title: Physical attractiveness

text: Studies have explored the genetic basis behind such issues as facial symmetry and body scent and how they influence physical attraction. In one study in which women wore men's T-shirts, researchers found that women were more attracted to the bodily scents in shirts of men who had a different type of gene section within the DNA called major histocompatibility complex (MHC). MHC is a large gene area within the DNA of vertebrates which encodes proteins dealing with the immune system and which influences individual bodily odors. One hypothesis is that humans are naturally attracted by the sense of smell and taste to others with "dissimilar" MHC sections, perhaps to avoid subsequent inbreeding while increasing the genetic diversity of offspring. Furthermore, there are studies showing that women's natural attraction for men with dissimilar immune profiles can be distorted with use of birth control pills. Other research findings involving the genetic foundations of attraction suggest that MHC heterozygosity positively correlates with male facial attractiveness. Women judge the faces of men who are heterozygous at all three MHC loci to be more attractive than the faces of men who are homozygous at one or more of these loci. Additionally, a second experiment with genotyped women raters, found these preferences were independent of the degree of MHC similarity between the men and the female rater. With MHC heterozygosity independently seen as a genetic advantage, the results suggest that facial attractiveness in men may be a measure of genetic quality. General genetic heterozygosity has been demonstrated to be related to attractiveness in that people with mixed genetic backgrounds (i.e., mixed race people) as seen as more attractive than people with a more similar genetic parents. (i.e., single race people). However, some studies have not found that mixed race individuals are rated as more attractive, and one found that only certain mixes were rated as more attractive; this study argued that equating race with genetics was incorrect and argued for social influences as the cause.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: A 2010 OkCupid study on 200,000 of its male and female dating site users found that women are, except those during their early to mid-twenties, open to relationships with both somewhat older and somewhat younger men; they have a larger potential dating pool than men until age 26. At age 20, women, in a "dramatic change", begin sending private messages to significantly older men. At age 29, they become "even more open to older men". Male desirability to women peaks in the late 20s and does not fall below the average for all men until 36. Other research indicates that women, irrespective of their own age, are attracted to men who are the same age or older.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: For the Romans especially, "beardlessness" and "smooth young bodies" were considered beautiful to both men and women. For Greek and Roman men, the most desirable traits of boys were their "youth" and "hairlessness". Pubescent boys were considered a socially appropriate object of male desire, while post-pubescent boys were considered to be "ἔξωροι" or "past the prime". This was largely in the context of pederasty (adult male interest in adolescent boys). Today, men and women's attitudes towards male beauty has changed. For example, body hair on men may even be preferred (see below).


title: Physical attractiveness

text: A 1984 study said that gay men tend to prefer gay men of the same age as ideal partners, but there was a statistically significant effect (p < 0.05) of masculinity-femininity. The study said that more feminine men tended to prefer relatively older men than themselves and more masculine men tended to prefer relatively younger men than themselves.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: Cross-cultural data shows that the reproductive success of women is tied to their youth and physical attractiveness such as the pre-industrial Sami where the most reproductively successful women were 15 years younger than their man. One study covering 37 cultures showed that, on average, a woman was 2.5 years younger than her male partner, with the age difference in Nigeria and Zambia being at the far extreme of 6.5 to 7.5 years. As men age, they tend to seek a mate who is ever younger.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: 25% of eHarmony's male customers over the age of 50 request to only be matched with women younger than 40. The 2010 OkCupid study found that female desirability to its male users peaks at age 21, and falls below the average for all women at 31. After age 26, men have a larger potential dating pool than women on the site; and by age 48, their pool is almost twice as large. The median 31-year-old male user searches for women aged 22-to-35, while the median 42-year-old male searches for women 27-to-45. The age skew is even greater with messages to other users; the median 30-year-old male messages teenage girls as often as women his own age, while mostly ignoring women a few years older than him. Excluding the 10% most and 10% least beautiful women, women's attractiveness does not change between 18 and 40. If extremes are included, however, "there's no doubt that younger [women] are more physically attractive – indeed in many ways beauty and youth are inextricable. That's why most of the models you see in magazines are teenagers".


title: Physical attractiveness

text: Pheromones (detected by female hormone markers) reflects female fertility and the reproductive value mean. As females age, the estrogen-to-androgen production ratio changes and results in female faces to appear more and more masculine (thus appearing less "attractive"). In a small (n=148) study performed in the United States, using male college students at one university, the mean age expressed as ideal for a wife was found to be 16.87 years old, while 17.76 was the mean ideal age for a brief sexual encounter. However, the study sets up a framework where "taboos against sex with young girls" are purposely diminished, and biased their sample by removing any participant over the age of 30, with a mean participant age of 19.83. In a study of penile tumescence, men were found most aroused by pictures of young adult females.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: Signals of fertility in women are often also seen as signals of youth. The evolutionary perspective proposes the idea that when it comes to sexual reproduction, the minimal parental investment required by men gives them the ability and want to simply reproduce 'as much as possible.' It therefore makes sense that men are attracted to the features in women which signal youthfulness, and thus fertility. Their chances of reproductive success are much higher than they would be should they pick someone older—and therefore less fertile.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: This may explain why combating age declines in attractiveness occurs from a younger age in women than in men. For example, the removal of one's body hair is considered a very feminine thing to do. This can be explained by the fact that aging results in raised levels of testosterone and thus, body hair growth. Shaving reverts one's appearance to a more youthful stage and although this may not be an honest signal, men will interpret this as a reflection of increased fertile value. Research supports this, showing hairlessness to considered sexually attractive by men.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: "Leg-to-body ratio" is seen as an indicator of physical attractiveness but there appears to be no single accepted definition of leg-length: the 'perineum-to-floor' measure is the most frequently used, but arguably the distance from the ankle bone to the outer hip bone is more rigorous. With the latter metric, the most attractive male leg-to-body ratio (judged by American women) is 1:1. A Japanese study using the former metric found the same result for male attractiveness but women with longer legs than the rest of their body were judged to be more attractive. Excessive deviations from the mean were seen as indicative of disease.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: A study using Polish participants found that legs 5% longer than the average for both sexes was considered most attractive. The study concluded this preference might stem from the influence of long-legged runway models. Another study using British and American participants found "mid-ranging" leg-to-body ratios to be most ideal.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: A study by Swami et al. of British male and female undergraduates showed a preference for men with legs as long as the rest of their body and women with 40% longer legs than the rest of their body. The researcher concluded that this preference might be influenced by American culture, in which long-legged women are portrayed as more attractive.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: Marco Bertamini criticized the Swami et al. study for using a picture of the same person with digitally altered leg lengths which he felt would make the modified image appear unrealistic. Bertamini also criticized the Swami study for only changing the leg length while keeping the arm length constant. After accounting for these concerns in his own study, Bertamini, using stick figures, also found a preference for women with proportionately longer legs than men. When Bertamini investigated the issue of possible sexual dimorphism of leg length, he found two sources that indicated that men usually have slightly proportionately longer legs than women or that differences in leg length proportion may not exist between men and women. Following this review of existing literature on the subject, he conducted his own calculations using data from 1774 men and 2208 women. Using this data, he similarly found that men usually have slightly proportionately longer legs than women or that differences in leg length proportion may not exist between men and women. These findings made him rule out the possibility that a preference for women with proportionately longer legs than men is due proportionately longer legs being a secondary sex characteristic of women.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: A 2006 study of 25,594 heterosexual men found that "men who perceived themselves as having a large penis were more satisfied with their own appearance".


title: Physical attractiveness

text: A 2014 study criticized previous studies based on the fact that they relied on images and used terms such as "small", "medium", and "large" when asking for female preference. The new study used 3D models of penises from sizes of long and in circumference to long and in circumference and let the women "view and handle" them. It was found that women overestimated the actual size of the penises they experimented with when asked in a follow-up survey. The study concluded that "women on average preferred the penis in length both for long-term and for one-time partners. Penises with larger girth were preferred for one-time partners."


title: Physical attractiveness

text: Evidence from various cultures suggests that heterosexual men tend to find the sight of women's genitalia to be sexually arousing.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: Manual laborers who spent extended periods of time outside developed a darker skin tone due to exposure to the sun. As a consequence, an association between dark skin and the lower classes developed. Light skin became an aesthetic ideal because it symbolized wealth. "Over time society attached various meanings to these colored differences. Including assumptions about a person's race, socioeconomic class, intelligence, and physical attractiveness."


