More specifically, we tend to think of someone's face. And regardless of ethnicity, race, culture, or time period, facial symmetry is the key aspect of ageless beauty. This has been confirmed by even babies, who prefer to look at symmetrical faces, which illustrates how recognition of symmetry is innate.


Facial Symmetry:
For decades, people have been curious about what contributes to antiaging beauty and middle aged beauties, leading to extensive research. There has been evidence that physical attractiveness in childhood leads to more attention from teachers and better opportunities and higher salaries in adulthood.

In all this research, one intriguing fact has continued to come to light: a woman's facial beauty is mathematically measurable.

In 1980, Dr. Michael Cunningham, a psychologist at the University of Kentucky, conducted a study where participants ranked women's facial beauty. With the rankings so consistent and precise, Dr. Cunningham was able to calculate the "ideal" measurements that epitomize a beautiful face.

These measurements include:

• Visible eyeball height is one-fourteenth the face's height
• Eye width is three-tenths the width of the face at the eyes' level
• Pupil width is one-fourteenth the distance between the cheekbones
• Chin length is one-fifth the face's height
• Distance from the eye's center to the bottom of the eyebrow is one-tenth the face's height
• The nose's total area is less than 5 percent of the face's total area

Keep in mind that these measurements only exemplify a standardized ideal and not an actual face. Even so, Dr. Cunningham discovered that this perceived beauty could be thrown off considerably by even a slight difference in ratios. For example, considering if the ideal mouth consists of 50 percent of the face's width, a women would be perceived as much less attractive if her percentage differed by even a few points.



Cultural-Specific Beauty:
Around the world, it is clear that facial symmetry is among the most desirable facial features in young, old and middle aged beauties. However, in addition, different cultures each possess their own unique preferences in how to 'dress up" a beautiful face.

Some examples include:

• In the Kanyan Tribe between Thailand and Burma, they like to wear heavy gold rings starting in childhood, in order to elongate their necks. As they grow older, they then remove their rings to reveal long, slender necks.  Middle aged beauties indeed!
  
• In India, women apply dramatic eyeliner and wear brightly colored saries, jewels, and a bindi dot on their forehead.
• In the Ethiopian Karo Tribes, women attract husbands by inflicting scars on their stomachs.
• Polynesian women like to wear traditional tattoos on their chins and lips.
• Ideal beauty in Asia is often characterized by very light, pale skin that is smooth and without blemishes or spots.
• In America, women often use earrings and necklaces to frame their faces, which they like to keep smooth, wrinkle-free, and tan.

What Beauty Really Means: 
Our perception of beauty is innate, and in discovering what beauty signals to our unconscious minds, we take a look at sex and reproduction.

Men value physical attractiveness in a mate more than women do (women value money and the ability to provide). However, it's surprising to see what physical attraction actually means to the male brain.

With exposure to things like pathogens, disease, toxins, and parasites during development, as well as genetic factors like inbreeding and mutations, facial symmetry decreases. Therefore, if women are developmentally and genetically healthy, they have greater symmetry and thus are perceived as more attractive. With this, they are more likely to rear and nurture healthy offspring.

So when a man thinks that a woman is beautiful, his primitive brain is really thinking that this woman is parasite-free and could produce healthy babies.

Lastly, men are also attracted to youthfulness, a low waist-to-hip ratio, and breast size, which, too are evolutionarily significant factors to producing and nurturing children.


Achieving Facial Beauty:
With our modern times, there are a variety of procedures, treatments, cosmetics, and products to help enhance our symmetry and beauty.  Many women desire an lifetime of antiaging beauty. We may have been born with a certain face or hand, but we don't have to live with it. As Helena Rubenstein, the cosmetics tycoon, said, "There are no ugly women, only lazy ones."

About the guest author:
Victoria Strander writes about the latest trends on enhancing and preserving a woman's beauty on her blog, The Beauty Rules. Topics such as "What Makes a Beautiful Face?" is one of the many she writes about.