Have you ever noticed how some folks seem to have it all?
They breeze through life with super good looks, land the most lucrative deals, and now, according to a study, they might have a few extra years on the clock.
Yup. If you’re blessed in the looks department, we’re talking People Magazine’s Sexiest Woman of The Year type of pretty; science says you might lead a very long life.
Now, before you roll your eyes and think, “Of course, life’s easier when you’re pretty,” let’s break down what this new research is really saying.
Do Pretty People Really Live Longer?
So, here’s the tea.
In a groundbreaking study titled Looks and Longevity: Do Prettier People Live Longer, researchers from Arizona State University and the University of Texas Austin explored how attractiveness might influence lifespan. They combined data from the National Death Index with yearbook photos from the Wisconsin Longitudinal Study (WLS).
The study followed 8,386 Wisconsin high school graduates from the class of 1957 throughout their lifetime. The team had independent judges rate the participants’ prettiness on an 11-point scale and account for all factors influencing life expectancy, such as education achievements, family background, income, intelligence, and physical fitness.
After comparing the beauty ratings to the WLS data, the researchers found that people who scored in the lowest one-sixth of the prettiness scale had an approximately 17% higher mortality risk than those with pretty looks.
Specifically, at age 20, women in this least attractive group lived almost two years less, while men lived nearly one year less compared to their more attractive counterparts.
Interestingly, there were no significant differences in mortality risk between those deemed highly attractive and those with average looks. This suggests that while unattractiveness is associated with a shorter lifespan, being pretty doesn’t extend life any more than being average-looking does.
This pattern was consistent across different life stages and measures of attractiveness within the study group. Moreover, the participants were primarily non-Hispanic white individuals from a single state, so the results might not apply to other groups.
But while the reasons behind these findings remain unclear, researchers suggest that pretty people might experience less social discrimination and fewer stressors related to their appearance.
Additionally, good-looking people might find it easier to secure a partner and benefit from a “prettiness advantage” that leads to better employment and financial advancement opportunities.
“Factors manifest in dating and marriage. For instance, previous research has indicated that women perceived as less attractive tend to marry men who earn less and have less education,” said Connor M. Sheehan, an associate professor at Arizona State University and co-author of the study.
“Given that there are life expectancy differences across levels of attractiveness, we then calculated how much less social security people rated as less attractive would receive given their shorter lives. Unattractive women could expect to receive about 6% less social security benefits than other women, i.e., about $250,000 less over their lives.”
Looking ahead, Sheehan and his team plan to expand their research on the connection between facial attractiveness and longevity by analyzing larger and more diverse samples across the United States.
They recognize that the limited data from the Wisconsin yearbook photos used in this study may not capture the full picture, especially since the sample was predominantly non-Hispanic white. This narrow focus means the findings might not extend to other racial and ethnic groups.
