Beautiful Asymmetry

Tom Cruise is newsworthy. Not my most surprising revelation, but hear me out. Apparently, everything he does is newsworthy. That “Tom Cruise picks his nose in public” Twitter account is still waiting for its moment to shine. Perhaps that is why, recently, the world was shocked to discover that Tom Cruise has an asymmetrical face.

And people just can't let it go (check out #9). No doubt, countless scholars in the area of psychology and other fields studying physical attractiveness and its impact, had the same reaction as me. “Yes, he does. So do I. So does the person who wrote this article. So do the people reading it.”

Asymmetry is completely natural - arguably more natural and common than the voyeurism so pervasive in our society that it clamors for more articles metaphorically dissecting our favorite celebs. Perhaps, then, what is more surprising than the realization that Tom Cruise’s face is asymmetrical, is the fact that it took this long for anyone to notice.

Researchers in the area of physical attractiveness have found, however, that symmetry is considered attractive to most human beings. So perhaps that is reason that we are shocked to discover that people we consider attractive have “flaws." Beautiful people tend to have a pretty easy lot in life: they get paid more, they are less likely to be found guilty by criminal juries (and if they are found guilty, tend to receive lighter punishments), and mothers are even more affectionate to attractive babies (read more here).

Symmetry is also a sign of good genes, because it means one is less likely to have genetic mutations. You see, symmetry is in essence averageness. In studies where researchers have composited multiple faces together, participants actually rate the composites as more attractive, because these composites average out distinctive features (a crooked nose, eyes that are slightly different sizes, etc.).

The truth is, if you scrutinize any face in isolation of other faces, you will find asymmetry. Want some evidence? Here are pictures of people perceived as being faces of beauty, and rather than just taking in the whole face, start looking at individual features and you'll see it. (Disclaimer: I am in no way saying these people are actually unattractive because of this asymmetry, just showing you it is there.)

First up, Cindy Crawford. Ignore the mole on one side (a pretty obvious instance of asymmetry) and look at the rest. Notice how her left eye (the right side looking at this picture) is slightly higher and larger than her right? This is very typical - the left side of just about anyone's face is usually larger. Also notice her face shape is not quite symmetrical; her left jaw is a bit more square.

Ryan Gosling. Notice that his left eye is lower (actually quite a bit lower) than his right. His nose is crooked, slanted a bit more to the left. And his face shape is also slightly different on his left side than his right.

One more - Marilyn Monroe. I'll admit, this one took me a little longer to see, since in most photos I found she is 1) heavily made up, 2) shot with very strategic shading over one side of her face, and 3) often shot from slightly off-center. Again, her left eye is slightly lower than her right, and the right side of her face is actually a bit narrower than her left.

I feel I've made my point that we're all asymmetrical. But just to belabor it a bit more (and in fairness to our perfectly gorgeous individuals pictured above), I give you one non-celebrity:

This was a Halloween pic, so don't worry - I don't usually have antennae. First, note that my left eye is lower than my right (not just because my head is turned), and my chin is a bit fuller on the left side. The right side of my face is also a bit narrower, just like Ms. Monroe above. Also, note that my left eyebrow has a more pronounced arch than my right. If you could see my ears, you'd probably also notice that one is lower than the other.

The truth is, even people without backgrounds in psychology or research experience have gotten the message that our faces are asymmetrical. Why do you think people talk about being photographed "from my good side"? It may be that one side is truly better than the other, but it's probably more likely having one side in the foreground is better than being photographed head-on. This technique camouflages the asymmetry. Makeup and good shading can also have a strong effect.

But I still haven't totally answered the question about why we may have missed these very human characteristics in celebrities. I'll introduce you to another offspring of this asymmetry work - more fun with averages!

Remember what I said above about composites being perceived as more attractive? Faces in a group photo are also perceived as more attractive than solo faces, for the very same reason. Our brains average across what we see in a picture. So if there are multiple faces, your brain will average across them, making them all seem more symmetrical in your mind's eye.

Where do we tend to see celebrities? When they're all glammed up attending an award show or movie premiere, they tend to be in groups. There are people in the background much of the time. On the other hand, where do we tend to see celebrities walking solo? Tabloids, where they're usually being attacked for their weight, their looks, their lack of makeup, etc. They are out of their usual context, and perhaps as a result, perceived as less attractive.

