Figure 1(a): Example of a morph (not used in the study) of two well-known faces (George W. Bush and Barack Obama)
Several composite images of "average" faces from different countries, morphed together from hundreds of photos, have recently made the rounds on the internet. Despite being "average", these faces overall are quite attractive, a phenomenon that is well known in psychology. However, what happens when you morph together recognizable faces instead of just your average Joe? Are the resulting faces still more attractive? Here, the researchers tested whether morphed celebrity faces are more or less attractive when compared to less recognizable face morphs. To be able to use the same sets of faces, they combined together faces of celebrities only famous in the Netherlands or New Zealand, and then showed the morphs to participants in each country. They found that when the two faces are independently recognizable (e.g., two Dutch ...
