Official: Stubble Is More Attractive
I think I look best with 3-5 days growth, and obviously the number of days will vary between men due to growth rates, and also how it matches their face. The key takeaway here is probably that women think men with beards make better fathers, and that heavy stubble suggests virility. I think it would be a different story if they only asked women, and only regarding a one-night stand. I think clean-shaven would win that one.
Here’s the article via Science:
Men may now think twice about reaching for a razor. A new study shows that facial hair says a lot about a man and that attractiveness peaks at the “heavy stubble” phase. Researchers photographed 10 men at four stages of beard growth: clean shaven, 5-day “light” stubble, 10-day “heavy” stubble (shown), and fully bearded. Three hundred and fifty-one women and 177 heterosexual men viewed the photos and rated each face for attractiveness, masculinity, health, and parenting ability. Women ranked heavily stubbled faces as the most attractive. Participants said that the clean-shaven men looked about as healthy and attractive as those with a full beard, but rated the bearded men higher for perceived parenting skills. Light stubble got the short end of the stick, garnering low scores across the board from both men and women. The 5-day growth may be too patchy, the researchers write in the May issue of Evolution and Human Behavior, which suggests “a threshold of density and distribution may be necessary for beards to function as an attractive signal.” Stubble conveys maturity and manliness, they write, with less of the macho aggressiveness implied by a full beard.