title: Physical attractiveness

text: A scientific review published in 2011 identified from a vast body of empirical research that light skin colour and skin tone tend to be preferred as they act as indicators of good health. More specifically, these indicators are thought to suggest to potential mates that the beholder has strong or good genes capable of fighting off disease.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: More recent research has suggested that redder and yellower skin tones, reflecting higher levels of oxygenated blood, carotenoid and to a lesser extent melanin pigment, and net dietary intakes of fruit and vegetables, appear healthier, and therefore more attractive.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: A preference for lighter-skinned women has been documented across many cultures. A 2010 study found a preference for lighter-skinned women in New Zealand and California. In parts of Africa and Asia, skin bleaching is common. The universality of this preference however has been questioned by a 2006 study on men of the Bikosso tribe in Cameroon which found no consistent preference for either lighter or darker skinned women. The relationship between attractiveness and skin colour may also intersect with ethnicity and prior experience.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: Skin color preferences may shift over time, as in Western culture, where tanned skin used to be associated with the sun-exposed manual labor of the lower-class, but since the mid-20th century it has generally been considered more attractive and healthier than before, with sun tanning becoming fashionable.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: Hands have been found to be physically attractive. The type of hands that are physically attractive are those with longer index and ring fingers. Men have a smaller index-to-ring-finger ratio than women. The gender differences in the ratio between the index and ring fingers are said to be influenced by exposure to testosterone within the womb. In a study where participants were shown computer-based images of hands, male participants found feminine hands with a smaller index finger more attractive. Whereas females found masculine hands with a longer ring finger more attractive. The study suggests that finger length has an effect on physical attraction because it gives indication of the desirable sex-hormone dependent traits which one may possess. Another study found that averageness, healthiness of the skin, how fat the hands appear to be, and the grooming of the hands, all effect the attractiveness of hands. What is meant by averageness is the degree to which the hands look like an average of the hands in the population. Average looking hands give an indication of an individual's health (because there are no abnormalities). The healthier looking the skin on the hands, the more attractive they appear. Reasons given for this say skin health may reflect an individual's overall health. Healthy skin can show that someone is free from illness because some illnesses have a bad effect on the look of skin. These features are found attractive because they show that the person has good genes and is therefore a suitable mate to reproduce with. Skin health may also give an indication of socioeconomic status, as rough hands may indicate a low paying laborious job. Low socioeconomic status might show that someone does not have resources to provide for the offspring, therefore this is less attractive. The more fat the hands appear, the less attractive they are. This is because of the co-morbidity associated with obesity. If someone is overfat, they may have another disease, which means they may not be able to produce healthy offspring. The attractiveness of the hands also gives an indication of other features of the individual, people with more attractive hands have been found to be taller and slimmer. In most of these hand attractiveness studies only white, European hands were used and the participants were in the age range between 18 and 26. So, the attractiveness of non-white hands and of different age groups was not tested. Also, the people who rated the hand attractiveness were white European, so their ratings may not represent how individuals of other skin colours and cultures would rate the hands.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: Females' sexual attraction towards males may be determined by the height of the man. The online dating Website eHarmony only matches women with men taller than themselves, because of complaints from women matched with shorter men.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: Other studies have shown that heterosexual women often prefer men taller than they are, rather than a man with above average height. While women usually desire men to be at least the same height as themselves or taller, several other factors also determine male attractiveness, and the male-taller norm is not universal. For example, taller women are more likely to relax the "taller male" norm than shorter women. Furthermore, professor Adam Eyre-Walker, from the University of Sussex, has stated that there is, as yet, no evidence that these preferences are evolutionary preferences, as opposed to merely cultural preferences. Still, the cultural perceived attractiveness preferences for taller men are powerful and confirmed by multiple studies. One study of speed-daters by Stulp found that "women were most likely to choose [men] 25 cm taller than themselves, whereas men were most likely to choose women only 7 cm shorter than themselves".


title: Physical attractiveness

text: Additionally, women seem more receptive to an erect posture than men, though both prefer it as an element within beauty. According to one study (Yee N., 2002), gay men who identify as "only tops" tend to prefer shorter men, while gay men who identify as "only bottoms" tend to prefer taller men.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: In romances in Middle English literature, all of the "ideal" male heroes are tall, and the vast majority of the "valiant" male heroes are tall too.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: Most men tend to be taller than their female partners. It has been found that, in Western societies, most men prefer women shorter than themselves. Having said this, height is a more important factor for a woman when choosing a man than it is for a man choosing a woman. Western men tend to view women taller than themselves as less attractive, and people view heterosexual couples where the woman is taller to be less ideal. Women who are 0.7 to 1.7 standard deviations below the mean female height have been reported to be the most reproductively successful, since fewer tall women get married compared to shorter women. However, in other ethnic groups, such as the Hadza people from Tanzania, a study has found that height is irrelevant in choosing a mate. Another study found the same preference in rural Gambia.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: In Middle English literature, "tallness" is a characteristic of ideally beautiful women. The British Fashion Model Agents Association (BFMA) says that female models should be at least tall.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: Standing in a contrapposto posture (with bodyweight predominantly supported by one leg which is either straight, or very slightly bent, and with the other leg slightly bent) has been found to be more attractive looking than standing in a more plain, upright posture. This was found to be the case for both men and women. This posture may lower a person's observable waist-hip ratio and make their hips look wider and their waists thinner. For women especially, this can accentuate the curvature of their figure on one side of their body and make them seem more attractive. Such poses have been used in historical sculpture to emphasize an ideal of physical beauty.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: The way an individual moves can indicate health and even age and influence attractiveness. A study reflecting the views of 700 individuals and that involved animated representations of people walking, found that the physical attractiveness of women increased by about 50 percent when they walked with a hip sway. Similarly, the perceived attractiveness of males doubled when they moved with a swagger in their shoulders.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: In the social psychology perspective, interpersonal attraction is when someone experiences a positive attitude or evaluation regarding a particular personal having potential of being a significant other. This includes "three components conventionally ascribed to attitudes: behavioral (tendency to approach the person), cognitive (positive beliefs about the person), and affective (positive feelings for the person)." With these three components, psychology has created five elements of interpersonal attraction. These include proximity, similarity, physical attractiveness, reciprocity, and responsiveness.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: Women, on average, tend to be more attracted to men who have a relatively narrow waist, a V-shaped torso, and broad shoulders. Women also tend to be more attracted to men who are taller than they are, and display a high degree of facial symmetry, as well as relatively masculine facial dimorphism. Women, regardless of sexual orientation, tend to be less interested in a partner's physical attractiveness than men.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: The degree of differences between male and female anatomical traits is called sexual dimorphism. Female respondents in the follicular phase of their menstrual cycle were significantly more likely to choose a masculine face than those in menses and luteal phases, (or in those taking hormonal contraception). This distinction supports the sexy son hypothesis, which posits that it is evolutionarily advantageous for women to select potential fathers who are more genetically attractive, rather than the best caregivers. However, women's likeliness to exert effort to view male faces does not seem to depend on their masculinity, but to a general increase with women's testosterone levels.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: It is suggested that the masculinity of facial features is a reliable indication of good health, or, alternatively, that masculine-looking males are more likely to achieve high status. However, the correlation between attractive facial features and health has been questioned. Sociocultural factors, such as self-perceived attractiveness, status in a relationship and degree of gender-conformity, have been reported to play a role in female preferences for male faces. Studies have found that women who perceive themselves as physically attractive are more likely to choose men with masculine facial dimorphism, than are women who perceive themselves as physically unattractive. In men, facial masculinity significantly correlates with facial symmetry – it has been suggested that both are signals of developmental stability and genetic health. One study called into question the importance of facial masculinity in physical attractiveness in men, arguing that when perceived health, which is factored into facial masculinity, is discounted it makes little difference in physical attractiveness. In a cross-country study involving 4,794 women in their early twenties, a difference was found in women's average "masculinity preference" between countries.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: A study found that the same genetic factors cause facial masculinity in both males and females such that a male with a more masculine face would likely have a sister with a more masculine face due to the siblings having shared genes. The study also found that, although female faces that were more feminine were judged to be more attractive, there was no association between male facial masculinity and male facial attractiveness for female judges. With these findings, the study reasoned that if a woman were to reproduce with a man with a more masculine face, then her daughters would also inherit a more masculine face, making the daughters less attractive. The study concluded that there must be other factors that advantage the genetics for masculine male faces to offset their reproductive disadvantage in terms of "health", "fertility" and "facial attractiveness" when the same genetics are present in females. The study reasoned that the "selective advantage" for masculine male faces must "have (or had)" been due to some factor that is not directly tied to female perceptions of male facial attractiveness.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: In a study of 447 gay men in China, researchers said that tops preferred feminized male faces, bottoms preferred masculinized male faces and versatiles had no preference for either feminized or masculinized male faces.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: In pre-modern Chinese literature, the ideal man in caizi jiaren romances was said to have "rosy lips, sparkling white teeth" and a "jasper-like face" ().


