This study tested whether perceived waist-to-hip ratio (WHR) predicts attractiveness, perceived age, and perceived parity (likelihood of prior childbirth) in 608 fully clothed female figures from European portraits (1650–1950), rated by 1,525 online observers who evaluated body shape, attractiveness, age, and parity separately.
Lower perceived WHR strongly predicted higher attractiveness (b = −4.82 per unit WHR; −0.48 points per 0.10 WHR increase on a 1–7 scale), younger perceived age (+4.25 years per 0.10 WHR increase), and lower perceived likelihood of prior childbirth (OR ×2.17 per 0.10 WHR increase). All effects persisted after controlling for perceived weight, posture, orientation, artistic school, facial age, and artwork date.
- Stimuli depict only White upper-class European women, limiting generalizability to other ethnic, cultural, and socioeconomic groups. - Raters' race/ethnicity, sexual orientation, and relationship status were not recorded, so moderation by these factors could not be tested. - Causal mechanisms cannot be established in this naturalistic design; cue overlap (e.g., clothing style, posture) cannot be fully excluded despite statistical controls.
This study is not directly clinically actionable, but it strengthens the evidence that WHR is a robust perceptual cue to reproductive-stage judgments even in clothed, real-world contexts — relevant for clinicians counseling patients on body image, social perception, and the cultural history of appearance-related behaviors.
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