So I came across this study which concludes that researchers were able to find morphological differences between the faces of gay males and the faces of heterosexual males. Now, many people in the comments section were immediately calling this study out: "bullshit", "there's no way to tell" ect. Nonetheless, the scientific method seems to be sound. There has been morphological differences in the gay male brain found, of which are similar to structures found in the opposite sex. So it's not entirely unreasonable to conclude that gay male faces may, when compiled together, have slightly different morphology. Here's a link to the article on the study: Could your face shape betray if you are gay or straight? | Mail Online There are several different morphological differences: the faces of gay men seem to be more compressed, aka. there's less distance between the eyes and the mouth. There's also more distance between the mouth and the chin, and gay men have a smaller nose. Gay men tend to have a rounder face with a strong round chin, while straight men tend to have a more oblong face with more feminine features and a weaker chin. Gay male faces tend to be more masculine, while straight male faces tend to be more feminine. Anyway, I'm just wondering what your thoughts are on this study. Is this complete bullpoo, or do you believe that if homosexuality is biological that therefore some biological differences in morphology might be valid? I myself am skeptical: after reading this I found mugshots of a bunch of people I know to be gay, and obviously, every trait wasn't universally true. Many gay faces had the exact opposite of what was described here. I myself have a couple of the traits, though not all of them (longer face, weak jawline but smaller nose). How many traits listed do you have? How many are similar to apparent heterosexual faces? though, maybe(?) good news, this guy who I suspect has a big crush on me, according to this study, has a super gay face! hurrah, maybe. but that's also pretty creepy of me. Anyway, discuss! Edit: participants in this study were strongly either heterosexual or homosexual. there weren't any bisexuals,
I can say I match some of these. Except the small nose part. I have a big nose, same as my mom's. Also, I hear that gay men tend to have bigger ears. I myself have big ears.
That is really interesting. I am honestly not sure about my nose size, but I do have larger ears. So that may be a sign
None of those attributes are applicable to my overall features, but apparently the study entirely is not applicable to me. The first reason that caused me to doubt the validity of these study is that it didn't seem very objective to begin with. The first statement of that segment certainly does not 'debunk' the ideal of there being a greater level of femininity amongst homosexuals compared to heterosexuals. The stereotype of femininity about homosexuals has nothing to do with facial structure and everything to do with expression and demeanor. Making that deduction was far to much of a leap to believe that the conductors were completely objective in what they sought to find out of this survey. Regardless of the validity of the survey, the underlining philosophy about what the findings are meant to say are entirely inaccurate. The idea of homosexuals sharing some similar physical attributes wouldn't necessarily be the farthest fetched idea considering that scientist are beginning to find evidence of the fact that homosexuality is likely a genetic variation that is possibly hereditary; however, you can't compare homosexuals genetic attributes alongside heterosexual genetic attributes in equal parts because heterosexuals are the overwhelming majority. For instance, if I wanted to compare the physical attributes of humans with brown eyes vs. green eyes, I would need to analyze the attributes of nine brown-eyed individuals for every one blue-eyed individual I attempt to compare them to since 90% of humans have brown eyes. You cannot compare equal pools when analyzing genetics because breeding always leads to dominance and rarities among traits; never equality. Many in the small pool of blue-eyed people are going to physical commonalities because they derive from a genetically variant minority. Though in the massive pool of brown-eyed humans, we will see nothing but diversity with the Latin, African, Asian, Indian, etc, ethnicities. Similar to brown eyes, the genetic pool that heterosexuals fall into is simply to massive to discover physical commonalities. Psychological or neurological connections, possibly. Structural or physical connections, absolutely not.
Eh, I'm going to join in on calling the conclusions drawn from that 'study' complete bullshit. For the record, none of those 'gay' characteristics apply to me, in fact I'm the opposite. A 'study' that included comparing only 40 Czech gay men and 40 Czech straight men really doesn't seem like a sound foundation for drawing any meaningful conclusions, there's a massive margin of error there.
It's a fairly small sample from a limited ethnic background, so I wouldn't put too much stock in the specific differences described. That said, I think its fairly well established that people can guess with better-than-chance accuracy what a person's sexual orientation is based on their face alone - or even using only particular facial features. If those findings are correct, then there must be some visible morphological differences. (And of course, all of this just refers to averages across populations. There will always be abundant counter-examples, and no one is going to be able to make a foolproof sexual orientation test based on facial structure.)
It was definitely convenience sampling white college students -- not sure that fully destroys the studies validity! Huh? The purpose of the study wasn't to debunk any myths. Along the way they came to the surprising conclusion that gay men tend to have more masculinized faces. That's it. ... No? Majority makes no difference. All the study was stating was that gay men tend to have X specific facial traits while heterosexual men tend to have X facial traits. The real life population percentages have no effect on this finding. Researchers will control for race (and therefore, in some sense, eye colour). And again, population percentages have no effect on findings that may indicate people with different eye colours have different morphological traits, if that was a study. The study, technically, can only be considered valid for Caucasian hetero and homosexual males. The worst part of the study is that it's a small convenience Czech study. A larger sample as well as recruiting Caucasian male homo/heterosexuals from around the world may have resulted in more accurate results.