title: Physical attractiveness

text: The physique of a slim waist, broad shoulders and muscular chest are often found to be attractive to both females and males. Further research has shown that, when choosing a mate, the traits females look for indicate higher social status, such as dominance, resources, and protection. An indicator of health in males (a contributing factor to physical attractiveness) is the android fat distribution pattern which is categorized as more fat distributed on the upper body and abdomen, commonly referred to as the "V shape." When asked to rate other men, both heterosexual and homosexual men found low waist-to-chest ratios (WCR) to be more attractive on other men, with the gay men showing a preference for lower WCR (more V-shaped) than the straight men.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: Other researchers found waist-to-chest ratio the largest determinant of male attractiveness, with body mass index and waist-to-hip ratio not as significant.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: Women focus primarily on the ratio waist to chest or more specifically waist to shoulder. This is analogous to the waist to hip ratio (WHR) that men prefer. Some studies have shown that attractive bodily traits in the eyes of a heterosexual woman would include a tall, athletic physique, with wide shoulders, and a slim waist area. Research has additionally shown that college males had a better satisfaction with their body than college females. The research also found that when a college female's waist to hip ratio went up, their body image satisfaction decreased.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: Some research has shown that body weight may have a stronger effect than WHR when it comes to perceiving attractiveness of the opposite sex. It was found that waist to hip ratio played a smaller role in body preference than body weight in regards to both sexes.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: Psychologists Viren Swami and Martin J. Tovee compared female preference for male attractiveness cross culturally, between Britain and Malaysia. They found that females placed more importance on WCR (and therefore body shape) in urban areas of Britain and Malaysia, while females in rural areas placed more importance on BMI (therefore weight and body size). Both WCR and BMI are indicative of male status and ability to provide for offspring, as noted by evolutionary theory.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: Females have been found to desire males that are normal weight and have the average WHR for a male. Females view these males as attractive and healthy. Males who had the average WHR but were overweight or underweight are not perceived as attractive to females. This suggests that WHR is not a major factor in male attractiveness, but a combination of body weight and a typical male WHR seem to be the most attractive. Research has shown that men who have a higher waist to hip ratio and a higher salary are perceived as more attractive to women.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: Men's bodies portrayed in magazines marketed to men are more muscular than the men's bodies portrayed in magazines marketed to women. From this, some have concluded that men perceive a more muscular male body to be ideal, as distinct from a woman's ideal male, which is less muscular than what men perceive to be ideal. This is due to the within-gender prestige granted by increased muscularity and within-gender competition for increased muscularity. Men perceive the attractiveness of their own musculature by how closely their bodies resemble the "muscle man." This "muscle man" ideal is characterized by large muscular arms, especially biceps, a large muscular chest that tapers to their waist and broad shoulders. Among Australian university students, the male body composition found to be most attractive (12.16 kg fat, 63.27 kg muscle) was in line with the composition that was perceived as healthiest, and was well within the healthy range.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: In a study of stated profile preferences on Match.com, a greater percentage of gay men than lesbians selected their ideal partner's body type as "Athletic and Toned" as opposed to the other two options of "Average" or "Overweight".


title: Physical attractiveness

text: In pre-modern Chinese literature, such as in "Romance of the Western Chamber", a type of masculinity called "scholar masculinity" is depicted wherein the "ideal male lover" is "weak, vulnerable, feminine, and pedantic".


title: Physical attractiveness

text: In Middle English literature, a beautiful man typically has thick, broad shoulders, a square and muscular chest, a muscular back, strong sides that taper to a small waist, large hands and arms and legs with huge muscles.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: Studies based in the United States, New Zealand, and China have shown that women rate men with no trunk (chest and abdominal) hair as most attractive, and that attractiveness ratings decline as hairiness increases. Another study, however, found that moderate amounts of trunk hair on men was most attractive, to the sample of British and Sri Lankan women. Further, a degree of hirsuteness (hairiness) and a waist-to-shoulder ratio of 0.6 is often preferred when combined with a muscular physique.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: In a study using Finnish women, women with hairy fathers were more likely to prefer hairy men, suggesting that preference for hairy men is the result of either genetics or imprinting. Among gay men, another study (Yee N., 2002) reported gay males who identify as "only tops" prefer less hairy men, while gay males who identify as "only bottoms" prefer more hairy men.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: One study shows that men with facial hair covering the cheeks, upper lip, and lower jaw were perceived as more physically attractive than men with patchy facial hair. In this study, men's facial hair was split into four categories, each differing in the thickness and coverage: very light, light, medium, and heavy. Light facial hair was rated as the most attractive, followed by medium, heavy, and the least attractive was 'very light'. This study suggests that some facial hair is better than none because it shows masculine development, as beard growth requires the conversion of testosterone. The study only examined the facial hair of brown-haired European males, so the results may not represent men of all ethnicities and hair colours. A different study found women are more attracted to clean-shaven faces than bearded faces.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: Because it generates the gonial angle, the ramus has a function in attractiveness. The gonial or jaw angle is the angle formed by the ramus and the rest of the mandible. It can range from 90 to 140 degrees, with the population average being 128 +/- 2.36 degrees for males and 126 +/-2.41 degrees for females. Larger, more obtuse gonial angles result in a rounder, feminine appearance, whereas more acute gonial angles result in square, masculine faces.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: This exact ratio is not seen as ideal in every ethnic group. Most research shows that attractive bigonial width and Ramus measurements have similarities, but the jutting square chin is a prominently European-heritage trait which means it should not be held as a universal indicator of attractiveness. Men with low submental fat were viewed to have "better jawlines" and a more "youthful look".


title: Physical attractiveness

text: Research indicates that heterosexual men tend to be attracted to young and beautiful women with bodily symmetry. Rather than decreasing it, modernity has only increased the emphasis men place on women's looks. Evolutionary psychologists attribute such attraction to an evaluation of the fertility potential in a prospective mate.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: Research has attempted to determine which facial features communicate attractiveness. Facial symmetry has been shown to be considered attractive in women, and men have been found to prefer full lips, high forehead, broad face, small chin, small nose, short and narrow jaw, high cheekbones, clear and smooth skin, and wide-set eyes. The shape of the face in terms of "how everything hangs together" is an important determinant of beauty. Women with thick, dark limbal rings in their eyes have also been found to be more attractive. The explanation given is that because the ring tends to fade with age and medical problems, a prominent limbal ring gives an honest indicator of youth.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: In Persian literature, beautiful women are said to have noses like hazelnuts. In Arabian society in the Middle Ages, a component of the female beauty ideal was for women to have straight and fine noses. In Jewish Rabbinic literature, the rabbis considered a delicate nose to be the ideal type of nose for women. In Japan, during the Edo period, a component of the female beauty ideal was for women to have tall noses which were straight and not "too tall".


title: Physical attractiveness

text: In a cross-cultural study, more neotenized (i.e., youthful looking) female faces were found to be most attractive to men while less neotenized female faces were found to be less attractive to men, regardless of the females' actual age. In a study of Italian women who have won beauty competitions, it was found that their faces had more "babyish" (pedomorphic) traits than those of the "normal" women used as a reference.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: In a cross-cultural study, Marcinkowska et al. said that 18-to-45-year-old heterosexual men in all 28 countries surveyed preferred photographs of 18-to-24-year-old white women whose faces were feminized using facial image editing software over faces of 18-to-24-year-old white women that were masculinized using that software, but there were differences in preferences for femininity across countries. The higher the National Health Index (based on eight national health statistics taken from the World Health Organization Statistical Information Service using data from 2002 to 2006) of a country, the more were the feminized faces preferred over the masculinized faces. Among the countries surveyed, Japan had the highest femininity preference and Nepal had the lowest femininity preference.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: Michael R. Cunningham of the Department of Psychology at the University of Louisville found, using a panel of East Asian, Hispanic and White judges, that the female faces tended to be judged as more attractive if they had features such as high cheekbones and small chins, as well as "neonate large eyes, greater distance between eyes, and small noses".


title: Physical attractiveness

text: Hispanic and East Asian women were judged as more attractive than White and Black women, and they happened to possess more of the attributes defined as attractive, however the authors noted that it would be inaccurate to conclude that any ethnic group was more attractive than the other, based on their sample. Using a panel of African Americans and whites as judges, Cunningham found more neotenous faces were perceived as having both higher "femininity" and "sociability". The authors found no evidence of ethnocentric bias in the Asian or White samples, as Asians and Whites did not differ significantly in preference for neonate cues, and positive ratings of white women did not increase with exposure to Western media.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: Rather than finding evidence for purely "neonate" faces being most appealing, Cunningham found faces with "sexually-mature" features at the "periphery" of the face combined with "neonate" features in the "center of the face" most appealing in women. Upon analyzing the results of his study, Cunningham concluded that preference for "neonate features may display the least cross-cultural variability" in terms of "attractiveness ratings" and, in another study, Cunningham concluded that there exists a large agreement on the characteristics of an attractive face.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: In computer face averaging tests, women with averaged faces have been shown to be considered more attractive. This is possibly due to average features being more familiar and, therefore, more comfortable.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: Commenting on the prevalence of whiteness in supposed beauty ideals in his book "White Lies: Race and the Myth of Whiteness", Maurice Berger states that the schematic rendering in the idealized face of a study conducted with American subjects had "straight hair," "light skin," "almond-shaped eyes," "thin, arched eyebrows," "a long, thin nose, closely set and tiny nostrils" and "a large mouth and thin lips", though the author of the study stated that there was consistency between his results and those conducted on other races. Scholar Liu Jieyu says in the article "White Collar Beauties", "The criterion of beauty is both arbitrary and gendered. The implicit consensus is that women who have fair skin and a slim figure with symmetrical facial features are pretty." He says that all of these requirements are socially constructed and force people to change themselves to fit these criteria.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: There are various opposing principles of female beauty including prettiness and rarity. So on average, symmetrical features are one ideal, while unusual, stand-out features are another. A study performed by the University of Toronto found that the most attractive facial dimensions were those found in the average female face. However, that particular University of Toronto study looked only at white women.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: A study that used Chinese, Malay and Indian judges said that Chinese women with orthognathism where the mouth is flat and in-line with the rest of the face were judged to be the most attractive and Chinese women with a protruding mandible where the jaw projects outward were judged to be the least attractive.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: A 2011 study, by Wilkins, Chan and Kaiser found correlations between perceived femininity and attractiveness, that is, women's faces which were seen as more feminine were judged by both men and women to be more attractive.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: A component of the female beauty ideal in Persian literature is for women to have faces like a full moon.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: In Arabian society in the Middle Ages, a component of the female beauty ideal was for women to have round faces which were like a "full moon".


