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Does Red Lipstick Really Attract Men? An Evaluation in a Bar

May 2012
International Journal of Psychological Studies 4(2)

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University of Southern Brittany

Previous research has demonstrated that the color red increases the attractiveness of women. It has also been found that makeup increases perceived women' attractiveness for men and was associated with perceived greater interest for the opposite sex. We hypothesized that women wearing red lipstick would be more favorably approached by men. Female confederates wearing red, pink, brown and no lipstick were seated in bars on Wednesday and Saturday nights in a popular spot on the West Atlantic coast of France. Each experimental session lasted one hour. The number of men's solicitations and the lead time of the first solicitation were used as dependent variables. Results showed that the red lipstick condition was associated with a higher number of male solicitations and a shorter lead time between the arrival of the confederates in the bar and the first courtship solicitation of a male.

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www.ccsenet.org/ijps International Journal of Psychological Studies Vol. 4, No. 2; June 2012

ISSN 1918-7211 E-ISSN 1918-722X

206

Does Red Lipstick Really Attract Men? An Evaluation in a Bar

Nicolas Guéguen1

1 Business department, Université de Bretagne-Sud, Vannes, France

Correspondence: Nicolas Guéguen, IMABS, Université de Bretagne-Sud, rue de la loi, Vannes, 5600, France. Tel:

33-297-012-663. E-mail: Nicolas.gueguen@univ-ubs.fr

Received: February 22, 2012 Accepted: April 9, 2012 Published: June 1, 2012

doi:10.5539/ijps.v4n2p206 URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.5539/ijps.v4n2p206

Abstract

Previous research has demonstrated that the color red increases the attractiveness of women. It has also been

found that makeup increases perceived women’ attractiveness for men and was associated with perceived greater

interest for the opposite sex. We hypothesized that women wearing red lipstick would be more favorably

approached by men. Female confederates wearing red, pink, brown and no lipstick were seated in bars on

Wednesday and Saturday nights in a popular spot on the West Atlantic coast of France. Each experimental

session lasted one hour. The number of men’s solicitations and the lead time of the first solicitation were used as

dependent variables. Results showed that the red lipstick condition was associated with a higher number of male

solicitations and a shorter lead time between the arrival of the confederates in the bar and the first courtship

solicitation of a male.

Keywords: red, lips, makeup, attractiveness

1. Introducation

The literature examining the role of cosmetics in social perception has found that, overall, makeup is associated

with a positive evaluation of a woman (Graham & Jouhar, 1981; Cash, Dawson, Davis, Bowen, & Galumbeck,

1989; Mulhern, Fieldman, Hussey, Lévêque, & Pineau, 2003; Nash, Fieldman, Hussey, Lévêque, & Pineau, 2006;

Richetin, Huguet, & Croiset, 2007). Men’s positive perceptions of the physical and sexual attractiveness of

women wearing cosmetics were also observed. Cox and Glick (1986) found that cosmetics were positively

associated with femininity and sexiness whereas Workman and Johnson (1991) observed that women’s cosmetics

significantly enhanced the impression of attractiveness and femininity. Recent studies found that men’s behavior

was also affected by women’s cosmetics. Guéguen (2008) observed that female confederates in bars were more

frequently and more promptly approached by men when wearing cosmetics. Jacob, Guéguen, Boulbry, and

Ardicioni (2009) found that male customers, but not female customers, in a restaurant gave more tips to

waitresses wearing cosmetics.

These previous studies seem to show that women with facial makeup become more attractive for men. It could

also be interesting to test if limiting the use of cosmetics to certain areas of the face exerts the same

attractiveness effect. Mulhern, Fieldman, Hussey, Lévêque, and Pineau (2003) found that faces of women

wearing full makeup were judged to be more attractive than the same faces without makeup, but they also found

that eye makeup alone yielded higher levels of mean attractiveness ratings than foundation makeup alone. One

aspect that has received little attention is lipstick and particularly the color of the lips.

Across cultures and time, it had been found that red lips are considered attractive in women (Schaffer, 2007) and

it has been found that women wearing red clothes are perceived by men to be more attractive and sexually

desirable (Elliot &Niesta, 2008). Further studies showed that men seek more social contact with or display more

sexual interest in women wearing red clothes (Niesta-Kayser, Elliot, & Feltman, 2010; Guéguen, in press).

