I was watching a television show recently which was tackling the difficult issue of body image. While their conclusions were the morally commendable ideals of 'being oneself is the best thing, don't succumb to popular images' this doesn't reflect the science. In fact, numerous psychology experiments on beauty has shown us otherwise - particularly in the case of female beauty. There IS a universal, world-wide standard for what is considered beautiful in women (and a broader, but no less enumerated, set for men) - (if you don't believe me, look at my post on January 31st for an elaboration on this point and a link to one of the many places you'll find reputable evidence).
Of course the data may be confounded, due to the fact that we (Americans) are bombarded with images of attractive women daily; women who, despite looking good already, are airbrushed to a perfection that is, quite frankly, insanely un-obtainable. But not everyone who participated in the cross-cultural psychology studies had been exposed to western culture, mass media, or ideals of beauty. And while fads may vary, and moderate differences arise between cultures (there is one memorable ethnic group with a strong liking for incredibly long necks, for example) the answer IS out there: baby features, combined with some trade-mark adult features (high cheek bones, narrow waist-regardless of actual dress size) make a woman both sexy and beautiful. If you are interested in this topic- and also enjoy being scared sh*tless and don't mind hiding your head under the covers with the lights on for a week - I would recommend one of my favorite books, "Survival of the Prettiest," by Nancy Etcoff, a brilliant researcher at Harvard Medical School who uses fMRI to uncover, among other things, the nature of attraction and beauty. There's only so much the data can tell us, but gazing directly into the brain normally doesn't lie. And the news isn't good, even for those few people who can qualify as nearly-perfect.
It is of course important to love yourself and to embrace yourself for who you are. That is one of the very first tenants of Diva-hood, and if you were to take all of the Divas on television and in real life and then distill them down to their very essences I believe that is one of the strongest things you would find. It is impossible to exude the confidence that a true diva channels if you aren't content with yourself to the core.
This doesn't mean that not looking perfect - or that looking TO perfect - isn't going to come back around to bite you. There's a reason why, whenever a recession occurs, the make-up industry is the last luxury goods market hit and one of the first to bounce back, as women (and some men) continue to buy those products until the very end. It just means that confidence can come from places other than looks.
So, sadly, beauty is NOT in the eye of the beholder. The key, however, is to be informed, make it work to the best of your advantage, and to 'be strong and carry on.'
Wednesday, April 27, 2011
Wednesday, February 16, 2011
Sunday, February 13, 2011
To Be a Diva You Need a Hot Pair of Shades
This is merely an observation, but all of the divas I know - and the women/men I have seen walking down the street who look like they could live up to the 'Diva Standard' - seem to be wearing really chunky, sexy sunglasses. Have you noticed this? Apparently, I'm not alone in noticing this trend, because when I typed "Diva Sunglasses" into a Google images search, it came up with 970,000 results. It's like, put on a pair of these sunglasses and BAM, instant Diva. But why?
It is likely the phenomenon occurs because it brings on, simultaneously, the air of the mysterious and that of wealthy glamor. Not any old pair of sunglasses will do. They either need to be very dark, chunky, and large (for women) or large, dark aviators (for men) ... or, for the future, the latest fashion in eyeglass wear. They need to look something like this:
As you can see, these sunglasses have a 'bling' element (in crystals on the side), advertise their origin (I am not pushing for Coach - this was simply the best example that I found on a cursory look. The sunglasses that I am really thinking of belong to a very good friend of mine - the inspiration for this blog, actually - who wears gorgeous Prada sunglasses which make her look like even more of a superstar), and have quite dark lenses. It is this dark lens, I believe, which gives sunglasses their appeal to the Diva, and the Diva aura to the sunglasses.
Dark lenses hide who one really is. Test this if you don't believe me - use your hand to cover the upper half of faces that are somewhat familiar to you in magazines and (no cheating!) try to guess who they are.
All security staff shown in movies seem to know that this is true; that it is much more difficult to recognize someone with the top half of their face covered than with the bottom half covered. This may have to do with greater eye variation/fixation (shape, color, even texture) than mouth variation (although mouths do vary in size, proportion, color, relation to the nose, and so on) or it may simply have to do with creating a disconcerting atmosphere - like the button eyes in Neil Gaiman's Coraline. This oddity in turn would cause us to actually look longer (babies look at novel stimuli longer than something familiar or expected) which is, of course, a big chunk of the reason why a Diva does anything. The fact that starlets like large dark sunglasses for supposedly both these reasons as well certainly doesn't hurt the lay Diva's need for 'sexy' shades.