title: Physical attractiveness

text: In Japan, during the Edo period, a component of the female beauty ideal was for women to have long and narrow faces which were shaped like ovals.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: In Jewish Rabbinic literature, the rabbis considered full lips to be the ideal type of lips for women.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: Historically, in Chinese and Japanese literature, the feminine ideal was said to include small lips. Women would paint their lips thinner and narrower to align with this ideal.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: Classical Persian literature, paintings, and miniatures portrayed traits such as long black curly hair, a small mouth, long arched eyebrows, large almond shaped eyes, a small nose, and beauty spots as being beautiful for women.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: A study that investigated whether or not an eyelid crease makes Chinese-descent women more attractive using photo-manipulated photographs of young Chinese-descent women's eyes found that the "medium upper eyelid crease" was considered most attractive by all three groups of both sexes: white people, Chinese and Taiwanese nationals together as a group, and Taiwanese and Chinese Americans together as a group. Similarly, all three groups of both genders found the absence of an eye crease to be least attractive on Chinese women.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: A study that used Russian, American, Brazilian, Aché, and Hiwi raters, found that the only strong distinguisher between men and women's faces was wider eyes relative to facial height for women, and this trait consistently predicted attractiveness ratings for women.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: In Arabian society in the Middle Ages, a component of the female beauty ideal was for women to have dark black eyes which are large and long and in the shape of almonds. Furthermore, the eyes should be lustrous, and they should have long eyelashes.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: A source written in 1823, said that a component of the Persian female beauty ideal was for women to have large eyes which are black in color. In Persian literature, beautiful women are said to have eyes that are shaped like almonds.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: In Chinese, the phrase "lucent irises, lustrous teeth" () is used to describe a beautiful woman with "clear eyes" and "well-aligned, white teeth", and the phrase "moth-feeler eyebrows" () is used to denote a beautiful woman by describing her eyebrows as being thin and arched like moth antennae. In the Chinese text "The Grotto of the Immortals" () written during the Tang dynasty period, narrow eyes were the preferred type of eyes for women, and, in the Chinese text "Jeweled Chamber Secrets" () from the Six Dynasties period, the ideal woman was described as having small eyes.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: In Japan, during the Edo period, one piece of evidence, the appearance of the "formal wife" of Tokugawa Iesada as determined by "bone anthropologist" Suzuki Hisashi, indicates that large eyes were considered attractive for women, but, another piece of evidence, the 1813 Japanese text "Customs, Manners, and Fashions of the Capital" (), indicates that large eyes were not considered attractive for women.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: Research has shown that most heterosexual men enjoy the sight of female breasts, with a preference for large, firm breasts. However, a contradictory study of British undergraduates found younger men preferred small breasts on women. Smaller breasts were widely associated with youthfulness. Cross-culturally, another study found "high variability" regarding the ideal breast size. Some researchers in the United Kingdom have speculated that a preference for larger breasts may have developed in Western societies because women with larger breasts tend to have higher levels of the hormones estradiol and progesterone, which both promote fertility.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: A study by Groyecka et al., in which they examined Poles and Yali of New Guinea, demonstrated that men's judgements of breast appearance is affected by the occurrence of breast ptosis (i.e., sagginess, droopiness). Greater breast ptosis (more sagging breasts) is perceived as less attractive and attributed to a woman of older age. These findings are coherent with previous research that link breast attractiveness with female youthfulness. Unlike breast size, breast ptosis seems to be a universal marker of female breast attractiveness.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: A study showed that men prefer symmetrical breasts. Breast symmetry may be particularly sensitive to developmental disturbances and the symmetry differences for breasts are large compared to other body parts. Women who have more symmetrical breasts tend to have more children.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: Historical literature often includes specific features of individuals or a gender that are considered desirable. These have often become a matter of convention, and should be interpreted with caution. In Arabian society in the Middle Ages, a component of the female beauty ideal was for women to have small breasts. In Persian literature, beautiful women are said to have breasts like pomegranates or lemons. In the Chinese text "Jeweled Chamber Secrets" () from the Six Dynasties period, the ideal woman was described as having firm breasts. In Sanskrit literature, beautiful women are often said to have breasts so large that they cause the women to bend a little bit from their weight. In Middle English literature, beautiful women should have small breasts that are round like an apple or a pear.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: Biological anthropologist Helen E. Fisher of the Center for Human Evolution Studies in the Department of Anthropology of Rutgers University said that, "perhaps, the fleshy, rounded buttocks... attracted males during rear-entry intercourse." In a recent study, using 3D models and eye-tracking technology Fisher's claim was tested and was shown that the slight thrusting out of a woman's back influence how attractive others perceive her to be and captures the gaze of both men and women. Bobbi S. Low et al. of the School of Natural Resources and Environment at the University of Michigan, said the female "buttocks evolved in the context of females competing for the attention and parental commitment of powerful resource-controlling males" as an "honest display of fat reserves" that could not be confused with another type of tissue, although T. M. Caro, professor in the Center for Population Biology and the Department of Wildlife, Fish, and Conservation Biology, at University of California, Davis, rejected that as being a necessary conclusion, stating that female fatty deposits on the hips improve "individual fitness of the female", regardless of sexual selection.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: In a 1995 study, black men were more likely than white men to use the words "big" or "large" to describe their conception of an attractive woman's posterior.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: Body Mass Index (BMI) is an important determinant to the perception of beauty. Even though the Western ideal is for a thin woman, some cultures prefer plumper women, which has been argued to support that attraction for a particular BMI merely is a cultural artifact. The attraction for a proportionate body also influences an appeal for erect posture. One cross-cultural survey comparing body-mass preferences among 300 of the most thoroughly studied cultures in the world showed that 81% of cultures preferred a female body size that in English would be described as "plump".


title: Physical attractiveness

text: Availability of food influences which female body size is attractive which may have evolutionary reasons. Societies with food scarcities prefer larger female body size than societies that have plenty of food. In Western society males who are hungry prefer a larger female body size than they do when not hungry.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: BMI has been criticised for conflating fat and muscle, and more recent studies have concentrated on body composition. Among Australian university students, the most attractive body composition for women (10.31 kg fat, 42.45 kg muscle) was found to be lower in fat than both the most healthy appearing composition, and below the healthy range.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: In the United States, women overestimate men's preferences for thinness in a mate. In one study, American women were asked to choose what their ideal build was and what they thought the build most attractive to men was. Women chose slimmer than average figures for both choices. When American men were independently asked to choose the female build most attractive to them, the men chose figures of average build. This indicates that women may be misled as to how thin men prefer women to be. Some speculate that thinness as a beauty standard is one way in which women judge each other and that thinness is viewed as prestigious for within-gender evaluations of other women. A reporter surmised that thinness is prized among women as a "sign of independence, strength and achievement." Some implicated the fashion industry for the promulgation of the notion of thinness as attractive.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: East Asians have historically preferred women whose bodies had small features. For example, during the Spring and Autumn period of Chinese history, women in Chinese harems wanted to have a thin body in order to be attractive for the Chinese emperor. Later, during the Tang dynasty, a less thin body type was seen as most attractive for Chinese women. In Arabian society in the Middle Ages, a component of the female beauty ideal was for women to be slender like a "cane" or a "twig". In the Chinese text "Jeweled Chamber Secrets" () from the Six Dynasties period, the ideal woman was described as not being "large-boned".


title: Physical attractiveness

text: In the Victorian era, women who adhered to Victorian ideals were expected to limit their food consumption to attain the ideal slim figure. In Middle English literature, "slender" women are considered beautiful.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: According to research on females, women consider a full body with good distribution to be highly important to be considered attractive by men.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: A WHR of 0.7 for women has been shown to correlate strongly with general health and fertility. Women within the 0.7 range have optimal levels of estrogen and are less susceptible to major diseases such as diabetes, heart disease, and ovarian cancers. Women with high WHR (0.80 or higher) have significantly lower pregnancy rates than women with lower WHRs (0.70–0.79), independent of their BMIs. Female waist-to-hip ratio (WHR) has been proposed by evolutionary psychologists to be an important component of human male mate choice, because this trait is thought to provide a reliable cue to a woman's reproductive value.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: Both men and women judge women with smaller waist-to-hip ratios more attractive. Ethnic groups vary with regard to their ideal waist-to-hip ratio for women, ranging from 0.6 in China, to 0.8 or 0.9 in parts of South America and Africa, and divergent preferences based on ethnicity, rather than nationality, have also been noted. A study found the Machiguenga people, an isolated indigenous South American ethnic group, prefer women with high WHR (0.9). The preference for heavier women, has been interpreted to belong to societies where there is no risk of obesity.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: In Chinese, the phrase "willow waist" () is used to denote a beautiful woman by describing her waist as being slender like a willow branch.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: In the Victorian era, a small waist was considered the main trait of a beautiful woman. The term "wasp waist" describes an extreme fashion silhouette, produced by a style of corset and girdle.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: According to some studies, most men prefer women with small feet, such as in ancient China where foot binding was practiced.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: In Jewish Rabbinic literature, the rabbis considered small feet to be the ideal type of feet for women.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: Men have been found to prefer long-haired women. An evolutionary psychology explanation for this is that malnutrition and deficiencies in minerals and vitamins causes loss of hair or hair changes. Hair therefore indicates health and nutrition during the last 2–3 years. Lustrous hair is also often a cross-cultural preference.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: A component of the female beauty ideal in Persian literature is for women to have black hair, which was also preferred in Arabian society in the Middle Ages. In Middle English literature, curly hair is a necessary component of a beautiful woman.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: There are some subtle changes in women's perceived attractiveness across the menstrual cycle. During their most fertile phase, we can observe some changes in women's behavior and physiology. A study conducted by G. Miller (2007) examined the amount of tip earnings by lap dancers across the menstrual cycle. He found that dancers received nearly US$15 more when they were near ovulation than during the rest of the month. This suggests that women either are more attractive during ovulation phase, or they experience a significant change in their behavior. Some other studies have found that there are subtle differences in women's faces when in their fertile phase. Bobst and Lobmaier (2012) created 20 prototyped photographs, some of a female during ovulation and some during the luteal phase. Men were asked to choose the more attractive, the more caring and the more flirtatious faces. They found a significant preference for the follicular phase (ovulation). This suggests that subtle shape differences in faces occurring during the female's ovulation phase are sufficient to attract men more. This idea is supported by another study, where a similar experiment was done. Men and women had to judge photographs of women's faces taken during their fertile phase. They were all rated more attractive than during non-fertile phase. They are some subtle visible cues to ovulation in women's faces, and they are perceived as more attractive, leading to the idea that it could be an adaptive mechanism to raise a female's mate value at that specific time (when probability of conception is at its highest).