In a recent study, Stephen and McKeegan (2010) observed that participants increase lip redness contrast to

enhance the femininity and attractiveness of women faces while they reduced redness contrast to enhance the

masculinity of men’s face. Thus, given the role of red in female attractiveness, it was hypothesized that red

lipstick would be associated with an increase in male approach.

2. Method

2.1 Participants

The participants were young men judged to be approximately 20 to 28 years old. Given the fact that this

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Published by Canadian Center of Science and Education 207

experiment was an observational study, no demographic information was available. They were present in four

bars where the experiment was carried out. The bars were situated in the center of a town of 70,000 inhabitants -

a seaside resort on the West Atlantic coast of France.

2.2 Volunters

Eight Caucasian female volunteers were recruited. The physical attractiveness of the confederates was previously

evaluated by a group of 48 young men who were instructed to examine photographs of the faces of 36 women

and to rate their attractiveness on a numerical scale going from 1 (low level of physical attractiveness) to 9 (high

level of physical attractiveness). We selected only women with attractiveness near the middle of the scale (5-7)

and precautions were taken to verify that the rate of attractiveness was not statistically different between the

confederates. With these 8 confederates, 4 two-person teams were constituted according to a random selection

made for each day of the experimental period.

2.3 Procedure

The experiment was conducted during 6 Wednesday and 6 Saturday nights between 8:30 p.m. and midnight with

the consent of the owners of the fours bars. Three observational sessions of 1 hour each were conducted each

night per bar: 8:30-9:30 p.m., 9:45-10:45 p.m., 11:00-12. The distribution of the confederates’ team for each

session and for each bar was randomized. Thus 144 observational periods were obtained: 2 days a week × 6

weeks × 3 sessions per day × 4 bars = 144 with N = 36 observational periods in each experimental condition.

Two male observers (20 years old) were seated in each bar where the experiment took place. A young female

beautician also volunteered to make up the female confederates for the duration of the experiment. In the lipstick

only condition, the beautician applied makeup only to the confederates’ lips using either a red, a pink or a brown

lipstick after cleaning their faces and applying a moisturizer. The same brand and its product line was used

throughout the experiment. In the no makeup condition, the female confederates’ lips and faces were simply

cleaned and moisturizer was applied as in the other condition. The two confederates in each team were in the

same lipstick condition. According to a random selection during the 12 nights in which the experiment was

conducted, both of the women-confederates either wore lipstick or not when they entered the bar, and stayed

with or without lipstick throughout the evening. The women were instructed to try to sit at a free table near the

area where single men often stand while drinking. The two young male observers were present in the bar two

minutes before the women-confederates entered. They were instructed to sit in a place where it was possible for

them to observe the bar and the tables, without choosing a table near the bar. The female-confederates were

instructed to sit down and begin talking to each other without showing interest in the other people present in the

bar. When the women-confederates were seated, one of the observers started a chronometer and stopped it when

either of the two women folded their arms. This was a code meaning that a man had made contact. A man’s

behavior was considered a contact if the man spoke to one of the two female confederates. Nonverbal behaviors

of men, such as a fixed gaze or a smile, were disregarded because they are difficult to interpret. When a verbal

contact was made by a man, one of the women-confederates was instructed to say “Hello, we are waiting for

someone who will probably arrive in one or two minutes. We have a lot to talk about. Another time perhaps?”

This brief statement was sufficient to stop the interaction and cause the male to leave the two confederates. The

second male observer was instructed to count the number of males who approached the two women (the same

code was used each time), whereas the first observer was instructed to give the “stop” signal by standing up after

each 60-minute session.

3. Results

The two dependent variables measured in this experiment were the time elapsed before a first verbal contact was

made by a man and the moment when the women confederates sat down, and the total number of verbal contacts

made by men during each one-hour session. These two sets of means are presented in Table 1.

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208

Table 1. Time elapsed before the first male contact (in minutes) and number of men making contact across

conditions

Lipstick condition

Measure

Red

N = 36

Pink

N = 36

Brown

N = 36

No lipstick

N = 36

SD M SD M SD M SD

Number of men making

contact by period

2.03 0.70 1.72 0.70 1.55 0.69 1.39 0.69

Time elapsed before the

first male contact

19.78 9.37 23.35 11.91 24.83 14.81 27.03 13.18

Note: N= 36 refers to 36 periods of observation

With the number of men’s contact per hour, a 4 between groups one-way ANOVA analysis was performed. A

main effect was found (F(3, 140) = 5.09 p = .001, ηp2 = .11). Post-hoc testing revealed that the red lips condition

was nearly significantly different from the pink lips condition (LSD test, p = .06) and clearly significantly

different from the brown lips condition (LSD test, p = .005) and the no lipstick condition (LSD test, p < .001).

