All Ye Need To Know

I've always been interested in the biological side of beauty--what consitutes a beautiful face, for instance, and why is looking at one such a powerful experience.

One recent piece of research (which I couldn't find a link for) suggested men's ratings of feminine beauty were more consistent than women's ratings of masculine handsomeness.

Here's a study using MRIs that showed looking at a beautiful woman (but not a goodlooking man) "can set off the 'reward centers'" in the brain and trigger "activity in brain regions previously associated with food, drugs and money."

Here's another study that "shows men who spend even a few minutes in the company of an attractive woman perform less well in tests designed to measure brain function than those who chat to someone they do not find attractive." Furthermore, women are not similiary affected by attractive men.

I realize a lot of people might say this sort of research is useless, since it just confirms common sense. But it's worth something to delve beyond basic understanding to find out just what the effect is and how far it goes. Anyway, since when does studying beauty require practical application?