title: Physical attractiveness

text: Women's attractiveness, as perceived by men and women, slightly differs across her menstrual cycle, being at peak when she is in her ovulation phase. Jones et al. (2008), focused on women's preferences for masculinity, apparent health and self-resemblance and found that it varies across the cycle. They explained that the function of the effects of menstrual cycle phase on preferences for apparent health and self-resemblance in faces is to increase the likelihood of pregnancy.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: Similarly, females prefer the scent of symmetrically faced men and men with masculine faces during fertile phases as well as stereotypical male displays such as social presence, and direct intrasexual competitiveness.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: During the follicular phase (fertile), females prefer more male's traits (testosterone dependent traits such as face shape) than when in non-fertile phase. Those findings have been found in the voice, showing that females' preferences for more masculine voices over feminine voices increase the fertile phase of the menstrual cycle.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: But not only females' preferences vary across cycle, their behaviours as well. Effectively, men respond differently to females when they are on ovulatory cycle, because females act differently. Women in the ovulatory phase are flirtier with males showing genetic fitness markers than in low fertile phase. It has been shown in some studies that women high in estrogen are generally perceived to be more attractive than women with low levels of estrogen, based on women not wearing make-up. High estrogen level women may also be viewed as healthier or to have a more feminine face.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: Similarly, a study investigated the capacity of women to select high quality males based on their facial attractiveness. They found that facial attractiveness correlated with semen quality (good, normal, or bad depending on sperm morphology and motility). The more attractive a man's face is, linked to his sperm being of better quality.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: Sexual ornaments are seen in many organisms; in humans, females have sexual ornamentation in the form of breasts and buttocks. The physical attraction to sexual ornaments is associated with gynoid fat, as opposed to android fat, which is considered unattractive. In human females, proximate causes of the development of sexual ornaments are associated with the predominance of estrogen in puberty. The activation of estrogen receptors around the female skeletal tissue causes gynoid fat to be deposited in the breasts, buttocks, hips and thighs, producing an overall typical female body shape. Specifically, female breasts are considered more attractive when symmetrical, rather than asymmetrical, as this is thought to reflect good developmental stability.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: Sexual ornaments are considered attractive features as they are thought to indicate high mate value, fertility, and the ability to provide good care to offspring. They are sexually selected traits present for the purpose of honest signalling and capturing the visual attention of the opposite sex, most commonly associated with females capturing the visual attention of males. It has been proposed that these ornaments have evolved in order to advertise personal quality and reproductive value. Honest signalling with sexual ornaments is associated with ultimate causation of these evolved traits. The evolution of these ornaments is also associated with female-female competition in order to gain material benefits provided by resourceful and high status males. In humans, once these sexual ornaments develop, they are permanent. It is thought that this is associated with the long-term pair bonding humans engage in; human females engage in extended sexual activity outside of their fertile period. This relates to another ultimate cause of sexual ornaments with function in obtaining non-genetic material benefits from males. In other animal species, even other primate species, these advertisements of reproductive value are not permanent. Usually, it is the point at which the female is at her most fertile, she displays sexual swellings.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: Adolescence is the period of time whereby humans experience puberty, and experience anatomical changes to their bodies through the increase of sex hormones released in the body. Adolescent exaggeration is the period of time at which sexual ornaments are maximised, and peak gynoid fat content is reached. In human females, the mean age for this is approximately 16 years. Female breasts develop at this stage not only to prepare for reproduction, but also due to competition with other females in displaying their reproductive value and quality to males.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: Most studies of the brain activations associated with the perception of attractiveness show photographs of faces to their participants and let them or a comparable group of people rate the attractiveness of these faces. Such studies consistently find that activity in certain parts of the orbitofrontal cortex increases with increasing attractiveness of faces. This neural response has been interpreted as a reaction on the rewarding nature of attractiveness, as similar increases in activation in the medial orbitofrontal cortex can be seen in response to smiling faces and to statements of morally good actions. While most of these studies have not assessed participants of both genders or homosexual individuals, evidence from one study including male and female hetero- and homosexual individuals indicate that some of the aforementioned increases in brain activity are restricted to images of faces of the gender participants feel sexually attracted to.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: With regard to brain activation related to the perception of attractive bodies, one study with heterosexual participants suggests that activity in the nucleus accumbens and the anterior cingulate cortex increases with increasing attractiveness. The same study finds that for faces and bodies alike, the medial part of the orbitofrontal cortex responds with greater activity to both very attractive and very unattractive pictures.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: For both men and women, there appear to be universal criteria of attractiveness both within and across cultures and ethnic groups. When considering long-term relationships, some studies have found that men place a higher emphasis on physical attractiveness in a partner than women do. On the other hand, some studies have found few differences between men and women in terms of the weight they place on physical characteristics when they are choosing partners for short-term relationships, in particular with regard to their implicit, as opposed to explicitly articulated, preferences. Other recent studies continue to find sex differences for long-term relationships. While still valuing physical attractiveness, women tend to prioritize a man's status over his physical attractiveness, while men prioritize physical attractiveness over status. There is also one study suggesting that only men, not women, place greater priority on bodily compared to facial attractiveness when looking for a short-term as compared to a long-term partner.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: Some evolutionary psychologists, including David Buss, have argued that this long-term relationship difference may be a consequence of ancestral humans who selected partners based on secondary sexual characteristics, as well as general indicators of fitness which allowed for greater reproductive success as a result of higher fertility in those partners, although a male's ability to provide resources for offspring was likely signaled less by physical features. It is argued that the most prominent indicator of fertility in women is youth, while the traits in a man which enhance reproductive success are proxies for his ability to accrue resources and protect.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: Studies have shown that women pay greater attention to physical traits than they do directly to earning capability or potential to commit, including muscularity, fitness and masculinity of features; the latter preference was observed to vary during a woman's period, with women preferring more masculine features during the late-follicular (fertile) phase of the menstrual cycle. Additionally, women process physical attractiveness differently, paying attention to both individual features and the aesthetic effect of the whole face.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: Bonnie Adrian's book, "Framing the Bride", discusses the emphasis Taiwanese brides place on physical attractiveness for their wedding photographs. Globalization and western ideals of beauty have spread and have become more prevalent in Asian societies where brides go through hours of hair and makeup to "transform everyday women with their individual characteristics into generic look-alike beauties in three hours' time." These brides go through hours of makeup to transform themselves into socially constructed beauty.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: According to strategic pluralism theory, men may have correspondingly evolved to pursue reproductive strategies that are contingent on their own physical attractiveness. More physically attractive men accrue reproductive benefits from spending more time seeking multiple mating partners and relatively less time investing in offspring. In contrast, the reproductive effort of physically less attractive men, who therefore will not have the same mating opportunities, is better allocated either to investing heavily in accruing resources, or investing in their mates and offspring and spending relatively less time seeking additional mates.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: Studies have suggested that people are generally attracted to people who look like them, and they generally evaluate faces that exhibit features of their own ethnic or racial group as being more attractive. Both men and women use children's "facial resemblance" to themselves in "attractiveness judgments," with a greater percentage of women in one study (37% n=30) finding hypothetical children whose faces were "self-morphs" of themselves as most attractive when compared to men (30% n=23).


