The Attractiveness of the Average Face

Transcription

1 The Attractiveness of the Average Face Margaret Collins This article explores the connection between perceived beauty and averageness. Although throughout the history of mankind attractiveness was linked to averageness, this concept is now being questioned in light of more recent developments in Evolutionary Psychology. What follows is in an attempt to open up the discussion on one aspect of beauty, averageness, including literature from the Humanities and Evolutionary Psychology. (Semin Orthod 2012;18: ) 2012 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. I have approached this article following the recommendation of Edward Angle ( ): All who hope to attain real success in the correction of malocclusion should cultivate a love for art and the beautiful...an appreciation and intelligent application of the principle of art must ever go hand in hand with the successful practice of orthodontia. 1 Averages are important for orthodontists when planning treatment. Their use in anthropometry date back to the second half of the 19th century, when the basic laws of statistics were well established. In 1842, the Swedish anatomist Anders Retzius ( ) introduced the cranial index categorizing skulls as dolicho-, meso-, and brachycephalic. The Facial Index subsequently categorized faces into lepto-, meso-, and euryprosopic 2 and the Nasal index into lepto-, meso-, and platyrhine. 3 In each case, the breadth was related to the length and the midpoint or average was identified and prefixed by the term meso. These indexes continued into the 20th century when Farkas developed normal proportional indexes based on measurements from 1312 Caucasians heads. 2 Consultant Orthodontist, Department of Orthodontics, The Dental Institute, King s College Hospital, Denmark Hill, London, England; Consultant Orthodontist, Department of Orthodontics, Queen Mary s Hospital, Sidcup, Kent, England. Address correspondence to Margaret Collins, BDS, FDSRCPS, DOrth, MSc, MOrthRCS, MA, Orthodontic Department, The Dental Institute, King s College Hospital, London SE5 9RS, England. margaretcollins4@hotmail.co.uk 2012 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved /12/1803-0$30.00/0 After Roentgen s discovery of x-rays in 1895, 4 and Pacini s (1922) 5 and Hofrath s (1931) 6 standardization of skull radiographs, 7 craniometry was transferred to the radiographic image. 8 Cephalometric analyses based on norms began in 1952 when Downs averaged a sample of year olds who had normal occlusion. 9 Others followed in pursuit of this ideal average. Ricketts 10 averaged findings of 1000 clinical cases. McNamara 11 combined the average values of the Bolton, Burlington, and Ann Arbour growth studies. It is noteworthy that the cephalometric analysis undertaken by Reidel on 30 Seattle Seafair Princesses showed that each beauty queen was close to the average, and the degree of similarity between these girls was striking, mirroring findings recorded in previous studies of normal occlusion. The girl selected as queen among this group of princesses recorded measurements, which fell within 1 degree or 1 mm of the mean in almost every instance. Reidel 12 concluded that the public s concept of acceptable facial aesthetics was close to the average and in close agreement with standards established by orthodontists on the basis of normal occlusion. Others have also found a preference for a normal (Skeletal Class I) profile. 13 However, cephalometric norms/averages are not always available to define beauty. An example of this is seen in the Sculpture of Queen Nefertiti ( BC), which dates back to the dawn of Egyptian civilization, a time when the Nile valley swamps were settled by people from Africa and Asia. Nefertiti has been extolled as a standard of beauty throughout the history of man, 14 not surprising, as her features represented the average of the population in which she lived, of Asian and African origin. However, we would struggle Seminars in Orthodontics, Vol 18, No 3 (September), 2012: pp

