Saturday, January 19, 2008

The Sexiest Legs: 5 % Longer than Average

Long
legs are really considered sexy. And if you thought than only men fix
in this issue regarding women, you are wrong: women too assess how sexy
a man is, based on this. A new research discovered that taller people
are more physically attractive to the opposite sex, and legs that are 5
% longer than average are considered the sexiest in both genders.



"There are good evolutionary reasons for the preference. Long legs are
a sign of health", lead researcher Boguslaw Pawlowski, of University of
Wroclaw in Poland, told "The Guardian".



The study was made on 218 male and female subjects, put to rank the attractiveness



of 7 men and 7 women from digitally altered images. All the people in
the images had the same height, but their legs length was digitally
processed to match the Polish medium value, or longer by 5 %, 10 % or
15 %. No matter the body shape and leg length, those with 5 % longer
legs than average were considered the most attractive. The next level
of attractiveness was the average leg length or 10 % longer.



However, legs 15 % longer than the average scored poorly.



"Extremely long legs in a woman could indicate poor child-bearing prospects", wrote the authors.



"Longer legs are one of many subtle cues that suggest good health,
especially in women. Leg length is a good indicator of childhood
nutrition in women because their legs stop growing once they reach
puberty. So if a woman has long legs it suggests she grew up in a good
environment and that has a positive effect on fertility. The effect in
men is more subtle, because their legs continue to grow beyond
puberty", said Prof Martin Tovee, of the Newcastle University.



The same research team had found that women regarded taller men as good
for one night stands, but shorter men as better for committed
relationships.



Many researches connected shorter legs to an increased risk of
cardiovascular disease and obesity-related diabetes, in both genders,
while in men this was connected to increased cholesterol levels, the
main cause of arterial disease and strokes. Recently, longer legs in
women have been connected to a healthier liver at an older age.



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