title: Physical attractiveness

text: The more similar a judged person is toward the judging person, the more the former is liked. However, this effect can be reversed. This might depend on how attractiveness is conceptualized: similar members—compared to dissimilar ones—of the opposite sex are judged as more likable in a prosocial sense. Findings are more ambiguous when looking for the desiring, pleasure related component of attractiveness. This might be influenced by the measure one uses (subjective ratings can differ from the way one actually reacts) and by situational factors: while men usually prefer women whose face resembles their own, this effect can reverse under stress, when dissimilar females are preferred.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: A study by R. E. Hall in 2008, which examined determinations of physical attractiveness by having subjects look at the faces of women, found that race was sometimes a factor in these evaluations. In 2011, two studies found evidence that the ethnicity of a face influenced how attractive it was judged to be. A 2014 study by Tsunokai, McGrath and Kavanagh based on data from a dating website, the authors cited race as a factor in dating preferences by Asian-American men, both homosexual and heterosexual. A 2013 study found only weak support for the view that people prefer the faces of those racially similar to themselves. One study suggests imbalance in interracial marriage (white male-Asian female marriages are more than twice as common as the reverse) may be attributed to the fact that Asian people are perceived as more feminine than white people, and thus that Asian women are perceived as more attractive than white women, and Asian men as less attractive than white men. Other studies suggest that inter-ethnic and intra-ethnic differences in perceived facial masculinity have no impact on attractiveness, and that skin color plays a more important role in attractiveness assessments of male faces within groups but not between groups as a health signal.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: The group attractiveness effect is where a group's overall attractiveness rating is higher than the mean of each individuals' attractiveness rating. This occurs because people selectively attend to the most attractive group members and thus they get the most attention. Men selectively attend to attractive people more than women, it has been suggested that this could be because men are less invested in their offspring, so they are less choosy when it comes to sexual partners, and therefore they are more easily attracted. As a result of selective attention, people end up giving a group rating which is biased as the rating focuses mainly on the attractive members and ignores the less attractive members. So the overall attractiveness rating is skewed towards more attractive. The group attractiveness effect was investigated in a study which got participants to rate the physical attractiveness of a group of females as a whole, individually in a group, and individually on their own. Participants were asked to give a rating of 1–7, with 1 being very unattractive and 7 being very attractive. The group attractiveness effect has been replicated with males as the main group and also with a group of both males and females. This effect may not be demonstrated across all cultures because the sample only contained Dutch university students.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: Perceptions of physical attractiveness contribute to generalized assumptions based on those attractions. Individuals assume that when someone is beautiful, then they have many other positive attributes that make the attractive person more likeable. This is referred to as the halo effect, also known as the 'beautiful-is-good' effect. Across cultures, what is beautiful is assumed to be good; attractive people are assumed to be more extroverted, popular, and happy. This could lead to a self-fulfilling prophecy, as, from a young age, attractive people receive more attention that helps them develop these characteristics. In one study, beautiful people were found to be generally happier than less beautiful or plain people, perhaps because these outgoing personality traits are linked to happiness, or perhaps because beauty led to increased economic benefits which partially explained the increased happiness. In another study testing first impressions in 56 female and 17 male participants at University of British Columbia, personality traits of physically attractive people were identified more positively and more accurately than those who were less physically attractive. It was explained that people pay closer attention to those they find physically beautiful or attractive, and thus perceiving attractive individuals with greater distinctive accuracy. The study believes this accuracy to be subjective to the eye of the beholder. Recent results from the Wisconsin Longitudinal Study confirmed the positive link between psychological well-being and attractiveness (higher facial attractiveness, lower BMI) and also found the complementary negative association with distress/depression. Even though connections and confounds with other variables could not be excluded, the effects of attractiveness in this study were the same size as the ones for other demographic variables.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: In developed western societies, women tend to be judged for their physical appearance over their other qualities and the pressure to engage in beauty work is much higher for women than men. Beauty work is defined as various beauty "practices individuals perform on themselves or others to elicit certain benefits from a specific social hierarchy." Being "beautiful" has individual, social and institutional rewards. Although marketers have started to target the "metro-sexual" male and produce hygiene and beauty products geared towards men, the expectations placed on them is less than women The time and money required for a man to achieve the same well-groomed appearance is much lower. Even in areas that men also face pressure to perform beauty work, such as haircuts/styling, the prices discrepancy for products and services are skewed. This phenomenon is called the "pink tax."


title: Physical attractiveness

text: However, attractiveness varies by society; in ancient China foot binding was practiced by confining young girls' feet in tightly bound shoes to prevent the feet from growing to normal size causing the women to have an attractive "lotus gait". In England, women used to wear corsets that severely constricted their breathing in order to achieve a visual effect of an exaggeratedly low waist-to-hip ratio.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: People make judgments of physical attractiveness based on what they see, but also on what they know about the person. Specifically, perceptions of beauty are malleable such that information about the person's personality traits can influence one's assessment of another person's physical beauty. A 2007 study had participants first rate pictures for attractiveness. After doing distracting math problems, participants saw the pictures again, but with information about the person's personality. When participants learned that a person had positive personality characteristics (e.g., smart, funny, kind), that person was seen as more physically attractive. Conversely, a person with negative personality characteristics (e.g., materialistic, rude, untrustworthy) was seen as less physically attractive. This was true for both females and males.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: Physical attractiveness can have various social effects. For instance, humans tend to self-organize into couples where both parties have loosely similar attractiveness levels as judged by third parties. A survey conducted by London Guildhall University of 11,000 people showed that those who subjectively describe themselves as physically attractive earn more income than others who would describe themselves as less attractive. People who described themselves as less attractive earned, on average, 13% less than those who described themselves as more attractive, while the penalty for being overweight was around 5%. According to further research done on the correlation between looks and earnings in men, the punishment for unattractiveness is greater than the benefits of being attractive. However, in women the punishment is found to be equal to the benefits. Another study suggests that more physically attractive people are significantly more likely on average to earn considerably higher wages. Differences in income due to attractiveness was much more pronounced for men rather than women, and held true for all ranges of income. In the US the earnings disparities along the attractiveness continuum (net of controls) are similar or greater than the black-white disparity. A study from 2020 found that social scientists who are judged as being more attractive receive higher public speaking fees than less attractive social scientists, whereas for natural scientists, relative unattractiveness is a comparative advantage in terms of public speaking fees.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: It is important to note that other factors such as self-confidence may explain or influence these findings as they are based on self-reported attractiveness as opposed to any sort of objective criteria; however, as one's self-confidence and self-esteem are largely learned from how one is regarded by their peers while maturing, even these considerations would suggest a significant role for physical appearance. One writer speculated that "the distress created in women by the spread of unattainable ideals of female beauty" might possibly be linked to increasing incidence of depression.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: Many have asserted that certain advantages tend to come to those who are perceived as being more attractive, including the ability to get better jobs and promotions; receiving better treatment from authorities and the legal system; having more choices in romantic or platonic partners and, therefore, more power in relationships; and marrying into families with more money. Those who are attractive are treated and judged more positively than those who are considered unattractive, even by those who know them. Also, attractive individuals behave more positively than those who are unattractive. One study found that teachers tend to expect that children who are attractive are more intelligent, and are more likely to progress further in school. They also consider these students to be more popular. Voters choose political candidates who are more attractive over those who are less attractive. Men and women use physical attractiveness as a measure of how "good" another person is. In 1946, Soloman Asch coined the Implicit Personality Theory, meaning that the presence of one trait tends to imply the existence of other traits. This is also known as the halo effect. Research suggests that those who are physically attractive are thought to have more socially desirable personalities and lead better lives in general. This is also known as the "what-is-beautiful-is-good effect" or physical attractiveness stereotype. Discrimination against or prejudice towards others based on their appearance is sometimes referred to as lookism (prejudice or discrimination based on physical appearance and especially physical appearance believed to fall short of societal notions of beauty).


title: Physical attractiveness

text: Some researchers conclude that little difference exists between men and women in terms of sexual behavior. Other researchers disagree. Symmetrically faced men and women have a tendency to begin to have sexual intercourse at an earlier age, to have more sexual partners, to engage in a wider variety of sexual activities, and to have more one-night stands. They are also prone to infidelity and are more likely to have open relationships. Additionally, they have the most reproductive success. Therefore, their physical characteristics are most likely to be inherited by future generations.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: Concern for improving physical attractiveness has led many persons to consider alternatives such as cosmetic surgery. It has led scientists working with related disciplines such as computer imaging and mathematics to conduct research to suggest ways to surgically alter the distances between facial features in order to make a face conform more closely to the "agreed-upon standards of attractiveness" of an ideal face by using algorithms to suggest an alternative which still resembles the current face. One research study found that cosmetic surgery as a way to "boost earnings" was "not profitable in a monetary sense." Some research shows that physical attractiveness has a marginal effect on happiness.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: The golden ratio, also known as the golden proportion, was considered the perfect measurement of harmony, beauty and proportion in Ancient Greece. Researchers Mohammad Khursheed Alam, Nor Farid Mohd Noor, Rehana Basri, Tan Fo Yew and Tay Hui Wen conducted a study to test if the golden ratio was a contributor to perceptions of facial attractiveness in various ethnic groups. A total of 286 people aged 18 to 25 participated in the survey, including 100 Malay (50 male, 50 female), 100 Malaysian Chinese (50 male, 50 female), and 86 Malaysian Indian (36 male, 50 female). This study excluded subjects of mixed race, those with craniofacial deformities, and those who had previously received orthodontic treatment or had face surgery. The results showed that the golden ratio had no significant association with physical attractiveness.


title: Physical attractiveness

text: Some argue that body type preference is a mark of culture and regional beauty standards, and that there is no definitive "ideal body" for women, because it constantly shifts. Some authors argue that body types have never been universal and that most evolutionary psychology studies on the "ideal female body" shape have been questioned or disproven due to external factors such as Eurocentric bias, unreliable data and idealized western gender roles. On the internet, communities can create their own niche beauty standards that differ from the cultural norm. It has been argued that the "perfect body" is a matter of personal preference and exposure to regional media.