2 218 Collins beautiful of virgins. The citizens of Croton gathered the virgins into 1 place from which Zeuxis chose 5: For he did not believe that it was possible to find in one body all the things he looked for in beauty, since nature has not refined to perfection any single object in all its parts. Consequently, Zeuxis selected the best features of each of the virgins whom he had chosen to serve as models for his paintings. 16 The Greek physician, Galen (c AC), subsequently reinforced this idea when he observed that whatever form is most beautiful in man or animal is found by seeking the mean within each genus. 17 The Renaissance artists, in turn, were strongly influenced by the Greeks, mentally merging the images of many, to produce the ideal. When the fresco of the beautiful and Greek mythological nymph Galatea was finished ( ), Raphael was asked where he had found a model of such beauty; he replied that: Figure 1. Bust Sculpture of Queen Nefertiti. c /5 BC. Painted Limestone. Height 48.3 cm. Ägyptisches Museum, Berlin. Nefertiti s appealing features represent the average of the Asian and African population in which she lived. (Reprinted with permission from bpk, Berlin/Aegyptisches Museum, Staatliche Museen, Berlin, Germany/Margarete Büsing/ Art Resource, NY.) (Color version of figure is available online.) to find a set of cephalometric norms to accurately represent her features, although radiographic examination of the mummified remains of ancient Egyptians confirm a high incidence of bimaxillary prognathism (Fig. 1). 15 The Attractiveness of the Average Face From a Historical Perspective Early Greek sculpture, such as the late 2nd century BC Venus de Milo illustrate the Greek portrayal of beauty (Fig. 2). The link between it and the average/mean was documented by Cicero ( BC) who reported that when the people of Croton hired the esteemed artist, Zeuxis of Herakleia, to paint a beautiful Helen, he requested that they provide him with the most Figure 2. Detail from Venus de Milo. c. 2nd-1st century BC. Greek marble. Height 204 cm. Musée du Louvre, Paris. Ancient Greek sculpture, such as Venus de Milo, was influenced by the existing philosophy that beauty should be sought from the mean of the population. (Reprinted with permission. RMN-Grand Palais/Art Resource, NY.) (Color version of figure is available online.)

3 Attractiveness of the Average Face 219 Similarly, Leonardo da Vinci ( ) applied these principles when painting The head of Leda and advised that to obtain beauty, the artist should consider what he saw and consult himself, choosing the most excellent part of everything (Fig. 4). 18 This idea was taken further by Albrecht Dürer ( ) in Four Books on Human Proportion, when he took detailed measurements from several hundred individuals in an attempt to come up with the average perfect canon of beauty, realizing that no single canon of beauty could be achieved. 19 The preference for facial averageness has been explained in terms of stabilizing selection, where sexual selection favors the average (as opposed to directional selection which favors extremes traits). 20 In 1990, Langlois and Roggman 21 sought to determine whether stabilizing selection, favoring average traits, was the key to attractiveness. They superimposed one photographic facial image on top of another, to obtain an average composite face. Composites look familiar and attractive because they are average or representative faces, resembling many faces. 20 This idea dates back to the philosopher Immanuel Kant 22 ( ) who, in The Critique of Judgment, referred to the mind s ability to superimpose as it were one image upon another and from this obtain a mean contour or average size, which underlies the normal idea of a beautiful man. The fundamental relevance of the mean/average was developed further by the Belgian astronomer and statistician Adolphe Quetelet ( ) who defined the average man (l h omme moyen) in his treatise, Sur L homme. Quetelet compared his study of human bodily proportions with those of the artist Albrecht Figure 3. Raphael The nymph Galatea. c Fresco m. Sala di Galatea, Villa Farnesina, Rome. The Renaissance artist Raphael created The nymph Galatea by merging the features of several beauties. (Reprinted with permission from Scala/Art Resource, NY.) (Color version of figure is available online.) In order to paint a beauty I would have to see several beauties, but since there is a scarcity of beautiful women, I use a certain Idea that comes to mind (Fig. 3). Figure 4. Detail from Leonardo da Vinci The head of Leda. c Pen and ink over black chalk. The Queens Gallery, Buckingham Palace, London. Leonardo da Vinci, who struggled to find beauty in any single individual, sought instead the most excellent part of everything to create beauty seen in The head of Leda. (Reprinted with permission from Royal Collection Trust/ HM Queen Elizabeth II 2012.) (Color version of figure is available online.)

