Is it true that makeup makes women appear more desirable to men? There have been several recent studies concerning women’s use of decorative cosmetics. Social networks can’t decide whether men prefer natural look on women or they like females wearing makeup. The latest study doesn’t judge what men really like in women but explains how males and females react to ladies who use cosmetics to improve their looks.
Makeup makes women appear more prestigious
Dr. Viktoria Mileva, the author of the study and researcher at the University of Stirling in Scotland, believes that makeup affects how males and females perceive a woman. This is one of the first studies of its kind, Science Daily reports.
The author says that both men and women agree that makeup makes a lady look more attractive, especially when it comes to the her social status. The difference is that men perceive women wearing make-up as more prestigious, while ladies see females who use cosmetics as more dominant.
According to scientists, a high social status may be achieved in 2 ways:
- A person behaves dominantly and chooses to use power and manipulation to win people over (negative connotations).
- A person reaches the high status by prestige, that is, thanks to his good character traits (positive connotations).
Interestingly, the researchers found that female participants of the experiment view women who use cosmetics rather negatively. Most likely it’s because of jealousy and feeling threatened — they could be more attractive to men than natural-looking girls. Also, females view dolled up girls as promiscuous.
Men, on the contrary, associate ladies using make-up with something prestigious and desirable.
How you can benefit from this knowledge
The study results can be useful in different situations. Thus, women can opt for a strong or light makeup depending on the gender of the hiring manager when getting ready for a job interview. Sometimes female candidates want to appear prestigious and ambitious, sometimes it’s useful to look humble. It all depends on what impression they want to make.
As we know, Russian women pretty much always apply lipstick, mascara and foundation when stepping out of their homes. They maintain this habit after moving to the west. It may be one of the reasons why western females may view them unfavourably.
If you want your family and friends to accept your girl, show them photos of her looking natural and rather plain than gorgeous. This will help them to view her as non-threatening rather than dominant. As you know, first impressions last!
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It’s rather difficult to confess but sometimes I do feel jealous when I see girls with heavy but beautiful make-up. It’s not like I can control it, it feels like an instinct. The fact that they really are more attractive to men makes me feel threatened and I believe I’m not the only one who experiences this. At least I hope so 🙂
As for me, I feel me nude going outside without makeup. Really. I don’t know much about all of those matters of prestige but it is also a kind of defense. I mean wearing of makeup. I could not go “without face”, how can I? And yes, I am Russian and can’t imagine all that nonsense about “dominance” . It is absolutely normal for woman to be attractive.
That’s funny: my boyfriend tells that it doesn’t matter if I have makeup or not. he loves me anyway. However when I put some on my face, he starts making compliments to me. To my mind, it’s reflexive 🙂
In addition. I’m sure. when a girl have some makeup on her face, she become much more confident and relaxed, so other people see that. This can seriously affect on relationship.
This question is really interesting. Cause every women wants to look like a queen. So what to do, if a half of men say that it’s awful to go out without a make-up and they want their women to use it, and another half say that they want to see how girls look naturally. Dear men, please, tell us, what we have to do with that? 🙂