Average faces are not more attractive. Their skin is just smoother

This is a good example of the type of scientific caveats you need to worry about when you run an experiment. Chances are, your experiment will tell you something, but it won't tell you the full story, and if you drill down further you'll discover something else that's more accurate but probably a less sensational headline.

http://www.uni-regensburg.de/Fakultaeten/phil_Fak_II/Psychol... http://www.uni-regensburg.de/Fakultaeten/phil_Fak_II/Psychol...

I don't think you can make this observation from these two faces. There appear to be differences in terms of hair and eye color as well. Plus, the facial hair isn't as visible in the smoothed-out face. I may be being pedantic in pointing the second point out, but I still think it says that there's more involved here than just the skin.

Not to mention that the skin color appears to me to "dull" some of the sharper features of the face by making them less noticeable. I think a case can be made that skin can have an enhancing effect on an average face, but I don't think this is enough to write facial structure out altogether.

The confusion is due to different interpretation of "average". They should have used median faces instead of mean faces.

Ba-da-bum.