title: Darth Maul

text: Darth Maul, also known simply as Maul, is a character in the "Star Wars" franchise. He first appeared as the secondary antagonist of the 1999 film "" (portrayed by Ray Park and voiced by Peter Serafinowicz) as a powerful Sith Lord and Darth Sidious' first apprentice. Though seemingly killed by Obi-Wan Kenobi at the end of the film, Darth Maul returned in the 2008 computer animated series "" (voiced by Sam Witwer). "Star Wars" creator George Lucas had intended for the resurrected Maul to serve as the main antagonist of the sequel film trilogy, but these plans were abandoned when Disney acquired Lucasfilm in 2012. The character nonetheless reappeared in the 2014 animated series "Star Wars Rebels" and the 2018 film "", voiced again by Witwer; Park physically reprised the role in "Solo". Since his initial defeat in "The Phantom Menace", Maul has become an independent criminal mastermind and endured as Obi-Wan's archenemy.


title: Darth Maul

text: Darth Maul is a Zabrak from Dathomir who is abducted by Sidious as a child and trained in the ways of the dark side of the Force. He kills Jedi Master Qui-Gon Jinn during the Battle of Naboo before being bisected by Qui-Gon's apprentice, Obi-Wan. Fueled by his hatred, Maul survives and is driven insane over a decade of isolation until his brother, Savage Opress, finds him during the Clone Wars. Once his mind and body are restored with magick and cybernetics by the Nightsister Mother Talzin, Maul obsessively seeks revenge against Obi-Wan. He unites various crime syndicates under his leadership, orchestrates a takeover of Mandalore and murders Obi-Wan's lover, Duchess Satine Kryze. Maul is captured by Sidious for becoming a threat, but escapes before the Republic is replaced by the Galactic Empire. He renounces his Sith title of "Darth", rebuilds his criminal organization and manipulates Ezra Bridger into helping him find Obi-Wan on Tatooine, where the two old rivals have a final confrontation that ends in Maul's death.


title: Darth Maul

text: In addition to the films and television series, the character has appeared in various forms of media in the "Star Wars" Expanded Universe, including novels, comic books and video games. Despite his limited presence in "The Phantom Menace", Darth Maul has become a fan favorite in the franchise and a widely recognised villain in popular culture for his intimidating appearance and double-bladed lightsaber. His resurgence and expanded characterization in "The Clone Wars" further heightened his popularity within the "Star Wars" fandom and earned him a cult following.


title: Darth Maul

text: After getting frustrated with a drawing by "The Phantom Menace" production designer Gavin Bocquet, concept artist Iain McCaig started covering it in tape. Both he and director George Lucas liked the result, described as "a kind of Rorschach pattern". The final drawing had McCaig's own face, with the skin removed, and some Rorschach experimentation (dropping ink onto paper, folding it in half then opening). Maul's facial tattoos were inspired by the indigenous peoples of Brazil. Maul is described as a thing of nightmares when his art design is finished.


title: Darth Maul

text: Maul's head originally had feathers, based on prayer totems, but the Creature Effects crew led by Nick Dudman interpreted those feathers as horns, modifying his features into those common in popular depictions of the devil.


title: Darth Maul

text: His clothing was also modified, from a tight body suit with a muscle pattern to the Sith robe based on samurai pleats, because the lightsaber battles involved much jumping, spinning, running, and rolling. Another concept had Maul a masked figure, something that could rival Darth Vader, while the senatorial characters would sport painted and tattooed faces. It was later decided to apply the painted and tattooed faces to Maul rather than the senator.


title: Darth Maul

text: George Lucas decided to resurrect Darth Maul for "The Clone Wars" after developing the character of Savage Opress. Series co-creator Dave Filoni initially responded to Lucas's idea as unrealistic, because, "It's over. He's cut in half. How does that work?" According to Filoni, Lucas replied, "I don't know. Figure it out."


title: Darth Maul

text: Darth Maul was portrayed by actor and martial artist Ray Park in "" and "". Peter Serafinowicz provided the character's voice in "The Phantom Menace". Sam Witwer replaced Serafinowicz when the character returned in "", and reprised the role in numerous subsequent projects, most notably in "Star Wars Rebels" and "Solo". Gregg Berger, Clint Bajakian, Jess Harnell, Stephen Stanton, and Lee Tockar have also voiced him in other appearances in less prominent capacities.


title: Darth Maul

text: Darth Maul is known for his use of a dual-bladed lightsaber, which he wields similar to a bo-staff. In "", the prop for his lightsaber was made of resin, cast over a metal rod to which the dueling blades were attached.


title: Darth Maul

text: Mauls only appearance in the Complete Saga was The Phantom Menace Darth Maul has appearances such as in, , Rebels and which makes him have a big role in Star Wars


title: Darth Maul

text: In his first appearance, Darth Maul is sent by his master Darth Sidious (Ian McDiarmid) to capture Queen Padmé Amidala (Natalie Portman) of Naboo to force her to sign a treaty that would legitimize the Trade Federation's invasion of the planet. Maul manages to track her starship to Tatooine, where he briefly engages Jedi Master Qui-Gon Jinn (Liam Neeson), who has been assigned to protect the Queen. Qui-Gon concludes that Maul is a Sith Lord and informs the Jedi Council on Coruscant of the Sith's return. In the film's climax, Maul duels Qui-Gon and his apprentice Obi-Wan Kenobi (Ewan McGregor). He is able to kill Qui-Gon and knock Obi-Wan down a shaft, but Kenobi propels himself out of the pit and uses Qui-Gon's lightsaber to bisect Maul, sending the two parts of his body falling down the shaft. In films and appearances after The Phantom Menace Maul seems to be wounded and half robotic after his duel with Obi Wan Kenobi and Qui Gon Jinn


title: Darth Maul

text: At the end of "Solo", Maul is revealed as the mastermind behind the crime syndicate Crimson Dawn. After killing Dryden Vos (Paul Bettany), whom Maul had appointed as his figurehead, smuggler Qi'ra (Emilia Clarke) tells Maul that Vos was betrayed and murdered by Tobias Beckett (Woody Harrelson) and his accomplices, neglecting to mention Han Solo (Alden Ehrenreich) and Chewbacca's (Joonas Suotamo) involvement. Seeming to believe her, Maul commands Qi'ra to meet with him on Dathomir and ignites his lightsaber, telling her that they will work more closely from that point forward.


title: Darth Maul

text: In George Lucas' unused outlines for the "Star Wars" sequel trilogy, Maul was intended to serve as the main antagonist. The cybernetic Maul would have become "the godfather of crime in the universe" and the master of Darth Talon.


title: Darth Maul

text: In , Darth Maul is revealed to have once been a member of the Nightbrothers clan from the planet Dathomir. Mother Talzin, the leader of the Nightsister witches and Maul's biological mother, sends her other son Savage Opress to find Maul, who has been living in the outer rim since he was bisected and presumably killed by Obi-Wan Kenobi over a decade prior.


title: Darth Maul

text: In , Maul is found by Savage on the junkyard planet of Lotho Minor. Having been stranded there and driven insane, Maul uses the Force to construct a spider-like apparatus to replace his severed legs. Savage brings Maul back to Dathomir, where Talzin uses Nightsister magick to restore his mind and outfit him with a pair of cybernetic legs. Seeking revenge against Obi-Wan, Maul goes on a killing spree to bait and capture the Jedi with Savage's help, but Asajj Ventress comes to Obi-Wan's aid and helps him escape.


title: Darth Maul

text: In , Maul takes Savage as his apprentice and begins building his own criminal empire. The two travel to Florrum in a bid to seize the territory of Weequay pirates led by Hondo Ohnaka. The Jedi track them down and Maul duels Obi-Wan while Savage fights and kills Adi Gallia. Obi-Wan and Hondo's crew work together to force the brothers to flee in an escape pod. Days later, Maul and Savage are found floating in dead space by the Mandalorian terrorist group Death Watch. Maul joins forces with their leader, Pre Vizsla, to take control of Mandalore and exact revenge against their common enemy, Obi-Wan. They recruit the Black Sun, Pyke Syndicate and Hutt Clan to form a criminal syndicate called the Shadow Collective. Maul engineers Vizsla's rise to power by ordering the crime families to attack Mandalore, allowing the Death Watch to capture them and gain the public's support. However, Vizsla betrays and imprisons Maul and Savage, though they easily break free, and the former challenges Vizsla to a fight for leadership of Mandalore. Maul overpowers Vizsla, beheading him with his own darksaber, and effectively takes over Mandalore, putting disgraced former Prime Minister Almec, whom Satine had imprisoned for corruption, in power as a puppet leader. However, a faction of Death Watch, led by Bo-Katan Kryze, refuse to accept an outsider as their leader, and escape to plan a coup. Maul later masterminds a trap for Obi-Wan, knowing that Satine will contact the Jedi Master for help because of their romantic past. When Obi-Wan arrives on Mandalore, he is quickly captured and forced to watch as Maul executes Satine. Obi-Wan is later freed by Bo-Katan's Death Watch faction.


