaped by evolution and reproductive success, and will thus be consistent across homo sapiens.

The opponents are more likely to be right. In multiple cross-cultural studies, people from around the world — including indigenous people not exposed to outside media — were asked to rank female faces, and they were largely consistent in the way they ordered them.

In another study, researchers showed newborn babies pairs of faces, and recorded how long the babies looked at each. The babies consistently spent more time looking at the more attractive one, implying that beauty preferences are something we're born with.

What about men?

When it comes to male beauty, the results aren't quite so clear-cut. Women are reasonably consistent in their rankings of male faces, but looks make up a small part of a man's overall attractiveness. Factors such as wealth, height, and personality play a large role too, making it difficult to disentangle their effects from looks.

Speed dating provides a useful insight. At a series of 10-round events, people's answers from the first nine rounds were used to predict their answers in round 10. For men, the predictions were 83% correct. For women, only 63%. Now, speed dating tends to measure overall attractiveness, not just looks, but the results indicate that men are more likely than women to agree on who is attractive.

Anecdotally, gay men place more importance on looks than straight women, so they may be more consistent when ranking male beauty. It would be an interesting hypothesis to test.

Some things are subjective

Although it appears that beauty is generally not in the eye of the beholder, there are some areas where subjective preferences do seem to make a difference.

Age is one. A 30 year-old woman is more likely to be attractive to a 35 year-old man than to a 20 year-old, since men generally prefer younger women.

Height also, since men can be intimidated by taller women (possibly because women are less interested in shorter men). This means that statuesque women are more attractive to tall men than short men.

And finally there is love. When someone falls in love, their partner becomes the most beautiful person in the world. And that is very much in the eye of the beholder.