4 220 Collins Dürer. He argued that the greater the number of individuals observed, the more do individual peculiarities, whether physical or moral, become effaced. He noticed that the anthropometric data he collected fell into a bell-shaped curve, the central portion of which, was called the mean. This point represented the average man who was the type of all which is beautiful of all which is good. 23 During the same time era, others were trying to come up with a visual version of the average. The English philosopher Herbert Spencer ( ), famous for coining the term survival of the fittest, devised an instrument for tracing the longitudinal, transverse, and horizontal sections of heads onto transparent paper, to superimpose them. At the same time but on the opposite side of the world, a New Zealander, A.L. Austin, came up with a similar idea and wrote a letter to Charles Darwin observing that: I find by taking two ordinary carte-de-visite photos of two different persons faces, the portraits being about the same sizes, and looking about the same direction, and placing them in a stereoscope, the faces blend into one in a most remarkable manner, producing in the case of some ladies portraits, in every instance, a decided improvement in beauty. 24 Galton believed that the composite portrait was the pictorial equivalent of Quetelet s statistical tables The process is one of pictorial statistics, suitable to give us generic pictures of man, such as Quetelet obtained in outline by ordinary numerical methods of statistics, as described in his work on Anthropométrie...By the process of composites we obtain a picture and not merely an outline. 25 Galton reinforced Quetelet s view, that the average was attractive. He developed a way of creating a composite photograph, which was the physical equivalent of Kant s imaginary superimposed images when he submitted a composite facial image to the Anthropological Institute in 1879, which he achieved by throwing faint images of the several portraits, in succession, upon the same sensitized photographic plate. The result of the composite was an imaginary figure possessing the average feature of any given group of men. He described how he created the image: I begin by collecting photographs of the persons with whom I propose to deal...i make two pinholes in each of them, to enable me to hang them up one in front of the other, like a pack of cards, upon the same pair of pins, in such a way that the eyes of all the portraits shall be nearly as possible superimposed. He also recognized the attractiveness of the average image created: All composites are better looking than their components because the averaged portrait of many persons is free from the irregularities that variously blemish the looks of each of them. Fueled by this success, Galton attempted, through the creation of average composites, to define the criminal type using photographic portraits of criminals convicted of murder, manslaughter, or robbery accompanied with violence. He failed to find the villainous face he sought. On the contrary, the average criminal face was, to his surprise, attractive:..the features of the composite are much better looking than those of the components. The special villainous irregularities in the latter have disappeared, and the common humanity that underlies them has prevailed...they represent, not the criminal, but the man who is liable to fall into crime. 14 In 1885, Galton 26 was commissioned by the Jewish historian, Joseph Jacobs ( ), to produce a composite image of Jewish boys, The Jewish Type. The aim was to bring together all the data, scientific or historical, which bear upon the purity of the Jewish race. Galton took photographs of 13 Jewish boys, chosen at random from the Jews Free School, Bell Lane and by superimposing one on top of the other, created a series of composite photographs, which he called The Jewish Type. 27 The composite of the Jewish face turned out to be wonderfully beautiful (Fig. 5). 26 He also attempted to use facial composite photography as a means of differentiating phthisical patients (suffering from tuberculosis) from non-phthisical patients. But he failed to find a connection. The composite face did not reveal the illness. 28 The French photographer Arthur Batut ( ) further developed Galton s composite methodology. His composites were designed to reveal the local characteristics of the beauty of the Arlésienne (thought to be a mixture of Roman and Saracen blood) with their allegedly less attractive sisters in the port of Agde in the Languedoc (thought to be of Greek origin). 29 By the end of the 1840s, photography was heavily involved in documentation and quantita-

