The day starts for me when I pick my outfit in the morning and spend a good few minutes getting ready. For me, my look decides how I’m feeling on a particular day. A bright colour equals happy, blacks and greys mean I’m sexy and I know it, and pink is downright cute. A thin layer of BB cream, kohl-rimmed eyes, and a nude lipstick later I’m ready for anything that the day has to offer. But on days when there’s nothing to look forward to, thick glossy eyeliner does the trick. Little did I know that putting on eyeliner for my happiness made me seem ‘less warm’ and ‘less competent’.
That’s right! According to a study published in Sex Role: A Journal of Research, women wearing heavy makeup are perceived as ‘less human’ than those who go for a fresh-faced look.
Study author, Philippe Bernard, tested the novel cosmetics dehumanization hypothesis (CDH), that says subtle manifestations of sexualisation, such as makeup, might influence the way people attribute humanness-related traits of women. To test this, four experiments were conducted with 1000 participants (mostly from the USA and UK with an even split of genders and sexual orientations). People were asked to evaluate women’s faces (model as well as ordinary women) with or without heavy makeup for 10 seconds each and to describe them with adjectives.
The results were consistent with the hypothesis (CDH). According to his paper, “Results showed that faces with makeup were rated as less human while using complementary indicators of dehumanization: They were perceived as possessing less humanness, less agency, less experience (Experiment 1), less competence, less warmth, and less morality (Experiments 2–4) than faces without makeup.”
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Furthermore, in Experiment 4, it was found that faces with eye makeup were attributed to the least amount of warmth and competence. Now there are two ways to handle this – either I stop wearing eyeliner or I don’t give a damn about what other people think. Obviously, I choose the second as would any person who loves themselves. #SelfLoveIsNotSelfish
On the other hand, women wearing no makeup or less makeup were described using words such as ‘warm’, ‘moral’ and ‘capable’. Funny how wearing makeup makes women seem ‘unprofessional’.
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“Concerning the fact that both men and women perceived women with heavy makeup the same way, it is likely that heavy makeup causes perceivers to focus more on women’s sexiness and sexual appeal and, in contrast, caused perceivers to focus less on women’s internal characteristics such as their personalities,” Bernard said. It is what’s inside that counts, my ass!
What are your thoughts on this study? Ridiculous haina?! Here’s what we think about it:
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Featured Image: YouTube
