currentsinbiology: When music makes male faces more attractive Women rate photographs of male faces
currentsinbiology:When music makes male faces more attractiveWomen rate photographs of male faces as more attractive and are more likely to date the men pictured when they have previously heard music. Moreover, highly arousing music led to the largest effect on sexual attraction. A team of psychologists led by Manuela Marin (University of Innsbruck) and Helmut Leder (University of Vienna) explains the significance of this finding in relation to the origins of music in their latest publication in the scientific journal PLOS ONE.In the current study, Marin and her colleagues investigated the impact of musical exposure on the subjective evaluations of opposite-sex faces. “Facial attractiveness is one of the most important physical characteristics that can influence the choice of a partner. We wanted to find out how music can alter the perception of this feature,” says Helmut Leder from the Faculty of Psychology at the University of Vienna. Since music, especially before the advent of modern technology, has always been experienced in the here and now, and mostly in a social context, it is plausible to assume that music could positively influence the visual perception of faces. “There is some evidence in the psychological literature that so-called arousal transfer effects can occur if two stimuli are processed consecutively. The processing of the first stimulus produces internal arousal, i.e. increased physiological activity, which is then attributed to the second stimulus. This mostly unconscious mechanism can then influence our actions, in this case, the choice of a partner,” explains Manuela Marin.Manuela M. Marin et al. Misattribution of musical arousal increases sexual attraction towards opposite-sex faces in females, PLOS ONE (2017). DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0183531“Group-wise analyses indicated that women, but not men, gave significantly higher ratings of facial attractiveness and dating desirability after having listened to music than in the silent control condition.“Hmm so do women also find other women more attractive after listening to music? When will we see that study? -- source link
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