5 Attractiveness of the Average Face 221 Figure 5. The average image obtained from early composite photography revealed that The Jewish Type was wonderfully beautiful. (Reprinted with permission from Jacobs. 27 ) (Color version of figure is available online.) tive measurement. Darwin s theory of evolution led to a new way of developing social structures, which required stratification of man. Photography was used to measure and classify the human body in an attempt to define the characteristics of a particular race, class, or social group. 30 In 1875, an Anthropometric and Racial Committee was set up in by the British Association for the Advancement of Science. Photography was the medium used for its documentation. 29 Galton s composite photographs were a part of this preoccupation with categorization of man. Following Charles Darwin s (Galton s first cousin) publication of On the Origin of Species (1859) and The Descent of Man (1871), Galton also became preoccupied with the idea of improving one s race. In 1904, Galton coined the term eugenics, which comes from the Greek, eu meaning well, and gen, meaning produce. 31 Eugenics is the science which deals with all influences that improve and develop inborn qualities of a race. The aim of eugenics is to represent each class or sect by its best specimens, causing them to contribute more than their proportion to the next generation. 32 Galton, however, never made the connection between his 2 great interests, the composite facial average and good genes. 33 The link between the 2 would take almost another century to establish by the evolutionary psychologists Langlois and Roggman. The Attractiveness of the Average Face From a Contemporary Perspective In 1990, Langlois and Roggman 21 used the same principles as those described by Galton to digitize and mathematically average male and female students faces and produce computer-generated composite images, which were then ranked for attractiveness. The averaged composite of the 32 faces were judged as significantly more attractive than the individual faces that yielded them. In addition, the composite face became more attractive as more faces were entered. They concluded that attractive faces were only average, and that this was consistent with evolutionary pressures that favor characteristics close to the mean of the population (Fig. 6). 21 This view is supported by another study that showed that full-face and profile views were perceived as less attractive as they were morphed away from the average. 34 The profile view added an additional advantage in that it allowed a face to be morphed toward an average shape without impacting on symmetry. 34 Furthermore, averaged composite profile photographs have been shown to be more attractive than the original photographs from which the composite was derived. 35 There are a number of possible explanations for the attractiveness of the average face.

6 222 Collins Figure 6. The averaged composite of faces becomes more attractive as more faces are added which is seen as you move down the column. (Reprinted with permission from Langlois and Roggman. 21 ) (Color version of figure is available online.) Langlois and Roggman 21 put forward the idea that the attractiveness of the average face is in keeping with the cognitive processes that favor prototypical category members. The model of a prototype helps explain how we evaluate visual stimuli and classifying these into categories. 20 A prototype is the central representation of any category, the average or mean value; it is perceived as typical. The average of a set of faces is perceived as attractive because it appears more facelike and more representative of the population. Any face will be judged as attractive if it is close to the average of the central tendency of the population. 21 Prototypes might be recognized faster and more easily, and thus may create higher nervous excitation. Our preference for average stimuli may be because our brain accepts such better-fitting stimuli more willingly (neuroaesthetics). 36 Typical faces close to the population average are consistently rated as more attractive than distinctive faces. Furthermore, the attractiveness of individual faces can be increased or reduced, by moving their configurations toward or away from an average configuration for that sex, which supports the view that average faces are attractive. 37 Prototypes help explain why the appreciation of beauty appears to be innate and present from birth. Young infants, for example, looked longer at attractive faces that are prototypical, easier to classify, and possibly elicit a strong response from the perceptual system. Through prototyping, our beauty standards adjust to the population in which we live, with the most attractive being close to the mean of that population. Prototyping expands our possibilities of mate choice. If we had an inflexible biological template for the judgment of attractiveness, we could risk never meeting somebody fitting the template. 21 However, some argue against prototyping because average faces are recognized poorly, as they do not deviate from the templates we use to store faces. Therefore, attractive people with average faces would be disadvantaged as individual recognition is the basis for social interaction. Thus, one should expect deviations from averageness to be found in the most beautiful faces. A beautiful face has to be recognizable and distinct to be memorable. Adding an individual touch to averageness could thus make an attractive face beautiful. 36 Evolutionary psychology also linked attractiveness of individuals to their value as mates. Thus, individuals who were attentive to cues of high mate value, left behind healthier and more fecund children than those who failed to attend to those cues. 38 Mating with an attractive partner would increase the probability of successful repro-

