ArticleCognitive research: principles and implications2022
Unattractive faces are more attractive when the bottom-half is masked, an effect that reverses when the top-half is concealed.
Article in Cognitive research: principles and implications, 2022. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 18 papers.
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
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Who cites it
18 citing papers in PubMed, 29 citations in OpenAlex.
- Incomplete Faces Do but Masked Faces Do Not Affect Mind Perception.Psychological reports · 2026Article
- Attenuated inferred-sensory mismatch during masked face recognition in schizophrenia.Frontiers in psychiatry · 2026Article
- Unveiling the "Less is More" paradox: How experience and cognitive filling drive attractiveness in occluded faces.Cognitive research: principles and implications · 2025Article
- Influence of aging on facial attractiveness perception in individuals with normal occlusion.The Angle orthodontist · 2025Article
- The Crucial Role of the Eyes in Predicting Facial Attractiveness from Parts.Behavioral sciences (Basel, Switzerland) · 2025Article
- Facial aesthetics is shaped not only by genetic predispositions but also by the cultural norms and values.World journal of clinical cases · 2024Article
- Influence of protective clothing and masks on facial trustworthiness in an investment game: insights from a Chinese population study.Cognitive research: principles and implications · 2024Article
- Unveiling why race does not affect the mask effect on attractiveness: but gender and expression do.Cognitive research: principles and implications · 2024Article
- Public perception on face mask wearing during COVID-19 pandemic in Malaysia: A cross sectional study.PloS one · 2024Article
- The Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on Orthodontic Adult Patients' Characteristics and Decision on Orthodontic Appliance.Journal of multidisciplinary healthcare · 2024Article
- When less is not more: the effect of transparent masks on facial attractiveness judgment.Cognitive research: principles and implications · 2023Article
- Impact of face masks and sunglasses on attractiveness, trustworthiness, and familiarity, and limited time effect: a Japanese sample.Discover psychology · 2023Article
- Post COVID-19, still wear a face mask? Self-perceived facial attractiveness reduces mask-wearing intention.Frontiers in psychology · 2023Article
- Mask-wearing selectivity alters observers' face perception.Cognitive research: principles and implications · 2022Article
- Incomplete faces are completed using a more average face.Cognitive research: principles and implications · 2022Article
- Wearing face masks impairs dyadic micro-activities in nonverbal social encounter: A mixed-methods first-person study on the sense of I and Thou.Frontiers in psychology · 2022Article
- Occlusion of faces by sanitary masks improves facial attractiveness of other races.Frontiers in psychology · 2022Article
- The Effect of Wearing a Mask on Facial Attractiveness.Aesthetic surgery journal. Open forum · 2022Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
2 authors at 1 institution in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Facial attractiveness in humans signals an individual's genetic condition, underlying physiology and health status, serving as a cue to one's mate value. The practice of wearing face masks for prevention of transmission of airborne infections may disrupt one's ability to evaluate facial attractiveness, and with it, cues to an individual's health and genetic condition. The current research investigated the effect of face masks on the perception of face attractiveness. Across four studies, we tested if below- and above-average attractive full faces are equally affected by wearing facial masks. The results reveal that for young faces (Study 1) and old faces (Study 2) a facial mask increases the perceived attractiveness of relatively unattractive faces, but there is no effect of wearing a face mask for highly attractive faces. Study 3 shows that the same pattern of ratings emerged when the bottom-half of the faces are cropped rather than masked, indicating that the effect is not mask-specific. Our final Study 4, in which information from only the lower half of the faces was made available, showed that contrary to our previous findings, highly attractive half-faces are perceived to be less attractive than their full-face counterpart; but there is no such effect for the less attractive faces. This demonstrates the importance of the eye-region in the perception of attractiveness, especially for highly attractive faces. Collectively these findings suggest that a positivity-bias enhances the perception of unattractive faces when only the upper face is visible, a finding that may not extend to attractive faces because of the perceptual weight placed on their eye-region.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.