Department of Psychology, Chungbuk National University, Chungdae-ro 1, Seowon-Gu, Cheongju, 28644, Chungbuk, Korea.
Cogn Res Princ Implic. 2023 Apr 15;8(1):21. doi: 10.1186/s41235-023-00477-y.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, face masks have been widely used in daily life. Previous studies have suggested that faces wearing typical masks that occlude the lower half of the face are perceived as more attractive than face without masks. However, relatively little work has been done on how transparent masks that reveal the lower half of the face affect the judgment of facial attractiveness. To investigate the effect of transparent masks on the perceived attractiveness, in the current study, we asked participants to rate the attractiveness of faces without masks and with a typical opaque mask and a transparent mask. The results showed that faces wearing opaque masks were evaluated as more attractive than those wearing transparent masks or no masks. The benefit of opaque masks was more pronounced in faces that were initially evaluated as unattractive. Interestingly, wearing transparent masks decreased the perceived attractiveness of faces but only for the faces initially rated as attractive, possibly because of the visual distortion of the lower half of the face by transparent masks. In summary, we found that opaque and transparent masks have different effects on perceived attractiveness, depending on the attractiveness of faces. Given benefits of transparent masks in socio-emotional and cognitive processing, it would be important to further understand the effect of transparent masks on face information processing.
在 COVID-19 大流行期间，口罩已在日常生活中广泛使用。先前的研究表明，与不戴口罩的面孔相比，那些佩戴典型口罩遮挡下半部分面部的面孔被认为更具吸引力。然而，对于透明口罩暴露下半部分面部如何影响面部吸引力的判断，相对较少的工作已经完成。为了研究透明口罩对面部吸引力的影响，在本研究中，我们要求参与者对面部没有口罩、佩戴典型不透明口罩和透明口罩的吸引力进行评分。结果表明，佩戴不透明口罩的面孔被评价为比佩戴透明口罩或不戴口罩的面孔更具吸引力。对于最初被评价为不吸引人的面孔，不透明口罩的优势更为明显。有趣的是，佩戴透明口罩会降低面孔的吸引力，但仅适用于最初被评价为有吸引力的面孔，这可能是因为透明口罩对面部下半部分的视觉扭曲。总之，我们发现不透明和透明口罩对面部吸引力的影响不同，这取决于面孔的吸引力。鉴于透明口罩在社会情感和认知处理方面的益处，进一步了解透明口罩对面部信息处理的影响非常重要。