7 Attractiveness of the Average Face 223 duction and genetic transmission. 39 We choose mates for genetic disease resistance by scrutiny of features whose expression is dependent on health. Attractive traits signal mate quality, so that preferences increase offspring viability. 40 Average proportions often signal good health, good design, and genetic fitness; for example, human babies that are born larger or smaller than average are less likely to survive. As evolutionary pressures favor the mean rather than the extremes of the population, one could maximize the fitness of one s offspring by being attracted to and mating with those who displayed average features. 41 Facial averageness reflects developmental stability, the ability to maintain normal development despite the environmental and genetic stresses. Developmental instability, by contrast, results in deviations from the average and craniofacial abnormalities. 42 There is modest evidence that averageness indicated health, specifically, facial distinctiveness, the opposite of averageness at 17, a prime age for mate choice, was associated with poor childhood health in males and poor current and adolescent health in females. Marked deviations from facial averageness are diagnostic of some chromosomal disorder, and more subtle deviations may prove cues to health of potential mates. A preference for average faces could therefore have evolved because it enhanced reproductive success, either because healthy mates provide better parental care or because they confer genetic benefits to their offspring. 43 Finally, preference for average facial features could have evolved because it denotes genetic heterozygosity, good genes. Heterozygosity reflects an outbred mate who provides genetic diversity in defense against parasites. Facial averageness reflects parasite-resistant genetic makeup, as it correlates with high individual protein heterozygosity, and thus with the presence of an array of alleles to which the parasite must adapt. 40 Attractive faces therefore signal parasite resistance. Parasites are ubiquitous and so humans, via their immune system, evolve defensive adaptations against parasites. In response, parasites evolve adaptations for circumventing these defensive mechanisms. There is a continuing process of host-parasite coevolution, during which both hosts and parasites are subjected to constant shifting selection pressures. Parasites are best adapted to most common proteins and least adapted to the protein products of rare alleles (sequences that code for a gene). Thus, individuals possessing rare alleles or uncommon proteins to which parasites are poorly adapted, generally have higher fitness with regard to parasitic infection. The more heterozygous (the greater the genetic diversity) an individual, the more uncommon alleles it may possess, and the better the defense against parasites. 44 In summary, Symons concluded that the average of a population is attractive, as it represents a functionally optimal design and the fittest in many species. Evolutionary pressures operate against the extremes of the population. Facial averageness is associated with above-average performance in tasks, such as chewing and breathing, and hence during evolutionary history, Natural Selection favored it. 45 Furthermore, homozygous individuals tend to be over-represented at the extreme tails of the distributions. By contrast, heterozygous individuals tend to be over-represented at the middle of such distributions. 36 The Average Is Not Necessarily the Most Attractive Face Alley and Cunningham counterargued in favor of attractiveness related to directional selection for extreme characteristics, such as dominant features (large eyes) or juvenile features (blonde hair) in females. In their opinion, evolutionary selection dictated that the ideal mate for a male was a female with a high reproductive capacity, that is, a young woman. Hence, youthful traits may take preference over average ones. Furthermore, some individual faces were more attractive than the corresponding composite. They concluded that although average faces were attractive, exceptionally attractive faces were atypical in some way. They argued that the composite produced an attractive face in part by the production of an unusually symmetric face and also by the elimination of skin blemishes or surface irregularities, creating a soft focus as well as smooth uniform skin tone. 46 Perrett et al 47 supported directional selection, rather than stabilizing selection by showing that the mean shape of a set of attractive faces is preferred to the mean shape of the sample from which the faces were selected. The average face from 60 females was less attractive than a face representing the average of the 15 most attractive female faces from the same