So what can we learn from this?

That I've perhaps made myself look more attractive by including my photo in the context of attractive celebrities? Maybe, though scrolling down to see my face probably means Ms. Monroe is out of the frame. Instead, you're probably averaging me with the parrot.

Or that if you want to look more attractive on dating websites, you should include a group photo instead of a picture of yourself alone? Again, maybe. I'd love to hear if that actually works (just idle curiosity; no plans on dating profiles anytime soon).

But perhaps the big thing we can learn from this is that, when we are comparing ourselves to celebrities and scrutinizing our own flawed face, that we can be assured that all faces have flaws. Flaws make us human.

Asymmetrically yours,

~Sara

Trivial Only Post: Random Thoughts about Vampires

I stumbled across an old (but still funny) cartoon about Blade crossing over into the Twilight universe and slaying Edward.  Okay, not actually Edward - they call him Edgar, probably to avoid copyright infringement.  But whatever.  And I thought, "Damn, if only..."

But then I thought, "What makes us think a stake would kill him?  I mean, sunlight doesn't kill him.  Poor writing doesn't kill him.  Bad acting doesn't kill him.  He's seriously immortal, which sounds cool and all, but I don't want it if it means I sparkle."

I've also already discussed (at length here and here) that Buffy the Vampire Slayer is my favorite show.  Of course, I'll be the first to admit the inconsistencies in its approach to vampire lore.  First of all, important vampire characters live longer in sunlight than throwaway characters, almost as if the love (or hatred, or sometimes a little of both) imbues them with additional powers.  One of the Master's goons (or really any character bereft of a name) can be thrown into sunlight and instantly explode, but Spike can sizzle for a full minute before an appendage bursts into flame.  Second, there is marked variation in vampiric gestation.  Some vampires awaken in the morgue (e.g., the vampire at the end of "The Body").  Others awaken on the table or in their casket at the funeral home (e.g., the vampire at the beginning of "Help").  Still others are buried, perhaps for days, before they wake up (e.g., Ford in "Lie to Me").  AND BUFFY ALWAYS KNOWS.  I think I need to watch more Buffy to figure this out...

Trivially yours,
~Sara

If Psychological Research in Movies Were More Realistic: The Haunting

I've been pondering this post for a while.  And after reading some IRB-themed jokes recently (yes, that's what I do for fun), I thought this would be a funny post to write.  So here it is, what research in movies would look like if it were more similar to research in real life.  When I started this, it was going to be just one post, but there's so much material out there, I thought this might be part of a series of portrayals of research in movies.

First off, the movie, The Haunting… Not a great movie by any means (it holds a rating of 17% on Rotten Tomatoes), and even the awesome cast couldn't save it.

The cast, searching desperately for a sensical plot...

Sadly, this movie depicts what many people think psychological researchers are like: manipulative, deceitful, lacking any empathy.  It also fails to follow the basic rules of ethical psychological research.  Forget about the fact that the house is actually haunted, and look only at the plan of the study.  Here's what would happen if someone tried to recreate this study in real life:

Research Protocol Review

Dr. David Marrow discusses his project with his department chair, who insists that he can't conduct the study ethically.  But he ultimately lets Dr. Marrow do what he wants and shrugs as if to say, "But hey, give it a try and see how it turns out."  How would that conversation have ended in real life?  The department chair would have concluded his comment on ethics with, "but we'll have to let the IRB sort it out.  File the paperwork and you should have a decision in a couple of months."

Let's see, I'm bribing emotionally unstable insomniacs with a sizable salary and free room-and-board to come to a weird old house that I'm going to trick them into thinking is haunted.  That should qualify for expedited review, right?

Barring the IRB determining, like the department chair said, that there is no way to conduct the study ethically, Dr. Marrow gets his approval and can go forward with his study.  Of course, that's a big if - the IRB would probably, at the very least, require lots of additional language in the consent form to warn people about how this study might make them feel (um, scared, probably) that would prevent Dr. Marrow from deceiving his participants as much as he would like.  And by the way, consent forms?  There don't seem to be any in this movie.  But okay, he gets that figured out and he can begin recruiting.

Recruitment

Did he get the IRB's approval of the text of his ad before putting it in the paper?  And is the newspaper staff member handling the call inquires on the IRB paperwork (since he or she will be speaking with potential participants)?  If not, better file an amendment first.

