What is Beauty?

When you look in the mirror, do you like what you see? Chances are you’ve got a feature or two that could be improved – after all, nobody’s perfect. But how far would you go to be more attractive?

A recent survey found that it’s no longer just women who want to become more beautiful: men are quickly catching up. In Britain, for example, 34 per cent of men are not satisfied with their bodies.

And if creams and lotions can’t do the trick, both sexes are increasingly ready to submit to the surgeon’s knife in search of perfection.

The world record for plastic surgery is held by Cindy Jackson – who has had more than 20 operations to redesign herself from top to toe. She has spent 55,000 pounds over eight years to achieve the Barbie Doll look, and considers it money well spent. “Now I can cross the street whenever I want to because male drivers will always stop to look at my figure.”

Research shows that beautiful people get a better deal. Small babies prefer to look at them, teachers are kinder to them and even mothers pay more attention to their prettier children. At school attractive children are punished less and often get higher marks for same work.

Every day, we are bombarded with beautiful faces. They smile at us from advertising hoardings, TV screens and magazines. Their perfect smiles, flawless cheekbones and wide eyes fuel the multi-billion-dollar beauty industry.

But what exactly is beauty? For centuries men – it usually was men – have tried to come up with a mathematical formula for beauty. The ancient Greeks thought the number three was the answer – a beautiful face was one that could be divided into three exactly equal parts, hairline to eyebrows, eyebrows to mouth, and finally mouth to chin.

The Victorians believed that a face with great beauty possessed the average features of all other faces. However, this has now been debunked by recent research which found that the most attractive faces have higher cheekbones, a thinner jaw and larger eyes relative to the size of the face than an average one.

Dr Alfred Linney at University College Hospital measured the faces of models and has found out that there’s no such thing as “the” beautiful face. Instead the features of models turn out to be just as varied as everyone else’s. “Some have teeth that stick out,” he says, “others have a jutting chin. There was no one ideal of beauty that was closer to others. In fact, there were some with features that could normally make them candidates for cosmetic surgery!”

Another survey shows that all sorts of non-standard looks still count as beautiful. Just think of Gerard Depardien.

The truth is that when it comes to choosing a mate, beauty is still very much in the eye of the beholder. Some of us make the oddest choices.

So the message is: if you’ve got it flaunt it – but if you haven’t, just make the most of what you’ve got.

What is in Your Appearance?

“If you are tall, people expect you to be strong, even though toy might feel a complete wimp.”

(Amanda Streeter, artist)

“If you are small you’re landed with a “sweet image”. I am constantly having to work harder in order to be taken seriously.”

(Karen Evennett, journalist)

“I’ve never come to terms with being fat because I’ve never considered there was anything to come to terms with. I like being fat. What I get truly angry about is the lack of choice in clothes for fat women.

There are a lot of men around who genuinely prefer big women. Many of the nasty comments actually come from thin women; they are so insecure that they simply have to turn on somebody else. Getting thin is not the way to attract a man. You must be loved for what you are, not for what someone wants you to be; otherwise you will end up always giving in, always trying to please.”

(Jackie Broad, actress)

“Society makes allowances for how men look because we feel they may have something else to offer. I am convinced that the same principles do not apply when we judge women; it is just no good a woman being brilliant or fascinating or brilliant if she fails to measure up to society’s physical ideal. If you call a man fat, the insult just doesn’t have the same sting.”

(Bonetta Adamson, television producer)

“Nobody should be treated differently because of their size. Unfortunately, we are conditioned to believe that if you are a boy, you can’t be too tall, but as a girl, you most certainly can, and many girls become extremely self-conscious. Small is seen as “charming” and people often react positively to tiny girls in later life, however, small women may feel they have to compensate by working harder than their taller colleagues in order to prove themselves professionally.”

(Penelope Leach, psychologist)