Further analysis revealed that the pink lips condition was significantly different from the no lipstick control

condition (LSD test, p = .04) but not different from the brown lips condition (LSD test, p = .30). Finally, no

significant difference was found between the brown lips condition and the no lipstick condition (LSD test, p

= .31)

With the time elapsed before a first male contact, the same 4 between groups one-way ANOVA analysis was

done and revealed no overall difference (F(3, 140) = 2.15 p = .10, ηp2 = .04). Post-hoc testing revealed that the

red lips condition was not significantly different from the pink lips condition (LSD test, p = .23) and the brown

lips condition (LSD test, p = .09) but was significantly different from the no lipstick condition (LSD test, p

= .02). Further analysis revealed that the pink lips condition was not significantly different from the no lipstick

control condition (LSD test, p = .21) and the brown lips condition (LSD test, p = .61) whereas the brown lip

condition and the no lipstick condition were not significantly different (LSD test, p = .46).

4. Discussion

The predictions were supported by the results of this experiment. The red lipstick worn by the

female-confederates was associated with higher male contact and a shorter lead time for the first contact than

when no lipstick was used. These results obtained in a real social setting were congruent with the data which

showed that red increases women’s attractiveness for men. Niesta-Kayser, Elliot and Feltman (2010) found that

men sat closer to a woman wearing a red shirt than a woman wearing a blue one, and Guéguen (in press) found

that women hitchhikers wearing a red tee-shirt increased the probability of a man (but not a woman) stopping to

offer a ride. Our results seem to show that a red lip color is sufficient enough to influence men’s approach. These

results are important given the fact that they again confirmed that makeup increases women’s attractiveness

(Graham & Jouhar, 1981; Cox & Glick, 1986; Cash, Dawson, Davis, Bowen, & Galumbeck, 1989; Workman &

Johnson, 1991; Mulhern, Fieldman, Hussey, Lévêque, & Pineau, 2003; Nash, Fieldman, Hussey, Lévêque, &

Pineau, 2006; Richetin, Huguet, & Croiset, 2007; Jacob, Guéguen, Boulbry, & Ardicioni, 2009), but they also

showed that lipstick and the color of the lipstick can exert a single attractiveness effect. Indeed, in these previous

studies, neither the color of the makeup nor the effect of lipstick alone were tested.

Across cultures and time, it had been found that red lips are considered attractive in women (Schaffer, 2007). In

a recent study, Stephen and McKeegan (2010) observed that participants increase redness contrast to enhance

femininity and the attractiveness of female faces. To explain their results, these authors stated that red lips would

be associated with an indication of estrogen levels, sexual arousal and health which in turn led to increase the

positive perception of the women’s faces. Such positive perceptions of the women probably explain why more

men approached our women confederates in this experiment. Further studies are now necessary to evaluate if a

relation exists between men’s behavior and the assumption that women with red lips are perceived to be more

sexually aroused and healthy. It would be the next step to explore using the same methodological approach as in

our experiment.

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Published by Canadian Center of Science and Education 209

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Cox, C. L., & Glick, W. H. (1986). Resume evaluation and cosmetics use: When more is not better. Sex Roles, 14,

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Elliot, A. J., & Niesta, D. (2008). Romantic Red: Red Enhances Men's Attraction to Women. Journal of

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Article

Mar 2008

N. Guéguen

It has been found that cosmetics do improve female facial attractiveness when judgments were made based on photographs. Furthermore, these were laboratory studies and no field study exists in the literature. An experiment carried out in a field context was conducted in order to verify if makeup is associated with higher attractiveness in a courtship context. Female confederates with and without makeup were seated in two bars on Wednesday and Saturday nights in an attractive spot on the West Atlantic coast of France. Each experimental session lasted one hour. The number of men's solicitations and the latency of the first solicitation were used as dependent variables. Results showed that the makeup condition was associated with a higher number of male solicitations and a shorter latency between the arrival of the confederates in the bar and the first courtship solicitation of a male.