8 224 Collins group. In addition, the composites were made more attractive by exaggerating the shape differences from the sample mean. They concluded that highly attractive facial configurations are not average and moderately extreme shapes enhanced attractiveness. Preference for nonaverage face shapes would therefore exert a directional selection pressure away from the population mean. In addition, it has been demonstrated that the public prefer nonaveraged traits, specifically a fuller more protrusive dentofacial pattern. This was illustrated when the dentofacial cephalometric measurements of professional models, beauty contest winners, and performing stars were found to be more protrusive than the average. 48 Langlois et al countered their critics by explaining that averaged faces can be both average in the sense of representing the mean and at the same time extreme in characteristics, such as youthfulness. They disagreed with the argument that symmetry explains attractiveness, as symmetry by itself is not enough to produce attractiveness. They demonstrated that although a mathematically averaged face will be symmetric, a symmetric face is not necessarily highly attractive or close to the mathematical average of a population of faces. Furthermore, a highly attractive face is not necessarily highly symmetric. Hence, movie stars often want to be photographed from their good side. In addition, they showed that asymmetric faces were rated as more attractive than the perfectly symmetric mirror-image right and left faces (chimeras). Langlois et al 49 accepted that composite faces have a soft focus and lack blemishes that increase the appearance of youthfulness and symmetry, but neither alone can guarantee attractiveness; a face can be both young and symmetric, yet still be unattractive. They agreed however that familiarity is related to averageness and attractiveness. In conclusion, averageness is essential for facial attractiveness; however, it is not exclusive. Youth (in females), symmetry, and sexually dimorphic traits are also important, although even they are not enough alone. Averageness is the only characteristic discovered to date that is both necessary and sufficient to ensure facial attractiveness without a facial configuration close to the average of the population, a face will not be attractive no matter how smooth, youthful, or symmetric. Averageness is fundamental. 39 The Impact of Globalization on the Average Face If facial beauty is even partially determined by average measurements, then it cannot be a predetermined standard planted in our mind. The mechanism that stores and averages the face is innate and universal, but the composite form is dependent on the faces it sees. 41 In 1872, Charles Darwin recognized this concept, when he argued that if a tribe spread over a continent they would gradually subdivide into smaller isolated tribes, each of which would subsequently be exposed to a different environment, and by natural selection, their features would also change to some degree: As soon as this occurred, each isolated tribe would form for itself a slightly different standard of beauty; and then unconscious selection would come into action through the more powerful and leading savages preferring certain women to others... According to Darwin, 50 we have survived not only through our ability to adapt to our environment through natural selection but also by being the offspring of those chosen through sexual selection. The latter, from an aesthetic perspective, is close to the average of all the faces we have seen. Because of globalization, we are now exposed to a much broader range of faces. This is altering our internal averages to reflect a preference for the universal face, a composite of all races. This is evident in the cosmetic surgery people seek. For example, in 2003, 1000 plastic surgeons in Korea performed about half a million procedures to create a more Western look. 51 Meanwhile, the West is also moving away from its traditional position. The preferred skin color is no longer the palest shades, and plumper lips are increasingly preferred. This reflects an internal average where Asian, African, and Hispanic features are helping to recalibrate norms of beauty. 41 However, although globalization may lead to a more universal standard of beauty across the globe, fewer can hope to approximate this mean than when the average of our own ethnic group was the most attractive. Moreover, the average is

9 Attractiveness of the Average Face 225 not best adapted to all environments. Face shape, for example, is adapted to climate. The most advantageous head shape in a cold climate would be rounded as it dissipates less heat, as seen in brachycephalic Arctic Inuits. Hot equatorial climates, by contrast, favor long-headedness, which dissipates more heat as seen in the dolichocephalic equatorial Africans. 52 Nose shape is similarly affected. Platyrrhine is best suited and more commonly found in hot moist climates in comparison with leptorrhine in cold dry ones. Eye shape is another adaptation. The epicanthic fold present in the Asian face protects against the glare of the sun, which would have been essential for survival in the last glaciation, and similarly the flatter facial form protected against frostbite. Dark helicotrichous hair in Africans has a protective value in areas of strong sunlight. The converse is true for those with blond cymotrichous hair in Northern climates. 