So the next time you are looking for sunglasses - provided that you have an inner Diva waiting to come out - get yourself a hot, blinged out, dark, chunky pair. And prepare to knowingly watch from behind the safety of your shades as people point and stare.
It is likely the phenomenon occurs because it brings on, simultaneously, the air of the mysterious and that of wealthy glamor. Not any old pair of sunglasses will do. They either need to be very dark, chunky, and large (for women) or large, dark aviators (for men) ... or, for the future, the latest fashion in eyeglass wear. They need to look something like this:
As you can see, these sunglasses have a 'bling' element (in crystals on the side), advertise their origin (I am not pushing for Coach - this was simply the best example that I found on a cursory look. The sunglasses that I am really thinking of belong to a very good friend of mine - the inspiration for this blog, actually - who wears gorgeous Prada sunglasses which make her look like even more of a superstar), and have quite dark lenses. It is this dark lens, I believe, which gives sunglasses their appeal to the Diva, and the Diva aura to the sunglasses.
Dark lenses hide who one really is. Test this if you don't believe me - use your hand to cover the upper half of faces that are somewhat familiar to you in magazines and (no cheating!) try to guess who they are.
All security staff shown in movies seem to know that this is true; that it is much more difficult to recognize someone with the top half of their face covered than with the bottom half covered. This may have to do with greater eye variation/fixation (shape, color, even texture) than mouth variation (although mouths do vary in size, proportion, color, relation to the nose, and so on) or it may simply have to do with creating a disconcerting atmosphere - like the button eyes in Neil Gaiman's Coraline. This oddity in turn would cause us to actually look longer (babies look at novel stimuli longer than something familiar or expected) which is, of course, a big chunk of the reason why a Diva does anything. The fact that starlets like large dark sunglasses for supposedly both these reasons as well certainly doesn't hurt the lay Diva's need for 'sexy' shades.
So the next time you are looking for sunglasses - provided that you have an inner Diva waiting to come out - get yourself a hot, blinged out, dark, chunky pair. And prepare to knowingly watch from behind the safety of your shades as people point and stare.
Thursday, February 3, 2011
You Can't Be a Diva Alone
Being a Diva is not a solitary act. In fact, by its very nature is it social; while there is an innate attitude involved in being a Diva, a true Diva requires an audience to witness all of his or her 'fabulosity.' Without a proper audience, there is no point or reason to being a Diva. Diva-dom thrives on public approval. Thus, the public she shall need!
One common and excellent way to solve this issue is to group two divas together; they can act as audience for each other, and as long as they remember those sharing rules they learned in kindergarten, or are fairly evenly matched in actual (not necessarily imagined) assets, the Diva pair can revel in each other's glory. This creates a bubble which allows each member to act out their impulses without destroying less fabulous - or confident - people's fragile egos. While Diva-dom is more of a lifestyle and is not contained to interacting with just one other person, each Diva who has a second Diva friend (to Diva it up with) will probably have many other non-Diva friends who like them better.
After all, a big chunk of being a Diva is that you get to take center stage. And sometimes us little people like to have a piece of it too.
One common and excellent way to solve this issue is to group two divas together; they can act as audience for each other, and as long as they remember those sharing rules they learned in kindergarten, or are fairly evenly matched in actual (not necessarily imagined) assets, the Diva pair can revel in each other's glory. This creates a bubble which allows each member to act out their impulses without destroying less fabulous - or confident - people's fragile egos. While Diva-dom is more of a lifestyle and is not contained to interacting with just one other person, each Diva who has a second Diva friend (to Diva it up with) will probably have many other non-Diva friends who like them better.
After all, a big chunk of being a Diva is that you get to take center stage. And sometimes us little people like to have a piece of it too.
Monday, January 31, 2011
When You're Cute - Everything's Tiny?
