St Andrews study reveals women more attracted to men who look like them

Published on Friday 14 August 2009 12:40

WOMEN are more attracted to men who look like them, researchers said today.

The study by the University of St Andrews also found women are more trusting of men who resemble them.

Scientists used computer graphics to manipulate men's faces before women rated their attractiveness.

The faces were made to look more or less masculine by altering areas including jawlines, and more or less like the women who rated them as part of the research.

Sixty women judged four faces made from 50 men's features for the six-month project.

Lead researcher Tamsin Saxton, a post-doctoral research fellow funded by the Economics and Social Research Council (ESRC) and based at the university's School of Psychology, said: "Previous research has often found that women can be attracted to masculine men, but also a bit suspicious of them.

"However, women tend to trust men more if they look like them. So perhaps the resemblance cancelled out the women's suspicions.

"Or maybe the women felt they were better matched with men who looked like them, because if two people resemble each other, they might both be attracted to each other."

The University of Liverpool also contributed to the study, which was published on the internet by the scientific journal Behavioral Ecology,

Researcher Craig Roberts said: "When people rate what's attractive, they have to consider lots of different characteristics. What's really interesting is that masculinity was more important to women's judgments compared with whether the men looked like the women."

The women looked at facial characteristics such as face shape and specific features including nose shape and eye size. Eye and skin colour were not taken into account in the research.