After filing his amendment and getting the staff member at the newspaper to complete the necessary ethics trainings, Dr. Marrow can again proceed with recruiting participants.  

The Study Itself

Once he has them, he invites them to the house where they will begin the study.  All good for now.  But what's next in the study procedure?  Signing consent forms!  What fun.  Oh, and since he's collecting information about people's sleeping patterns, medical diagnoses of insomnia, etc., he better also have them sign a HIPAA authorization too.

And on page 20 of the consent form, you'll see that you can stop participating at any time without penalty.  Directly below that, see the note about the gatekeeper chaining us in every night.

So now he has three consenting, HIPAA-authorizing participants.  He can go on with the study, which also involves the house staff giving the participants additional information about the house being haunted.

Wait, I didn't see anything about confederates in your study paperwork.  Better file another amendment and complete protocol deviation forms for the three participants.

But then things go horribly wrong.  It turns out the house really is haunted and the people are actually in danger.  What does the IRB say?  The IRB requires researchers to report any adverse events (harm) or serious adverse events (injury or even death) caused by the study.  Both require forms to be filed with the IRB, and the IRB must then decide if the study can continue safely.

This would be a serious adverse event.

Basically, all of these protections are in place for a reason.  Informed consent means the participants know what they are in for - they may not know the true purpose of the study (because deception is allowed) but they have to know what they will be asked to do in the study and potential harms that may result.  Participants also have to be allowed to leave the study at any time if they wish.  The IRB continues to oversee studies and steps in if things turn out to be more harmful than originally thought.

Somebody find the chain cutters...

Thoughtfully yours,

~Sara

Trivial Only Post: An Open Letter to Winter

Dear Winter,

We realize that you have been wronged.  You've gone easy on us these last couple years, and how did we repay you?  We called you 'mild', we jokingly referred to you as 'Spring'; yes, we know you are not Spring, and so calling you this wrong name must have really hurt your feelings.

So what did you do this year?  You reminded us what Winter really is.  It's cold.  It's long.  It's loaded with snow.  It makes you question why you live where do, because, despite being tolerable to gorgeous 9ish months out of the year, it's "snow, snow, too cold to snow, still too cold to snow, warmed up and guess what? Snowed" the other 3 months.

We see now that your actions are just a response to our behavior.  We remember what you are - you are cold, you are rough, you make small children and even grown adults cry.  You make us buy funny hats with earflaps and lined with so much fleece we spend the day with sweaty hat-hair, and coats so puffy, we have to loosen our seatbelt.  Never again will we call you 'mild.'  Never again will we question, "What's with all the snow?"  We know; it's Winter.

Never forget

We get it now.  And we apologize.  We remember who you are.  You can be over any time now.

Be sure to send in Spring on your way out.

Hugs and lollipops,
~Sara

The Truth about OCD: A Real-Life Example

I am thankful for all of the organizations and people who have worked to make the public aware of mental illness and convince them that is nothing to joke around about.  At the same time, I constantly encounter people, including friends, who joke about their "OCD" acting up - when they see something out of place, when a line painted on the road is crooked, when a pencil is upside down, whatever.

What a coincidence - my annoyed psychologist senses are tingling

As a response to these jokes and comments, allow me to present something that just happened to me.  I went out to my car to run a quick errand, and saw one of my neighbors outside cleaning off her car that was parked next to mine.  She said hello and kept brushing.  I've seen her before and strongly suspect she has OCD (Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder), but will admit I don't know that for sure.  She always seems very sedate when I talk to her, so she is probably on some pretty heavy anti-anxiety meds to help control the condition (or she has something else I'm not aware of and can't detect because she's so heavily medicated).

She walked around her car once, continuing to brush as I started my car and got my brush out.  And when I say she was brushing the snow off her car, I mean she was brushing each and every flake off of her car, off of the windows, the sides, the tires, the headlights.  Her car was clean - far cleaner than mine was even after I finished brushing.  The wind picked up and blew some of the snow from my car onto hers.  I apologized, and she smiled and kept brushing, each new flake that flew onto her car being immediately brushed off.  And as new snow started to fall, she continued walking around her car, brushing.  

