Sex Differences in Physical Attractiveness Investments: Overlooked Side of Masculinity.
Level 3 - non-randomized controlled study
Non-clinical design analogy: prospective longitudinal follow-up study with repeated measures
PubMed 35409526 · doi:10.3390/ijerph19073842
What was done
The authors conducted a two-part investigation to examine sex differences in attractiveness-enhancing behaviors. Study 1 was a qualitative exploration of appearance-enhancement strategies (N = 121). Study 2 was a longitudinal quantitative study tracking time allocated to attractiveness-enhancing activities across seven repeated measurement points (62 participants; total N = 367 observations).
What was found
No overall sex differences in total beauty investments were observed. Women spent more time on make-up and cosmetics usage, whereas men spent equivalent compensatory time on exercising and bodybuilding. The abstract reports no numerical values, variances, or p-values.
Why it matters
This paper challenges the assumption that appearance investment is predominantly female by demonstrating that total effort is similar when physical conditioning and bodybuilding are accounted for.
Limits
The abstract reports no numerical data, effect sizes, or test statistics. The longitudinal sample is small (62 individuals), and specific demographic, recruitment, and measurement details are not provided in the abstract.
Cited by
- context In Marta Kowal's beautification study, among individuals who wear makeup, men who wear makeup spend more time applying it than women do.