Biology - Evolution the Evolutionary Term Paper

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However, the growth of our understanding of the degree to which human behavior is actually attributable directly to automatic processes contradicts that point-of-view.

As much as we may believe that we select our partners by virtue of their inner qualities and attributes that are more meaningful than superficial appearance, most of the characteristics to which we respond with potential romantic interest are dictated by automatic processes and quantifiable variables (Morris 2002) that are as predictable and unconscious as their counterparts throughout the rest of the animal kingdom.

Traditionally, sociologists have pointed to the environmental influences of human culture and societal norms to explain the perceived value of physical beauty, often suggesting that variation in concepts of attractiveness among different cultures evidences that physical beauty is strictly an arbitrary subjective measure that is learned along with other fundamental elements of human social culture.

However, a long series of studies going back to 1981 (Bornstein, et al.) has revealed that even very young human infants actually recognize basic components of human attractiveness long before they could possibly have been influenced by social norms defining beauty.

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In those studies, infants were presented with images of adult strangers of previously determined attractiveness in terms of quantifiable measurements such as straight teeth, clear skin, and feature symmetry. In variants of those studies, composite images not corresponding to any actual person were substituted for images of actual adults. By comparing the amount of time that infants spent looking at each image, the researchers determined that, as expected, human infants stared at the images precisely in proportion to their attractiveness rank, in addition to smiling or gesturing more at the more attractive images.

The purpose of those experiments was not to deny the influence of.....

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