Cross-ethnic comparison of the effect of garment color on male perception of female attractiveness

Abstract

The present study investigated whether the clothing color of female stimuli and the perceived attractiveness judgments of Caucasian and Chinese male observers for own- and other-ethnicity are correlated. Results indicate that Caucasian observers evaluated stimuli in white and black as the most attractive while giving low ratings for stimuli in orange, yellow, or lime. Results for the Chinese observers were found to depend on the stimulus type, whereby the Caucasian stimulus received significantly lower ratings when dressed in lime, and the Chinese stimulus was rated as the least attractive when in lime, orange, green, or cyan. White was found to have a positive effect on Chinese observers' ratings for both stimuli. A comparison of the general versus the facial attractiveness lends some evidence that red enhanced Caucasian observers' attraction to the Chinese stimulus while findings fail to support the general red-effect. We propose a potential mechanism underlying the color-attraction associations.