Steph's Friend

Thursday, April 13, 2006

Female Beauty

How do you define "beauty"? Double eyelids? Almond-shaped eyes? Wrinkle-free complexion? Different people have different yardsticks for measuring "beauty". In this website, a group of researchers went about studying the faces of the people around before coming up with a prototype of a face that is "attractive" and another prototype of a face that is "unattractive". So how do they look like? What are the features that defines a "pretty face"? Well, the answer according to them is below.



(Although I am talking about females, this picture is posted for those who are interested in the results of the study for males)

Do you agree with them? You can navigate around their website if you want to know more about their research project.

According to a study commissioned by Dove, most Asian women are content with their looks with the exception of Japan where more than half of them are not satisfied with how they look.


Which feature do you think plays a great impact on defining how "beautiful" you are? For Singaporean women, it's the face and shape of eyes.


Other interesting finds:

  • Fewer Than 3% of Women Call Themselves “Beautiful”
  • Singapore Women Near Bottom on Compliments (95 days on average since they were told they were beautiful)
  • Only 2 out of 10 Singapore Women Happy with their Breasts
  • Singapore women very “natural,” with least amount of skin whitening and second least usage of deodorant

  • MOST SATISFIED

    FAMILY RELATIONS: Malaysia, China, Philippines, Thailand
    ROMANTIC RELATIONS: Korea, Vietnam, Philippines
    FRIENDS: Hong Kong, Malaysia, Philippines, Korea
    BEAUTY: Philippines, Malaysia, China
    FINANCIAL SUCCESS: Philippines, Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand
    HEALTH: Vietnam, Philippines, Malaysia

    There appears to be a strong relationship between happiness in other aspects of one's life, such as family and friends, and feeling beautiful.


    What if you don't have any of those features listed in the "attractive face" picture? Are you still satisfied with your looks? You can visit Dove's Campaign For Real Beauty and find that there are millions of girls out there who share the same sentiment as you. If you are feeling generous, you can even donate to The Dove Self-Esteem Fund. The fund aims to teach and show girls a wider definition of "beauty". Here's a commercial on bodily characteristics that girls are concerned about.





    Here are some comments by girls from the forum:

    Tasha: Hi. I'm a 14 year old girl with a low self-esteem. After seeing the advert i couldn't believe how much i could relate to it. There's so much pressure to be beautiful and skinny. I have been bullied many times (and still am) for being ugly and smart so i think what doves doing is really great:)

    Guest: hey.i know this self esteem site is about how you feel about how you look but i have problems with whats on the inside.i think im a good looking girl but i dont think i have a personality that anyone will want to know.i hvae no problems with how i look but,stupid as its sounds, i dont think im a person worth knowing.i dont feel i have an impact on anyones life and my confidence in myself is rock bottom.do i sound stupid?

    Daniela Hooper: It is rare, in our world to see that real beauty is in fact the real thing, and what we should be proud of at all times. As a normal girl, I have always been influenced by the media, magazines, and theyre potrays of what beauty is. The truth is, thats how beauty sells.
    What beauty is, is something that they dont know about. Something that lies within every women, every soul. It is the fact that you can be beautiful, by being yourself. Love youself, your inner self and with that comes outside beauty as well. That is what I can see when I watch the DOVE ads, and that is the truth.
    THANK you for realizing.

    _-Sammy-_: When I saw the advert I was shocked how it was like me
    All my life I thought I was fat and ugly and people told me that.
    After seeing the advert I realised that there is beauty in me and I should ignore what everyone else says.
    My Boyfriend said "See even they say your beautiful!"
    Aww bless Him
    Sammy

    After reading all these, how do you define "beauty"? Is it the physical built outside or the personality inside that makes you unique as you are? The outside or the inside?

    Personally, I feel that even though your physical features does play a part in defining "beauty", but what is more important - and also the most overlooked part - is your personality and characteristics. Let me share something that I saw.

    Once, I was queuing up to collect the TODAY newspaper at Toa Payoh Interchange. There was this schoolgirl who looked like an average Singaporean girl. Nothing outstanding, just average. From her uniform, I could see that she's from a girls' school - CHIJ or some Convent school. She was standing at one corner. I was thinking to myself, "Shouldn't she be in school at this hour? It's like 7.15am." Then when the MRT (Mass Rapid Transit) train came and commuters streamed out of it, there was this other schoolgirl in the same uniform who was in crutches. The one who was standing at one corner, approached this other schoolgirl and helped her to carry her schoolbag! Oh man, I was so touched. She waited all this while for her friend to come so that she could assist her in carrying her schoolbag. Her friend initially refused but she insisted on, seeing how difficult it was for her friend to walk with her crutches and carry her schoolbag at the same time. Does she look nice? Average I would say. But it's her kind personality that makes her even more beautiful than the beautiful lady in front who just said the four-letter word.