title: Darth Maul

text: Meanwhile, Darth Sidious learns of Maul's survival and the power he has accumulated, and, fearing that his former apprentice may challenge him, travels to Mandalore to address the matter. After a lightsaber duel against Maul and Savage, Sidious easily kills the latter, enraging Maul, who briefly holds his own against Sidious, but is ultimately defeated. Sidious proceeds to torture Maul with Force lightning, but spares his life because he has other uses for him.


title: Darth Maul

text: In the , following the events of the comic book "", Maul still leads the Shadow Collective, now consisting of the Black Sun, the Pyke Syndicate, and Crimson Dawn, and rules over Mandalore, until Bo-Katan enlists the Galactic Republic's help in deposing him. During the "Siege of Mandalore" story arc (which is set during ""), Bo-Katan's Death Watch faction and a branch of the 501st Clone Legion, led by Ahsoka Tano and Commander Rex, lead an assault on Maul's Mandalorian forces to draw him out of hiding. Unbeknownst to them, Maul has foreseen the events that are about to unfold, and orders his Shadow Collective lieutenants to go into hiding, warning them of the Galactic Empire that is about to be created. While confronting Ahsoka, Maul shares his visions with her, revealing that Darth Sidious will destroy both the Republic and the Jedi Order, and invites her to join him so that they may stand a chance to stop him. However, when Maul reveals that Ahsoka's former master, Anakin Skywalker, will be turned to the dark side by Sidious, and that he had hoped to kill Anakin to prevent this from happening, Ahsoka engages Maul in a lightsaber duel, which ends with the latter's capture.


title: Darth Maul

text: Maul is subsequently imprisoned in a Mandalorian device that renders his Force powers useless, and is set to be taken to Coruscant to stand trial. However, at this point Sidious executes Order 66, which causes clone troopers from all across the galaxy to betray and attempt to execute their Jedi generals. Maul is almost killed himself, but Ahsoka, who survived her clones' attempt on her life, rescues him, so that he may serve as a distraction while she and Rex try to escape. However, during his rampage, Maul destroys the ship's hyperdrive, causing it to crash on a nearby moon. He then betrays Ahsoka and steals her shuttle to escape, though Ahsoka and Rex manage to find another way off the ship before it crashes.


title: Darth Maul

text: An older Maul appears in the season two finale of "Star Wars Rebels", which takes place between "Solo" and "A New Hope". Tracked by an Imperial Inquisitor called the Eighth Brother, Maul is stranded on the ancient Sith world of Malachor, where he is discovered among the ruins by series protagonist Ezra Bridger. Introducing himself as an "old master" and seeking revenge against Sidious, Maul wins Ezra's trust by denouncing the Sith. He encourages the boy to use the dark side, and leads him into an ancient Sith temple, where they discover a holocron that Maul claims can give them the knowledge needed to defeat the Sith. After recovering it, the two find Ezra's master Kanan Jarrus and Ahsoka Tano locked in battle with the Eighth Brother, as well as the Fifth Brother and the Seventh Sister. Maul—having cast aside the title of Darth—reveals a new lightsaber disguised as a walking stick and joins the Jedi in battling the Inquisitors.


title: Darth Maul

text: After the Inquisitors retreat, Maul suggests to the Jedi that they team up, telling them that he cannot defeat Darth Vader on his own. Although Kanan and Ahsoka do not trust him, they only cooperate upon the insistence of Ezra. Once all three Inquisitors are killed, Maul turns on the Jedi, revealing his intention to take Ezra as his apprentice and that he tricked him into activating the temple. After blinding Kanan with his lightsaber, Maul briefly duels Ahsoka and then the now-blind Kanan, who knocks him off the temple's edge. However, he survives the fall and escapes Malachor in the Eighth Brother's TIE fighter.


title: Darth Maul

text: In the third season, Maul takes the "Ghost"s crew hostage and threatens to kill them unless Kanan and Ezra bring both the Sith and Jedi holocrons to him. Maul takes the crew to a remote base in the Outer Rim where he awaits Kanan and Ezra's arrival. He lures Kanan away from Ezra, and makes an attempt on his life. Afterwards, Maul and Ezra hazardously unite the holocrons, allowing them to see visions of their desires: Ezra sees images of a way to destroy the Sith, images including "twin suns", while Maul sees a vision of his own. Kanan begs Ezra to look away before he sees too much of the dark side, while Maul tells him to ignore Kanan and keep looking. Ezra heeds his master's words and breaks off the connection, which causes a great explosion. Maul escapes in the confusion, uttering, "He lives."


title: Darth Maul

text: Maul returns after finding the rebels' secret base. He tells Ezra that because the connection was severed, they got bits and pieces of each other's visions. After the holocrons were destroyed, Maul discovered another way to get the information he needed. He travels to Dathomir with Ezra, and recreates a Nightsister spell to temporarily meld his and Ezra's minds, which leads them to realize that they are both looking for Obi-Wan Kenobi. However, in return for the provided answers, the Nightsister spirits demand a sacrifice, and possess Kanan and Sabine Wren when they arrive to rescue Ezra. After escaping from them, Maul makes Ezra one final offer to become his apprentice, and leaves him behind to try and rescue his friends after he refuses.


title: Darth Maul

text: Eventually, in the "Twin Suns" episode, Maul tracks down Obi-Wan to Tatooine, but gets lost in the desert, and decides to use Ezra to lure his old nemesis out of hiding. His plan is ultimately successful as he tracks Ezra's movement, who came to find and warn Obi-Wan of Maul, until he is rescued by the Jedi Master. As Ezra is ushered away by Obi-Wan, Maul threatens his old enemy, and quickly deduces that he is not only hiding, but is protecting someone. Realizing that he cannot allow Maul to escape with this information, Obi-Wan ignites his lightsaber and prepares to duel Maul, who is swiftly defeated in a few strikes. As he lies dying in Obi-Wan's arms, Maul asks if the person he is protecting is the "Chosen One", and Obi-Wan replies that he is. Maul declares that this "Chosen One" will avenge them, and passes away.


title: Darth Maul

text: In "Tales of the Jedi", while he neither appears, he is mentioned by Count Dooku and Darth Sidious in the episode "The Sith Lord".


title: Darth Maul

text: In 2017, Marvel released "Star Wars: Darth Maul", a 5-issue prequel series centered on Maul before the events of "The Phantom Menace". The comic details upon Maul's training under Darth Sidious, and how he was manipulated into hating the Jedi for leading the Sith to near-extinction. The main plot follows Maul's quest to kill his first Jedi, allying himself with several bounty hunters and facing a crime lord along the way.


title: Darth Maul

text: Maul had his own one-shot comic book within the 2018–19 "Age of the Republic" miniseries, which depicts short stories of various characters during the Galactic Republic era. In his story, Maul poses as a member of a criminal cartel to kill a Force-sensitive thief for Darth Sidious, and experiences a vision of an alternate life as a peace-keeping Jedi, which he denies, much to Sidious' content. The story takes place shortly before "The Phantom Menace".


title: Darth Maul

text: Dark Horse Comics produced "" based on the scripts and storyboards of an unproduced four-episode story arc intended for the seventh season of "The Clone Wars". The events of the comic are set some time after Maul's defeat at Darth Sidious' hands in the fifth season of the television series, and before his eventual return in the seventh season.


title: Darth Maul

text: After defeating Maul and killing his brother Savage Opress, Sidious takes him to a Separatist prison, where Count Dooku tortures him for information about the Shadow Collective. Prime Minister Almec arranges Maul's escape and the latter then heads back to Zanbar to command the Death Watch army. However, he is followed by General Grievous and his droids, who battle with Maul and the Mandalorians. While they put up a fierce fight, Maul and his minions are ultimately overwhelmed by the droids. During the battle, Maul tears through the droid ranks and attacks Grievous, but is overpowered and forced to retreat. Afterwards, Maul confers with Mother Talzin and plots to draw out Sidious by capturing Dooku and Grievous. The scheme works, and Talzin is able to restore herself to her physical form, but she sacrifices herself to save Maul. Although Maul escapes with a company of loyal Mandalorians, the Shadow Collective has disintegrated due to the conflict with Sidious, as the Hutts, Pykes, and Black Sun have all abandoned Maul.


title: Darth Maul

text: In flashbacks during the novel "", it is revealed that during the final days of the Clone Wars, Maul and his forces were besieged on Mandalore by an army of clone troopers led by Ahsoka Tano and Captain Rex. During the siege, Maul confronts and duels Ahsoka. Though he proves to be the stronger fighter, the former Jedi outwits him and traps him in a ray shield. However, before Maul can be taken into official custody, Order 66 is enacted and the clone troopers following Ahsoka turn on her, with the exception of Rex. With Rex's life in peril, Ahsoka abandons the chance of killing Maul, allowing the former Sith to escape once again.


title: Darth Maul

text: The events of this battle were later adapted and altered by the final episodes of the seventh season of "The Clone Wars", as described earlier.


title: Darth Maul

text: Maul would have been the main character of "Battle of the Sith Lords", an action-adventure title set before "The Phantom Menace" that was cancelled in 2011.


title: Darth Maul

text: With the 2012 acquisition of Lucasfilm by The Walt Disney Company, most of the licensed "Star Wars" novels and comics produced since the original 1977 film "Star Wars" were rebranded as "Star Wars Legends" and declared non-canon to the franchise in April 2014.