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Olivia B Tomeo1, Leslie G Ungerleider1, Ning Liu1

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Monkeys do not find average faces attractive like humans do. Instead, rhesus macaques preferred faces that differed more from the average, suggesting averageness aids recognition, not attraction.

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Area of Science:

  • Neuroscience and social science research on facial attractiveness.
  • Comparative psychology and animal behavior studies.
  • Primate cognition and visual perception.

Background:

  • Facial attractiveness is well-studied in humans, with averageness being a key factor.
  • Non-human primates share social behaviors and neural mechanisms for face processing with humans.
  • Previous research has not determined if monkeys exhibit facial attractiveness preferences.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To investigate if monkeys (rhesus macaques) show preferences for facial averageness.
  • To determine if facial averageness influences attractiveness judgments in non-human primates.
  • To explore the role of the average face in primate face recognition versus attractiveness.

Main Methods:

  • Utilized a visual paired comparison (VPC) task with three adult male rhesus macaques.
  • Monkeys viewed pairs of faces, including individual and average faces.
  • Measured preference based on the duration of viewing time for each face.

Main Results:

  • Monkeys demonstrated differential viewing times, indicating preferences for certain individual faces.
  • Contrary to human preferences, monkeys did not prefer the average face over individual faces.
  • Monkeys looked longer at individual faces that deviated more from the average face.

Conclusions:

  • The preference for facial averageness does not generalize from humans to non-human primates.
  • The average face may function as a norm for face recognition rather than an attractiveness standard in monkeys.
  • Findings suggest distinct evolutionary pathways for facial attractiveness perception in primates.