Color and women hitchhikers' attractiveness: Gentlemen drivers prefer red

Article

Feb 2012

Nicolas Guéguen

Research has shown that with some nonhuman primates, red is associated with greater sexual attractiveness of females. Five female confederates in their early 20s posed as hitchhikers wearing T-shirts of different colors (black, white, red, blue, green, or yellow). It was found that the women wearing red solicited a higher response in the number of male drivers who stopped to offer a ride. No color effect was found when considering the behavior of female drivers. © 2010 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Col Res Appl, 2012

The Effects of Cosmetics Use on the Physical Attractiveness and Body Image of College Women

Article

Jun 1989

Thirty-eight American female college students completed several body-image measures and were photographed while wearing their typical facial cosmetics and following the removal of their makeup, in a counterbalanced within-subject experimental design. Results indicated more positive body-image cognitions and affect in the cosmetics-present than the cosmetics-absent condition. The more makeup typically worn by the subject, the greater the body-image differences between the two cosmetics conditions. Sixteen peer judges rated the attractiveness of the women in either the cosmetics-present or the cosmetics-absent photograph. Male judges were less favorable when the women were cosmetics free; female judges were not differentially affected. Findings are discussed in the context of a dynamic state-trait perspective that physical appearance is not simply a fixed, immutable attribute, but rather is altered by individuals to manage and control their self- and social images.

The Role of Cosmetics in Impression Formation

Article

Sep 1991

The purpose of this research was to investigate the effect of cosmetics use on impression formation. The study was a single factor experiment with three levels of cosmetics (heavy, moderate, none). Eighty-five undergraduate females viewed one of three colored photographs of a professional model wearing either heavy, moderate, or no cosmetics and indicated impressions of her attractiveness, femininity, personal temperament, personality, and morality by checking 7-point Likert-type scales. Analysis of variance revealed no significant difference on impressions of personal temperament or personality traits based on cosmetics use. Cosmetics use did significantly affect impressions of attractiveness, femininity, and morality.

Red and romantic behavior in men viewing women

Article

Oct 2010
EUR J SOC PSYCHOL

In many non-human primate species, a display of red by a female increases attraction behavior in male conspecifics. In two experiments, we investigate an analogous effect in humans, specifically, whether red on a woman's shirt increases attraction behavior in men. In Experiment 1, men who viewed an ostensible conversation partner in a red versus a green shirt chose to ask her more intimate questions. In Experiment 2, men who viewed an ostensible interaction partner in a red versus a blue shirt chose to sit closer to her. These effects were observed across participants' perceptions of their own attractiveness (Experiment 1) and general activation and mood (Experiment 2). Our findings suggest that red acts as a basic, non-lexical prime, influencing reproduction-relevant behavior in like manner across species. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Cosmetics: They Influence More Than Caucasian Female Facial Attractiveness

Article

Feb 2006
J APPL SOC PSYCHOL

The study explored whether 4 Caucasian women would be evaluated differently on 4 social measures depending on whether they were presented with or without makeup. Participants—152 men and 171 women—were split into 2 groups and were presented with the women's facial photographs either with or without cosmetics. Women presented wearing cosmetics were perceived as healthier and more confident than when presented without. Participants also awarded women wearing makeup with a greater earning potential and with more prestigious jobs than the same women without cosmetics. The results suggest that women can successfully employ cosmetics to manipulate how they are assessed, which may be advantageous in social situations where women may be judged on their appearance, such as job interviews.

Resume evaluations and cosmetics use: When more is not better

Article

Jan 1986

Physical appearance is an integral component of self-presentation in all social situations, including that of applying for a job. This project investigated the relationship between employment evaluations of women and one aspect of their appearance under the individual's control—the use of varying degrees of cosmetics. Cosmetics use was found to be positively correlated with perceived attractiveness, femininity, and sexiness. Based on resume evaluations, however, cosmetics use had a negative effect on the expected performance of female applicants for a gender-typed (secretary) position, but no effect on the expected performance of female applicants for a nongender-typed (accountant) position. Makeup thus appears to strengthen sex role stereotypes associated with traditionally feminine jobs.

Waitresses’ facial cosmetics and tipping: A field experiment

Article

Mar 2010
Int J Hospit Manag

It had been found that cosmetics do improve female facial attractiveness when judgments were made based on photographs. However, these studies were conducted only on laboratory and field studies are scarce in the literature and none of them have tested the effect of customers’ behavior. An experiment was carried out in restaurant in order to verify if waitresses’ makeup is associated with an increase in patrons’ tipping behavior. Female waitresses with and without makeup were instructed to act in the same way than usual with their patrons. Results showed that the makeup condition was associated with a significant increase in tipping behavior of the male customers.