The first reason wasn't pointed towards the first quote that I presented, rather the second. In the exact words of the article in reference: Population ratios will always have an effect in genetic study. There is no way to analyze a genetic pool without putting the found data in perspective based on the concentration or diffusion of genetic commonalities in the area that is being studied. The consensus of a study is to gather information from a controlled group in hopes that the findings would be applicable to a much greater population respectively. I'm not understanding how one would think that a study that is attempting to speak on supposed "real-world" genetic commonalities would not need to properly proportion itself in accordance with "real-world" populations. Something must have been missed from the explanation of my example. You absolutely cannot claim that there are inherent structural, genetic commonalities in humans who have brown eyes because brown eyes comprise 90% of the human population with the mere exception of iris pigment. The gene pool, especially after millennia of breeding, is far too vast and diverse. Heterosexuality is no different. You can find genetic commonalities between those with blue eyes, green eyes, and a number of other members of a genetically variant group in areas other than iris pigment, because they comprise only a small section of the species population and share common ancestry; ancestry whom could have given them common traits in other areas (Hair, Nose, Ears, Skin, etc). Not to mention, many of those traits are recessive and therefore require a greater concentration in a gene pool to survive. We do not know enough about the genetics behind sexuality to deduct the presence of possible physical, genetic commonalities. It is possible, in the case that variant sexualities originated from similar ancient ancestors; however, attempting to present the idea that heterosexuals have a tendency to specific genetic attributes is entirely nonsensical, as the gene pool that has evolved since creation is astronomical.
I still don't think the researchers were extending this to anything outside of facial morphology. The myth, as discussed earlier in the article, was that gay men likely had more feminine faces! They weren't talking about behaviours ect. Homosexuality is arguably not solely genetic (epi-genetics and prenatal hormones have been implicated). Facial morphology is also subject to non-genetic influences. The study was (crudely) controlled for. As I stated, this study *technically* can only be applied to young gay and heterosexual males of Czech background. Finally, the genetic pool was *not* analyzed. Facial morphology was -- which is, yes, genetically influenced. But for the most part, genes were controlled for *imperfectly* as everything is in a scientific experiment (heterosexual caucasian Czech males were used). Yes, there is indeed error. In terms of population, I meant the proportion (perhaps more specifically, the ratio) of homosexuality to heterosexuality in the "real-world" (sorry for using such a non-scientific term on a forum -- clearly needs to be quoted due to it's obvious erroneousness) population likely has no influence on the results of this study. There are enough gay people in the world, as well as heterosexual, of enough backgrounds to have vast and incalculable variations in their genetic code. Again, genetics aren't the sole influence on human morphology. Furthermore, larger, controlled random samplings will further tend to mitigate the effects of the randomness of genes on this study. They controlled for race, country of origin (and therefore, likely to some degree ancestry), sex, age and sexual orientation. If there are hormonal differences or epigenetic differences in straight people vs gay people, it's perfectly possible that there might be, on a whole, some slight variation in facial morphology. They might be specific to this group, they might not be. Yes, you're right, you can't necessarily extend it the conclusions entire freakin' human population. And yes, it's perfectly possible they just so happened to recruit a bunch of gay people with similar genetic backgrounds and a bunch of straight people with different, similar genetic backgrounds which could explain the difference. More studies needed -- if this can be replicated, it would give the study more validity, I agree! I've seen studies on morphologies (not of this specific nature), and I have never ever seen anything more than some simple controls. There has never been deep comparisons to the varying genes of each individual. Obviously genes are a massive factor -- and they may indeed explain why the conclusions of this study cannot be applied to every human being. Everyone is different. But, according this study, which I agree is anything but fantastic science which I myself do not give my full creed, on a "larger" scale there are indeed some observable morphological changes in the facial shape of gay caucasian young (presumably non-smoking, had a healthy childhood, no health problems or diseases, whatever else you can think of ect) Czech men. ---------- Post added 2nd Mar 2014 at 12:12 AM ---------- -.- this really wasn't supposed to boil down to one of these picky overly long scientific debates, only casual discussion!
Oh, I certainly do not disagree that the genetic pool was 'not analyzed', as that is the very reason why the statements that are being made in regards to the findings of this study are incorrect. It doesn't matter who this survey "technically" can only be applied to; the consensus that it is being asserted by this article as a result of this study is incorrect regardless. It does not take much knowledge of genealogy to see the flaw in the way this study was carried about and what this article is attempting to have readers believe as a result of it. The analysis of facial morphology and the use of the information as to make assumptions on the morphology of other organisms of that species is to analyze that species genealogy. I genuinely have no idea how I could further break that down. This entire statement is completely contradictory to the points that are made in this thread. The origins of homosexuality or morphology aside from genetics are irrelevant to the consensus of the study. The premise of this study is that there is a biological connection between sexuality and morphology. The only way that those two entities could have been birthed in connection with each other genetics. Outside sources could cause one to be homosexual and have certain physical characteristics, but the only way they could have formed in connection with each other, in theory, is through a genealogical predisposition, which is the theory that this study is advocated. This, however, is a scientifically illogical theory as I have previously explained. Despite the fact that this article was tossing out widespread generalizations like candy, which is again contradictory to how applicable even you yourself have admitted this information to be on a larger scale, the only way that that hormonal and morphology commonalities exist is through genetic predisposition. Outside sources can effect the mind and body, but those are not features that are going to remain constant in a genetic community in the long run. Nevertheless, I am in no more of a mood to continue discussing genealogy and science at this point. At the end of the day, its fine if you wish to believe the premise that this study was intending to prove, but the evidence it is attempting to present simply does not have scientific standing. There "could" be connections, but those connections were not proven, nor even relatively supported through the findings of this study. Sure, possibilities are endless; however, my point in my original post was to explain why I wouldn't expect the findings of this study to have credibility in the rest scientific community.