Have you ever noticed that essentially anything miniature is considered 'cute'? Mice are suddenly cute when they make tiny, high-pitched, soft yawns and sneezes in cartoons; in real life, smaller mice are considered less scary and much cuter than the larger rat. This perception only really holds with regard to the expected size of the target; a spider that's the size of a thumb nail is HUGE; one the size of a dot on a page is 'cute' (barring strong arachnophobia). Like so many other things, cuteness is relative when it comes to size invoking the cute reaction. However, what we actually find cute isn't a cultural thing; it's an innate thing. Combined with our natural human tendency to find meaning in anything, it is not surprising that we find 'cute' not just in our offspring, but everywhere.
Cuteness can be found in adults as well as in children. There is strong evidence suggesting that female attractiveness is more or less judged by the same set of 'rules' regardless of culture or background. For the moment, we're going to focus on women because a) based on current research women are just easier to generalize about and b) because not many men are actually 'cute' in the biological sense. The word has simply been misappropriated to mean attractive when used in the male sense, and while this is debatable, after the age of 10 very few boys qualify as being 'cute' by psychological metrics. If they are, then chances are they look very feminine and attempt to mask it any way they can.
When you're cute not everything is tiny - what I mean by this is that you look child-like. As it is biologically adaptive for us to hang around to raise our children, nature gave us our reaction to 'cute' so that we would actually want to stick around. It is not just our culture which is obsessed with youth in women regarding attractiveness; most attractive women actually exhibit child-like physical features, such as large eyes, small noses, smallish, full mouths - even small size. This causes the same knee-jerk reaction we have to cute kids to occur with cute women: you want to protect them. This is often why your average super-model isn't cute (after all, she's huge) while your average petite woman - regardless of actual physical attractiveness - is considered cute. The tinier you physically are, the more likely you are to look cute because people simply can't get over how tiny you are.
So regardless if you're at the top of the height chain or the bottom of the height chain, some baby-ish characteristics make you more attractive, but at the top end you're a 'sexy' model; at the bottom end of the height spectrum you're a pixie. It's the women in between that you've got to watch out for.
Cuteness can be found in adults as well as in children. There is strong evidence suggesting that female attractiveness is more or less judged by the same set of 'rules' regardless of culture or background. For the moment, we're going to focus on women because a) based on current research women are just easier to generalize about and b) because not many men are actually 'cute' in the biological sense. The word has simply been misappropriated to mean attractive when used in the male sense, and while this is debatable, after the age of 10 very few boys qualify as being 'cute' by psychological metrics. If they are, then chances are they look very feminine and attempt to mask it any way they can.
When you're cute not everything is tiny - what I mean by this is that you look child-like. As it is biologically adaptive for us to hang around to raise our children, nature gave us our reaction to 'cute' so that we would actually want to stick around. It is not just our culture which is obsessed with youth in women regarding attractiveness; most attractive women actually exhibit child-like physical features, such as large eyes, small noses, smallish, full mouths - even small size. This causes the same knee-jerk reaction we have to cute kids to occur with cute women: you want to protect them. This is often why your average super-model isn't cute (after all, she's huge) while your average petite woman - regardless of actual physical attractiveness - is considered cute. The tinier you physically are, the more likely you are to look cute because people simply can't get over how tiny you are.
So regardless if you're at the top of the height chain or the bottom of the height chain, some baby-ish characteristics make you more attractive, but at the top end you're a 'sexy' model; at the bottom end of the height spectrum you're a pixie. It's the women in between that you've got to watch out for.
Friday, January 28, 2011
When You're a Diva, You've Got to Turn the Volume UP!!!!
According to the Urban Dictionary, the number one definition of Diva is: "Female version of a hustler." Since I find that definition slightly unsatisfactory, I am going to offer one of my own: 'A Diva is a person (usually of the feminine persuasion) who turns the emotional volume up, in either direction, good or bad, in order to bask in said personal emotion and to make sure everyone in near proximity knows about it.' This may not be the only facet involved in being a Diva, but it is one of the most noticeable ones, and thus we will treat it first.
So then, given that definition, there is a fine, fine line between a 'Diva' and a 'Drama Queen.' What makes the difference? A drama queen blows anything upsetting out of proportion. A true diva, on the other hand, embraces theatrics into her (or occasionally his) self-image, causing everything, regardless of valence (positive or negative) to be worthy of extensive effort, energy, and repetition. When you're a Diva, diva is always spelled with a capital D. The day is Ecssssssstatic, or it completely Suuuuuucccccks. There's very rarely a 'meh;' or if there is, no one ever hears about it. When you're a drama queen, your days have the right to only be 'ok.' But if you get a paper cut, well, then that's Ragnarok and everybody for a several mile radius better duck for cover (although, to be fair, paper cuts really can hurt).