3 There is also a strong correlation between latitude, ultraviolet radiation, and skin color. In equatorial sunshine, only the darkest skin offers protection against skin cancer or folate depletion. The fairest skin by contrast is best adapted to northern latitudes offering greater resistance to Rickets. 53 In summary, the average may not be best adapted to all climates, and it might be more appropriate to temper our selection to the climate in which we live, rather than seek the universal mean. The Impact of Digital Technology on the Average Face The importance of the average face is evident in the use of composite images to portray attractiveness in the public domain. The photographer Christian Dorley-Brown achieved pleasing results in his project Haverhill 2000, which set out to establish a permanent and accessible image of a town s population. Using computer software, 2000 individual photographs were merged. This hyper-real and somewhat ghostly image is created from photographs of 1000 females and 1000 males aged 6 months to 80 years, covering 50 ethnic groups (Fig. 7). 54 Time magazine succeeded in producing the first alluring global composite image of a female face. In a special issue cover, Fall 1993, they used Figure 7. An attractive composite image has been created for artistic purposes by merging photographic images of 1000 females from the town of Haverhill. (Reprinted with permission. Christian Dorley- Brown and Haverhill Town Council.) (Color version of figure is available online.) a computer software to create a female image of a multiethnic face of America. She had the facial features of a woman who was 15% Anglo-Saxon, 17.5% Middle Eastern, 17.5% African, 7.5% Asian, 35% Southern European, and 7.5% Hispanic. This was hailed as the face of melting pot America. This magazine argued that with globalization, Eastern and Western perceptions of beauty are merging to produce a global standard of beauty. 55 Newsweek matched this, coming up with their own version of the new global face of beauty. Saira Mohan, who featured on their cover in 2003 was of mixed ancestry, French-Irish-Canadian on her mother s side and North Indian, Punjab on her father s side; her instant appeal was said to be because she represented a type of global mean 51 (Fig. 8). To complicate matters further, we are increasingly exposed to standards of beauty set by cosmetically enhanced and digitally altered facial images. Digital technology is also creating virtual models, such as the virtual model Maya 56 who looks similar to the artistically created sculpture of Nefertiti described earlier (Fig. 9). This preoccupation with artificial beauty has been extended to Miss Digital World, which was set up

10 226 Collins Figure 8. Left: Computer software has created an averaged face from the American melting pot, which is 35% Southern European, 17.5% African, 17.5% Middle Eastern, 15% Anglo-Saxon, 7.5% Asian, and 7.5% Hispanic. (Reprinted with permission from Time, special issue, Fall:cover, 1993.) Right: Saira Mohan was considered by Newsweek to be symbolic of a global beauty because of her mixed ancestry, which was French-Irish-Canadian on her mother s side and North Indian, Punjab on her father s side. (Reprinted with permission from Newsweek, November: cover, 2003, The Newsweek/Daily Beast Company LLC. All rights reserved. Used by permission and protected by the Copyright Laws of the United States. The printing, copying, redistribution, or retransmission of the Material without express written permission is prohibited.) (Color version of figure is available online.) by Franz Cerami in Boundaries are being blurred between the real and virtual face. The airbrushed and digitally enhanced media images of celebrities add to the problem. When the media raise beauty standards too high, unreal expectations emerge. If the mean is more beautiful than reality, no mate selection can occur, and this leads to a greater percentage of singles. 20 With increasing globalization and digital imagery, the ever-changing average is difficult to determine. The appeal of averageness or as it has been coined, Koinophilia, the preference for mates with predominantly common traits, is now an accepted finding. 58 Thus, should we strictly adhere to or move away from the average, defined by cephalometric norms, in planning orthodontic and orthognathic movements? Some advocate moving away from average, toward a broader more protrusive smile, although defining the latter is not clear. Moreover, there is no agreement on the merits of extraction/nonextraction, 59 expansion/nonexpansion, 60 or one bracket system in favor of another. Treatment philosophies are advocated by individual orthodontists whose internal average Conclusions Figure 9. Left: Virtual model. Maya. (Reprinted with permission from Rene Morel. Rene Morel.) Right: Bust Sculpture of Queen Nefertiti. c /5 BC. Painted Limestone. Height 48.3 cm. Ägyptisches Museum, Berlin. (Reprinted with permission from bpk, Berlin/Aegyptisches Museum, Staatliche Museen, Berlin, Germany/Margarete Büsing/Art Resource, NY.) Digital technology is used to create virtual models, such as Maya who has similar features to those seen in the sculpture of Nefertiti. (Color version of figure is available online.)

