2026/05/27 by Eugen Wassiliwizky, Brendan P. Zietsch, Karel Kleisner +1 · 1 voice
Psychology · Business, Management and Accounting · #Evolutionary Psychology and Human Behavior #Consumer Behavior in Brand Consumption and Identification #Eating Disorders and Behaviors
paper · pdf · doi:10.1098/rspb.2026.0362
openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex publication_date 2026/05/27 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/28
Abstract Writers from Darwin to Dawkins have noted that, in humans, women are considered the ‘beautiful sex’, whereas in most species, it is males who display more elaborate, visually striking traits. This reversal of typical sex roles has long been debated in the literature but never empirically verified. Here, we present a large-scale cross-cultural meta-analysis of same- and opposite-sex ratings of facial attractiveness. Our findings provide robust evidence for a gender attractiveness gap (GAP), with female faces rated more attractive than male faces across rater sexes, cultures, races and age groups. Surprisingly, the GAP is more pronounced among female raters, who rate other women substantially higher than male faces, while male faces receive similarly low ratings from both sexes; the GAP is absent in self-ratings. Morphometric analyses further show that sexual shape dimorphism accounts for a substantial portion of the GAP. Additionally, we observe a tendency for greater stringency among male raters. This study draws on the largest worldwide collection of facial-attractiveness data assembled to date, which we make openly available to facilitate future research. Together, these results demonstrate that facial-attractiveness judgements extend well beyond heterosexual mate choice and reflect the joint influence of facial structure, rater characteristics and sociocultural context.