“Perception of Sexual Orientation from Facial Structure: A Study With Artificial Face Models”, 2017-02-02 (; backlinks; similar):
Research has shown that lay people can perceive sexual orientation better than chance from face stimuli. However, the relation between facial structure and sexual orientation has been scarcely examined. Recently, an extensive morphometric study on a large sample of Canadian people (2014) identified 3 (in men) and 4 (in women) facial features as unique multivariate predictors of sexual orientation in each sex group.
The present study tested the perceptual validity of these facial traits with 2 experiments based on realistic artificial 3D face models created by manipulating the key parameters and presented to Spanish participants.
Experiment 1 included 200 White and Black face models of both sexes. The results showed an overall accuracy (0.74) clearly above chance in a binary hetero/homosexual judgment task and statistically-significant differences depending on the race and sex of the face models.
Experiment 2 produced 5 versions of 24 artificial faces of both sexes varying the key parameters in equal steps, and participants had to rate on a 1–7 scale how likely they thought that the depicted person had a homosexual sexual orientation. Rating scores displayed an almost perfect linear regression as a function of the parameter steps.
In summary, both experiments demonstrated the perceptual validity of the 7 multivariate predictors identified by et al 2014 and open up new avenues for further research on this issue with artificial face models.
[Keywords: sexual orientation, facial structure, artificial faces, homosexuality, perception]