Thus, it would be reasonable to conclude that a Diva, in the common sense, is a person who likes to live life on the emotional edge. This involves heightening the intensity of every moment. One of the easiest ways to tell a Diva is by looking at the volume control in her or his car. Is the music blasting so loudly that people several cars over can hear it, even with all the respected windows closed? Then they're probably a Diva, baby!*
*Audiophiles and people with varying degrees of deafness are not necessarily Divas. Thus, they are the most common exceptions to this heuristic.
So then, given that definition, there is a fine, fine line between a 'Diva' and a 'Drama Queen.' What makes the difference? A drama queen blows anything upsetting out of proportion. A true diva, on the other hand, embraces theatrics into her (or occasionally his) self-image, causing everything, regardless of valence (positive or negative) to be worthy of extensive effort, energy, and repetition. When you're a Diva, diva is always spelled with a capital D. The day is Ecssssssstatic, or it completely Suuuuuucccccks. There's very rarely a 'meh;' or if there is, no one ever hears about it. When you're a drama queen, your days have the right to only be 'ok.' But if you get a paper cut, well, then that's Ragnarok and everybody for a several mile radius better duck for cover (although, to be fair, paper cuts really can hurt).
Thus, it would be reasonable to conclude that a Diva, in the common sense, is a person who likes to live life on the emotional edge. This involves heightening the intensity of every moment. One of the easiest ways to tell a Diva is by looking at the volume control in her or his car. Is the music blasting so loudly that people several cars over can hear it, even with all the respected windows closed? Then they're probably a Diva, baby!*
*Audiophiles and people with varying degrees of deafness are not necessarily Divas. Thus, they are the most common exceptions to this heuristic.
Thursday, January 27, 2011
The Road to Being a Diva - And to Understanding What it Means To Be 'Cute'
WARNING: This is a Forward. I am attempting to explain myself and why I'm blogging about this. You are welcome to ignore it to get directly to the good stuff.
There is power, there is cachet, there is a type of glory that comes with being a Diva. I wouldn't know. I am not a Diva. But I'm learning.
I am a Ph.D. student with certain frustrations. Mostly, not being able to share what I know. And I know what it means to be cute, and what it means to be a Diva, and what I mean when I say they are, moment to moment, mutually exclusive (don't worry, I'll share that thought. Eventually).
My goal here is to mix a guide book on how to be a Diva, a survival guide for how to be 'cute' in a grown-up world (once I figure that out - I will, however, explain what it scientifically means for children, and why it's adaptive, and also why it's such a mixed blessing for adults). I will try my best to explain the Diva craze. You may not find anything brilliant or enlightening here - then again, you may. If I can help you achieve some sort of clarity on something which irritates people everyday, then the reason for this blog will be fulfilled. After all, my brand of research studies extravagance, attraction, and spending. It would be a travesty to keep it from you.
So off we go down the road of being fabulous - any way we look at it. I hope you enjoy the journey.
There is power, there is cachet, there is a type of glory that comes with being a Diva. I wouldn't know. I am not a Diva. But I'm learning.
I am a Ph.D. student with certain frustrations. Mostly, not being able to share what I know. And I know what it means to be cute, and what it means to be a Diva, and what I mean when I say they are, moment to moment, mutually exclusive (don't worry, I'll share that thought. Eventually).
My goal here is to mix a guide book on how to be a Diva, a survival guide for how to be 'cute' in a grown-up world (once I figure that out - I will, however, explain what it scientifically means for children, and why it's adaptive, and also why it's such a mixed blessing for adults). I will try my best to explain the Diva craze. You may not find anything brilliant or enlightening here - then again, you may. If I can help you achieve some sort of clarity on something which irritates people everyday, then the reason for this blog will be fulfilled. After all, my brand of research studies extravagance, attraction, and spending. It would be a travesty to keep it from you.
So off we go down the road of being fabulous - any way we look at it. I hope you enjoy the journey.
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