    Hopefully this post will inspire you and help you realise that true beauty is not defined by your built, but by your inside - that is something you can change and improve on. The same can be said for the males also.

    "It's beauty that captures your attention; personality which captures your heart." ~Anonymous ~

    (Statistics, figures and findings taken from Dove's "New Study of Asian Women's Attitudes Reveals".)


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    28 Comments:

    Blogger animalfamily said...

    looks like singaporeans are pretty low on being satisfied!

    yeah, i always feel that it is the personaility that animates the facial features that make an average person attractive and a beautiful person even more stunning. works both ways, beautiful people can lose their attractiveness in an instant when they act like idiots. a fine example would be Tom Cruise.

    5:50 PM, April 14, 2006  
    Blogger Steph said...

    Haha...glad that you find this post informative.

    I feel that society places too much emphasis on the outward looks and all, neglecting the inside - the individual's personality. Some girls have low self-esteem because of their looks (as shown in the commercial in the post).

    This is not right for them.

    I guess it's because of society and the media where "Beauty Pageants" and "It's cool to be skinny and un-cool to be fat" tags go about.

    As for Tom Cruise...lol...I have no comments :D

    11:18 PM, April 14, 2006  
    Anonymous Anonymous said...

    Beauty is within the eyes of the beholder. Beauty also counts alot on ones self esteem.

    Looking at a face does not tell me a thing. A person can be the ugliest person of the world mentally.

    You cannot judge a book by its cover. Anyone can have beauty if they are confident and love who they are.

    10:07 AM, April 15, 2006  
    Blogger Unknown said...

    What an interesting post! I think beauty is women is judged by how feminine their facial features look (smaller nose, smaller face, smaller eyes, delicate features etc.). Women with traits that are more masculine are usually considered less attractive.

    10:47 AM, April 15, 2006  
    Blogger Steph said...

    I agree with you Anonymous.
    It's not the shell but the inside that matters.

    5:57 PM, April 15, 2006  
    Blogger Steph said...

    Thanks for the compliment :D
    Glad that you found it interesting.

    6:00 PM, April 15, 2006  
    Anonymous Anonymous said...

    Hi Steph,
    I just stopped by to see what your blog was about. This was an interesting post although I whole-heartedly agree that it's what's on the inside that really counts.

    10:29 PM, April 15, 2006  
    Blogger Steph said...

    Hi Lauren,

    Thanks for stopping by. Glad that you agree with me. I hope that many others will realise that it's the inside that counts and not the face of a beauty pageant.

    11:54 AM, April 16, 2006  
    Anonymous Anonymous said...

    That was really interesting.

    10:02 PM, April 16, 2006  
    Blogger Steph said...

    Robin,

    Glad that you found it interesting :D

    10:12 PM, April 16, 2006  
    Anonymous Anonymous said...

    I feel it's time for Singaporeans to wake up!!! Physical beauty does not last... we'll grow old someday. Lasting beauty is when we focus more on helping those around us instead.

    1:03 AM, April 17, 2006  
    Anonymous Anonymous said...

    Physical beauty isn't everything, but it's hard to convince yourself of that when FHM and Miss Singapore Universe exist. Pretty people get treated better. It's a fact.

    10:20 AM, April 17, 2006  
    Anonymous Anonymous said...

    excellent write-up. You should consider joining the beauty industry as a full-fledged researcher. dump ur engineering place ;)

    1:17 PM, April 17, 2006  
    Blogger juz_A_ga| said...

    wow. now this was certainly worth the read.

    I also think that a pretty girl cussing just makes her look ugly.

    Beauty.. it's a never ending pursuit for the woman. The pressure to be pretty-fied is too strong to let us be us. Especially when the argument comes up that one has to be "presentable" at all times. And by presentable to most people, it does mean dolled up in thick make-up, high heels, hair done up, and trendy clothes.

    5:21 PM, April 17, 2006  
    Blogger Steph said...

    Steph to Anonymous:
    True...true...it's the unexplained charm from an individual's characteristics that outshines that beautiful face.
    I agree, it's a fact that those endowed with good looks are treated better, but in the long run, I believe that the one with a good heart gets the better treatment. It's not the short-term benefit, but the long-term one that matters.

    Steph to juz_A_ga|:
    Thanks for the compliment, glad that you liked it. Well, "dolling up" basically makes you into someone that you aren't. Is "Jane" the girl with the lipstick? Or is "Jane" the one with curls? No! I believe "Jane" is the one who is confident in herself and is proud of who she is.

    10:01 PM, April 18, 2006  
    Blogger Steph said...

    Steph to freakkler:
    Lol...but my passion still lies in Material Engineering. Maybe I will come up with some "nano-particles" that clean the skin ;P

    11:17 PM, April 18, 2006  
    Blogger Dank said...

