Makeup Works by Modifying Factors of Facial Beauty

Makeup is known to increase female facial attractiveness, but it is unclear how. To investigate how makeup enhances beauty, we took a theoretically driven approach, borrowing from the rich literature on facial attractiveness and testing the proposal that cosmetics increase attractiveness by modifying 5 known visual factors of attractiveness: symmetry, averageness, femininity (sexual dimorphism), age, and perceived health. In 6 studies using 152 carefully controlled images of female faces with and without makeup, participants rated the faces on attractiveness and on each of the 5 factors. We analyzed the effect of makeup on these factors and analyzed whether the factors mediated the effect of makeup on attractiveness. Makeup affected all the factors. Averageness, femininity, and health individually mediated the effect of makeup on attractiveness. Finally, with all five factors as mediators in a multiple mediation model, we observed full mediation of the effect of makeup on attractiveness, almost entirely via femininity and health. These findings support a scientific understanding of how makeup works based on the manipulation of visual factors of facial beauty.