Identifying Stereotypes in the Online Perception of Physical Attractiveness

TL;DR

This study investigates online stereotypes of female physical attractiveness by analyzing images from search engines, revealing racial and age-related biases and regional patterns in perceptions of beauty.

Contribution

It introduces a methodology to analyze stereotypes in web images and uncovers racial, age, and regional biases in perceptions of female attractiveness.

Findings

Existence of stereotypes favoring white women over black women.

Negative stereotypes associated with older women.

Regional patterns in attractiveness stereotypes.

Abstract

Stereotyping can be viewed as oversimplified ideas about social groups. They can be positive, neutral or negative. The main goal of this paper is to identify stereotypes for female physical attractiveness in images available in the Web. We look at the search engines as possible sources of stereotypes. We conducted experiments on Google and Bing by querying the search engines for beautiful and ugly women. We then collect images and extract information of faces. We propose a methodology and apply it to analyze photos gathered from search engines to understand how race and age manifest in the observed stereotypes and how they vary according to countries and regions. Our findings demonstrate the existence of stereotypes for female physical attractiveness, in particular negative stereotypes about black women and positive stereotypes about white women in terms of beauty. We also found negative stereotypes associated with older women in terms of physical attractiveness. Finally, we have identified patterns of stereotypes that are common to groups of countries.