kbc32{at}yahoo.com (kbc) wrote in news:buc90d$9ub$1{at}darwin.ediacara.org:

> I am curious whether there is any scientific explanation for the
> role  facial appearance plays in mate-selection in humans.
 
> Are beautiful people genetically better ( such that their survival
> chances are more ) ? ( i am not hinting anything.  just explaining
> my question. )
 
> Or is this just a case of our body and hormones behaving stupidly ?
> (We maybe much better off going for an intelligent mate than a
> beautiful mate.) 
 
> I read that  beauty is nothing but a measure of facial symmetry.
 
> ( Sorry, I have been waching lot of Discovery channel of late. :0)   )

If you are really interested, I suggest you take a break from watching TV 
and read Geoffrey Miller's "The Mating Mind", which discusses the whole 
question of mate selection in humans in considerable detail.

Very briefly, yes a number of studies show beauty to be a measure of 
facial symmetry. Symmetry is an indicator of lack of genetic or 
developmental abnormalities, and so is a good fitness indicator. So 
beautiful people are likely to be genetically "better". You should note 
that they are only "better" in terms of the conditions that humans 
evolved under, which are not necessarily the conditions we experience 
today.

There is also evidence that indicates that humans to a certain extent 
prefer faces with younger looking features (especially in females), which 
probably relates to  the interest in having a mate who is still young 
enough to bear and raise a number of children.  

But intelligence is also a powerful influence on attraction - it has been 
suggested that our love of song and poetry may be related to their being 
an indicator of intelligence. 


Yours,

Bill Morse
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