Beauty-enhancement practices are an element of many individuals’s each day lives, but how much of their lives are literally dedicated to it? A team of researchers has found just how much time people spend to boost their appearance and likewise make clear the the reason why they do them.
As a part of their study, published in Evolution and Human Behavior, researchers collected a big sample of information on people’s beauty-enhancing behaviors.
“People internationally and throughout history have gone to great lengths to boost their physical appearance,” they wrote. “Evolutionary psychologists and ethologists have largely attempted to elucidate this phenomenon via mating preferences and methods.”
Some theories classify appearance enhancement as an element of efforts to seek out a mate or, in countries where the prevalence of infections is high, to hide visual imperfections which will imply signs of disease, noted the National Research University Higher School of Economics (HSE University).
Sociocultural aspects might also play a job, equivalent to gender inequality, social media usage and whether the culture in a certain place is more individualistic or collectivist.
The team surveyed 93,158 people across 93 countries about appearance-enhancing behaviors equivalent to applying make-up, grooming their hair, body hygiene practices or exercising to enhance their physical attractiveness.
They found that individuals worldwide on average spend about 4 hours a day to boost their looks. That translates to a couple of sixth of individuals’s lives.
In addition they found some reasonably interesting insights behind such behaviors.
As an illustration, the idea related to finding a mate suggests that ladies and young people could also be more keen on enhancing their appearance, but the information revealed that each men and ladies actually spent quite a considerable period of time on it, with men spending on average 3.6 hours for it and ladies 4 hours.
Even those of older age spent in regards to the same period of time as younger people, which is “contrary to predictions.”
The pathogen prevalence hypothesis was only “partly confirmed,” the HSE University said in a release. While those that have a history of pathogenic disease did spend more time enhancing their beauty, this was not related to living in a rustic where such pathogens occur.
Researchers also make clear the cultural aspects which may be affecting people’s beauty-enhancement behaviors, as women in countries with less gender equality were found to take a position more time in such activities. It was the identical case with people in cultures that were more individualistic than collectivistic.
Unsurprisingly, energetic users of social media spent more time in improving their looks in comparison with those that spent less or no time on such platforms. This was, actually, was the “strongest predictor of attractiveness-enhancing behaviors.”
“This study provides novel insight into universal beauty-enhancing behaviors by unifying evolutionary theory with several other complementary perspectives,” the researchers wrote.
The theories on beauty enhancement behavior are complementary as a substitute of “mutually exclusive,” explained study co-author Dmitrii Dubrov.
“We confirmed certain assumptions and got here up with some interesting and fewer expected results,” Dubrov said. “This study is a vital step in evolutionary and sociocultural research that can allow a greater understanding of human psychology and our attitudes towards beauty.”