    Great article!

    Very true but sad indeed that people look not to beautify the inside... but we should take comfort in the few (and hopefully growing numbers) in our midst who are like-minded as you are.

    Together, we can make this world a better place! Haha!
    At least we try...

    7:43 PM, April 19, 2006  
    Blogger Steph said...

    Steph to Dank:

    Lol...true. Hopefully more and more people will realise that it's the inside that counts.

    11:01 PM, April 21, 2006  
    Anonymous Anonymous said...

    I'm currently doing research about female beauty for a school project where I'm going to create one (digitaly). With this research I stumbeled on many interesting things about how media sort of lies about beauty. Like I've read at one or more comments on this page, magazines and such shows us woman which supposedly be the most beautifull on the planet, but the truth is, they are far from being attractive. Just take the face of an average girl smooth the skin texture a little bit and you will see that they often look way better then those models in your magazines. They often look like little boys, yes even a famouse model like Heidi Klum.
    Daniela Hooper talks about real beauty which is a rare sight in the real world, but the fun thing about this beauty is, that though it's a treat for the eyes, it is often not the kind of beauty one is attracted to.
    Anyway what I'm trying to say is, don't compare yourself with these kinds of artificual beauty.

    5:12 AM, December 01, 2006  
    Anonymous Anonymous said...

    Hi dear Wiebee...

    I think that Daniela Hooper is not comparing herself to the "modelling beauty out there" , she is just saying that real beauty is a "day to day woman". So really your just agreeing with her.
    Besides, the whole point of the forum is the idea that women compare themselves to these "unacheavable figures" of modelling etc. "Attraction" persay, and what attracts people the most (whether its a model type or a normal/woman type) is not the point here. The point is that women should realize that they are unique and beautiful in their own ways, and that these types of women although useful to the industry, they are far from what a woman shoudl want to be deep inside.

    Sandra P. -Texas-

    5:03 AM, May 31, 2007  
    Blogger Steph said...

    To Wiebee,

    Very interesting information you have there.

    Yes, I totally agree with you. Beauty is a treat for the eyes, but not often the kind of beauty one is attracted to.

    Thanks for that sentence. It summarizes a lot of things.

    9:01 PM, June 05, 2007  
    Blogger Steph said...

    To Sandra P,

    I am not too sure about Daniela Hooper, but I agree that women should learn to understand that they are unique and beautiful like what you said.

    Thanks for the comment Sandra :)

    9:03 PM, June 05, 2007  
    Anonymous Anonymous said...

    I'd say that there is a reason ( actually, many) why the concept of outer beauty affects the amount of self esteem a girl have,
    As said in an earlier comment,good looking people gets treated better, and although u said that this doesnt affect the "long term", I think, in a way, it does...

    Okay..see it in this sense..
    You're comparing a
    GOOD LOOKING LADY( with bad personality) with A LESSER GOOD LOOKING LADY( with good personality)..

    ++ in this case, of course the lesser good looking lady gets the better treatment( in the long term)

    but what about the situation where..
    A GOOD LOOKING LADY( with good personality) is compared to A LESSER GOOD LOOKING LADY ( also with good personality?

    ++ the good looking lady have the higher chance of getting better treatment dont u think?

    So, my point is, anyhow, there's still discrimination by everyone on how people look on the outside, and we really can't blame people with low self esteem (reg. their looks), because it is just the way the world is!
    The real culprit who deserves the blame is PEOPLE WHO JUDGE the said people. If they are always judged on their personality, and not by their looks, they wouldn't have low self esteem in the first place.

    ++this is only my opinion tho =)

    9:33 PM, July 25, 2007  
    Anonymous Anonymous said...

    I think real beauty is...Daniela Hooper..

    10:09 AM, November 23, 2007  
    Anonymous Anonymous said...

    Personality brings back the beauty of every woman, better than getting lessons for women beauty tips

    5:37 AM, March 26, 2008  
    Anonymous Anonymous said...

    I appreciate the beauty of asians. Simple yet fabulous. Just like the tips you can get from women beauty tips

    10:44 AM, April 03, 2008  
    Anonymous jason chaotic said...

    Hi, first comment here.
    Anyways, I think that our gender is dismissed as being entirely visual. Yeah we're visual and looks do matter to some extent but a womans inner beauty does account for something. After all, pretty bitches suddenly turn unattractive very fast when they get unbearable. Also, most gals think that looks are the only thing that they need to depend upon but the ones who are just self absorbed tend to become boring fast IMHO. When a gal gets personality/intellectual pursuits/some physical ones and passion they become the entire package deal.

    12:35 AM, June 07, 2009  
    Anonymous buy eyelashes extensions michigan said...

    Found this statistics interesting and this is a good guide for beauty appreciation.

    6:36 AM, November 21, 2013  

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