I have a tendency to get lax when it comes to regular shaving, sometimes even letting a week or two go by without shaving.  Recently, during a visit to my parents my Dad jokingly asked if I was growing a beard.  My brother who shares my intellectual curiosity about intergender and mating dynamics used the comment to interject that science indicated that facial hair was sexy.

I was actually initially skeptical, and asked him to forward me the source information.  One reason I was skeptical was because my wife strongly prefers me being clean shaven (smooth as a baby’s butt), and looking back over the years, I received a lot more interest from women when I was clean shaven or a day or two stubble at most compared to around 7-10 days growth.  Interestingly, I was having a conversation with a woman at work, and my facial hair came up (during a conversation on aging), and she specifically mentioned she liked it.  I also recall reading a post by a blogger going off on male facial hair, and then a few posts later showing a picture of a guy with a goatee as a “hottie”.  Clearly, female opinion can differ, even the same woman from one day to the next.  Go figure.

http://www.ehbonline.org/article/S1090-5138%2813%2900022-6/abstract

Abstract

Facial hair strongly influences people’s judgments of men’s socio-sexual attributes. However, the nature of these judgments is often contradictory. The levels of intermediate facial hair growth presented to raters and the stage of female raters’ menstrual cycles might have influenced past findings. We quantified men’s and women’s judgments of attractiveness, health, masculinity and parenting abilities for photographs of men who were clean-shaven, lightly or heavily stubbled and fully bearded. We also tested the effect of the menstrual cycle and hormonal contraceptive use on women’s ratings. Women judged faces with heavy stubble as most attractive and heavy beards, light stubble and clean-shaven faces as similarly less attractive. In contrast, men rated full beards and heavy stubble as most attractive, followed closely by clean-shaven and light stubble as least attractive. Men and women rated full beards highest for parenting ability and healthiness. Masculinity ratings increased linearly as facial hair increased, and this effect was more pronounced in women in the fertile phase of the menstrual cycle, although attractiveness ratings did not differ according to fertility. Our findings confirm that beardedness affects judgments of male socio-sexual attributes and suggest that an intermediate level of beardedness is most attractivewhile full-bearded men may be perceived as better fathers who could protect and invest in offspring.

 

The conclusion is a bit mixed as stated in the abstract.  I did not read the full study, but I think they have missed a piece of the puzzle that would have yielded more conclusive results.

This article contains poll results for a number of celebrities with pictures of them without facial hair and with facial hair, and asks which picture is more attractive.  I am often skeptical of survey and poll results, but this one is fairly simple in that it simply asks which of two pictures is more attractive instead of asking a person to predict their behavior in a particular situation.  I’m also sure the results contain some male answers (I did NOT answer the poll out of respect for data integrity), but for the most part I think the answers are mostly women giving their sincere evaluation and thus the results are fairly accurate.

The four I want to highlight are Ryan Gosling, George Clooney, Daniel Craig, and Bradley Cooper.  For Ryan Gosling, 97% liked scruffy better, while only 3% liked clean better.  In contrast, for Daniel Craig, 82% liked smooth better, while only 18% liked rough better.  George Clooney and Bradley Cooper were both closer to 50/50 either way.

What’s going on here?  How do we make sense of this?  Particularly the difference between Ryan Gosling and Daniel Craig.  The key fact to note is that facial hair is masculinizing.  When I thought about it, particularly the results of Ryan Gosling and Daniel Craig, I realized that a concept I read about it in a study of male muscularity explained the results.

The paper is Why Is Muscularity Sexy? by Martie G. Haselton PhD

http://www.sscnet.ucla.edu/comm/haselton/papers/

The concept at work is termed the Inverted-U hypothesis of masculine traits.  From the paper:

Women will not prefer mates with
extremely high and extremely low levels of masculinity
(e.g., muscularity, facial masculinity, shoulder-to-hip ratio,
and chest-to-waist ratio). Very high levels will be viewed as
unattractive because these men are viewed as volatile and
threatening, perhaps presenting a direct danger to the
woman. Low levels will be viewed as unattractive because
these men are viewed as weak and submissive. Men with
moderate to high levels should be preferred most as mates.

Put simply, there is a golden mean of masculinity in terms of optimizing sexual attractiveness.  No doubt, there is individual variation across women in terms of the amount of “masculinity” they find most attractive, or at least verbally articulate.  I have some theories on that, but that is a post for another time.  There is some evidence that women with higher testosterone levels prefer men with higher levels of masculinity.

Another excerpt from the paper:

Facial masculinity was positively correlated
with sexual desirability, but the relationship was nonlinear,
with the most masculine faces perceived as being
somewhat less sexually desirable, trustworthy, and sensitive
than less masculine faces.

So there is a tipping point where additional “points of masculinity” (I like the idea of using the concept of points which I’ve taken from the brilliant Bastiat Blogger) actually reduces sexual desirability.

We now can make sense of the wildly divergent results of Ryan Gosling and Daniel Craig.  Ryan Gosling has a more “feminine” looking face, probably a considerable distance from that optimal facial masculinity so by adding facial hair he moves in the right direction closer to the optimal point which explains why an overwhelming 97% prefer him scruffy.  In contrast, Daniel Craig already has a very masculine face so by adding facial hair he is moving in the wrong direction away from that optimal point of facial masculinity towards too much which explains why 82% preferred him smooth.  With George Clooney and Bradley Cooper, I think the baseline of facial masculinity is pretty neutral which is why you probably don’t see a strong preference either way.  This also made sense when I thought of myself and my experiences.  I have a masculine face, and looking back I always got the most attention and best results when I was clean shaven, and in my early to mid-twenties I sported a goatee for about 1.5 years.

So to answer the question of the post, I think it is DEPENDS.  It depends on what level of facial masculinity you are starting with.  On some guys, facial hair is going to “add sexy”, on others it will detract.

If you are a younger guy (early 20s) and still have kind of a young boy face, I’d recommend growing out a goatee or beard, and see what kind of responses you get.  If you are an older guy with a more feminine leaning face, do the same.  If you have a masculine face, I’d recommend staying clean shaven, especially if you have other “masculinity points” you are adding such as muscularity.  You don’t want to cross over that tipping point on the Inverted U of masculine traits.

For our younger male readers. don’t be afraid to experiment with different looks including facial hair, hairstyles, choice of apparel.  It is easy to get into self-limiting beliefs about how you should look because that is “who you are”.  As I approach 40 this year, I am very glad that I experimented with all sorts of looks and experiences in my twenties, and I am glad I realized I didn’t have to stay the “same guy” that finished high school or college.

So unless you fall into that group that already has a high level of facial masculinity, grow out that beard or goatee and just see what happens.

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