I don't know how long she had been out there before I came outside, or how long she was there after I left.  But my heart went out to this poor lady, who could not stop brushing her car until every single flake was gone.  I look out the window and see that it is snowing now, and I think of what a futile task it is to want - no, need - every single flake of snow off of the car.

Desiring order in all things, being really bristled when something is not perfect - that's not the same thing as what this woman experiences, where desiring order, obsessing over each little detail, keeps her from being able to move forward; where her compulsion for things to be perfect keeps her from being able to complete a simple task like cleaning off her car.

I'll resist the urge to go on.  And for my friends out there who make comments about their OCD, I will only say - if you really truly think that your need for order and perfection constitutes a mental illness, please get help.  But if you are just using this diagnosis as a joke, or a "prettier" way of referring to your anal retentive nature, think about this woman, and how every single flake on her car needs to be gone before she can get in and drive away.

Thoughtfully yours,

~Sara

Digital Recreation: Practical Movie-Making or Grave-Robbing?

It's been less than a week since Philip Seymour Hoffman was found dead in his apartment.  Like many people, I was in shock over the news.  Not only was he one of my favorite actors - and my frequent example of incredibly versatile actors who could take on pretty much any role - I was only vaguely aware of his drug problem.  I heard the news through a story posted by a friend on Facebook, and had to Google and check multiple news sites before I believed it wasn't a hoax.

I thought over some of my favorite movies in which he appeared, and had the urge to watch them, but thought that would be kind of morbid.  I also remembered seeing him in the latest Hunger Games movie and absent-mindedly thought, "Hmm, I wonder what they'll do about his character."

And then today I found out.  Hoffman had finished filming Mockingjay Part I, and had only a week left of filming on Mockingjay Part II.  To complete the one major scene Hoffman had left, the film-makers will use digital effects to recreate Hoffman.

The more I thought about this, the more I thought, "Wow, apparently Hollywood gets to decide when you're actually dead or not."  I was reminded of the Ed Wood film, Plan 9 from Outer Space, regarded as one of the worst movies ever made.  The movie starred Bela Lugosi, a man known for his portrayal of Dracula.  Lugosi and Wood became friends, and Lugosi appeared in many of Wood's movies.  When Lugosi died during filming of Plan 9, due to complications from methadone and morphine addiction, Wood was devasted… but also had a movie to finish.  They found a man (his wife's chiropractor) who looked like Lugosi from the eyes up, and had him cover his face with a cape for his scenes as the reanimated Lugosi (reanimated both in the sense of the character - who died and was brought back by aliens - and reanimated in the same sense Hoffman will be).

True, Hoffman's digital recreation for Mockingjay Part II will only be for one scene (or so the film-makers say), while Lugosi's double appeared in a large chunk of the movie.  So we may only be talking about 10 or so minutes.  And this certainly wouldn't be the first time a movie was released after one of its actors had died.  But where do we draw the line?  Now that computer effects have gotten so good that this kind of recreation is possible - and probably won't even be noticeable to the viewer - is this something we will see more of in the future?  Where do we say, "Okay, that amount of digital recreation is acceptable" and where do we say, "That's going to far"?

As always, please share your thoughts in the comments below!

Thoughtfully yours,
~Sara

Trivial Only Post: Last Night's Dinner Entertainment - the Mutant Fruit Fly

My husband and I went to one of our favorite local beer gardens for dinner.  Everything was excellent - except for this one fruit fly buzzing around our heads as we ate and drank.  We cracked jokes about it (I'd ordered a lambic beer - so I joked that my fruit beer came with a fruit fly), tried to kill it several times, and eventually gave up on it until my husband looked down and noticed that it had fallen into his beer.

Certain the fruit fly was dead, we looked closer only to see that it was swimming - kicking its legs and seemingly quite alive.  My husband fished the fruit fly out with his fork and set it on his napkin, saying, "You're welcome."  Of course, we were certain it wouldn't be alive much longer.

We were wrong.  Slowly, it straightened out its wings, walking along the napkin, shaking its legs.  We watched this for a couple of minutes, and snapped a picture.

Almost good as new - but will he ever be able to fly again?

It hung around for several minutes, walking around a little square of my husband's napkin, and didn't move when I got in close to take the above picture.  Finally, my husband reached over to grab his phone, and it took off.

In fact, it flew back and landed on my beer bottle and crawled inside (it was empty).  I decided not to bother him.