11 Attractiveness of the Average Face 227 face may/may not comply with others and may/ may not be influenced by other aesthetic goals, such as youth and sexual dimorphism. Furthermore, our patients, influenced by images portrayed in the media, may request treatment, which does not comply with the average. The use of cephalometric norms is tempting, as it is clear that the average face is attractive. However, this does not mean that all attractive faces are average or that average faces are optimally attractive. Nevertheless, average facial configurations are more attractive than most faces. 37 But, as cephalometric norms are merely the average of the faces from which they were sourced, they may not accurately represent the patient we are treating, even if matched for ethnicity because No one knows what a pure race is. 61 Substantial overlap can occur between populations, invalidating the concept of races as discrete groupings. Populations have only been partially isolated and seldom demarcated by precise genetic boundaries; race is socially, not scientifically, constructed. 62 The paradigms of human identity based on races, as biological constructs are being questioned in light of the findings from the Human Genome Project; race is poorly correlated with genes. 63 In conclusion, the average face is attractive and reflects good genetic heterozygosity. But, it is not optimally attractive, being neither distinctive nor memorable. With globalization and digital imagery, the ever-changing average is difficult to determine. I hold that the perfection of form and beauty is contained in the sum of all men. -Albrecht Dürer 19 References 1. Angle EH: Treatment of Malocclusion of the Teeth. Philadelphia, PA: SS White Dental Manufacturing Co, Hajnis K: Categories in classical anthropometric proportion systems, in Farkas L, Munro I (eds): Anthropometric Facial Proportions in Medicine. Springfield, IL, Charles C. Thomas Publisher, 1987, pp Coon CS: What is Race? Atlantic Monthly 200: , Viteporn S: The technique of cephalometric radiography, in Athanasiou AE (ed): Orthodontic Cephalometry. London, Mosby-Wolfe, 1995, pp Pacini AJ: Roentgen ray anthropometry of the skull. J Radiol 3: , Hofrath H: Die bedeutung der röntgenfern und abstandsaufnahme für die diagnostik der kieferanomalien. Fortschr Orthodont 1: , Broadbent BH: Craniofacial growth, in Broadbent BH, Bolton GW (eds): Standards of Dentofacial Developmental Growth. St Louis, MO, C.V. Mosby, 1975, pp Jacobson A: The role of radiographic cephalometry in diagnosis and treatment planning, in Jacobson A, Caufield PW (eds): Introduction to Radiographic Cephalometry. Philadelphia, Lea & Febiger, 1985, pp Downs WB. The role of cephalometrics in orthodontic case analysis and diagnosis. Am J Orthod 52: , Ricketts RM. A foundation for cephalometric communication. Am J Orthod, 46: , McNamara JA: Method of cephalometric evaluation. Am J Orthod 86: , Reidel RA: An analysis of dentofacial relationships. Am J Orthod 43: , De Smit A, Dermaut L: Soft-tissue profile preferences. Am J Orthod 86:67-73, Gore R: Pharaohs of the Sun. London, National Geographic, Peck H, Peck S: A concept of facial esthetics. Angle Orthod 40: , Cicero: De inventione 2.1.1, in Pollitt JJ (ed): The Art of Ancient Greece: Sources and Documents. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2001, pp Galen: De temperamentis 1.9, in: Pollitt JJ (ed): The Art of Ancient Greece: Sources and Documents. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2001, p Bellori G: Lives of the modern painters, sculptors and architects, 1672, in Harrison C, Wood P, Gaiger J (eds): Art in Theory An Anthology of Changing Ideas. London, Blackwell Publishing, London, 2000, pp Bartrum G: Albrecht Dürer and his Legacy. London, The British Museum Press, Grammer K, Fink B, Juette A, et al: Female faces and bodies: N-Dimensional feature space and attractiveness, in Rhodes G, Zebrowitz L (eds): Facial Attractiveness. Evolutionary, Cognitive and Social Perspectives. Westport, CT, Ablex, 2002, pp Langlois JH, Roggman LA: Attractive faces are only average. Psychol Sci 1: , Kant I: Critique of judgement, in Preziosi D (ed): The Art of Art History: A Critical Anthology. Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1998, pp Sekula A: The body and the archive, in Bolton R (ed): The Contest of Meaning. London, MIT Press, 1992, pp Galton F: Composite portraits, made by combining those of many different persons in a single resultant figure. J Anthropol Inst 8: , Galton F: Generic images. Nineteenth Century 6: , Galton F: Photographic composites. The Photographic News , April Jacobs J: On the racial characteristics of modern Jews. J Anthropol Inst XV:23-62, 1885

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