Short or long hair?

kendall916

Long hair for me. I tried super short hair when I was in 6th grade and ended up looking like a character from Scooby Doo. I vowed never to have super short hair again. If I had to cut my hair for some reason (a kindergartener putting chewed gum in my hair) I'd have my hair shoulder length.

Mario_Az

i prefer long hair but short is not bad some women could pull off the short hair look

Natmarie73

Either way doesn't bother me as long as it's cut well, washed and clean.
I have shorter hair right now, slowly growing it out into a short bob. I've had long hair and short shaved hair and I've always had compliments. I think long hair can make some women look older, especially if it is not kept well. Longer hair eventually annoys me to death and I just tie it back all the time.

With men I prefer short and definately NO mullets!!!

kendall916

With men I prefer short and definately NO mullets!!!

Some men can pull off a mullet but I agree I prefer men to have short hair. The longest the hair can grow, in my opinion is a little below the eyebrows. The reason why is because in reality, I'd prefer to see a mans gorgeous eyes! :flowerforyou:

AussieGal73

I like men so hair length is not a priority LOL.. although, bald men are very sexy and I like very short military style too.

On women, I like a bit of length, some women can look gorgeous with short hair. I tried short once and didn't like it on me. I prefer shoulder length ++ hair for myself.

katylil

Woman: LONG HAIR.

Very, very, very few women can pull off short hair. Sorry ladies who think it's "cute"...it's really not. Even if you do look decent with it, I can bet you 99% of the time, you'd look BETTER with long hair.

Truth.

THIS!!!

That's not "truth." It's a stereotypical generalization.

Nope, it's actually scientifically based. We talked about this in our anthropology class at my university, and I wish like heck I still had the notes from that class...

I'm not talking about what YOU think looks best on you, I'm talking about letting an unknown group of men look at two pictures of the same woman with short and longer hair. This is not to say she looks "bad" with short hair, just that she will comparatively look BETTER with longer hair. Evolutionary characteristics ensure that long hair is going to win out. There will be "some" who like it shorter, but the male gender will overwhelmingly choose the longer haired version of the same woman.

In this instance the preference of the men is dictated by societal trends NOT evolutionary benefit. Big hips, big boobs = better mother. THIS is evolutionary. NOT hair length.

Orion782

BOOMshakalaka! Here's the evidence that proves I wasn't just making this up.

http://www.meskonorbert.hu/wp-content/documents/Mesko.et.al.2012.EIIC.pdf

Please read the full study starting on Page 463. Some excerpts:

"Young adult men prefer women
wearing their hair long (11) and they rate blondes more
feminine and attractive than others (12). Hair affects the
perception of faces in different dimensions. As the results of
Bereczkei and Meskó (13) point out, the same female faces
appeared more feminine, intelligent, dominant and healthier
with long hair than with short hair, while female faces with
short hair were perceived as being more reliable, caring and
emotional. Meskó and Bereczkei (14) also studied the effect of
hairstyle on the evaluation of female facial attractiveness. In
contrast with morphological traits, hair can be modified in
relatively simple yet lasting ways. Just like men, women
frequently apply different hairstyles to alter their appearance
and increase their attractiveness in the eyes of potential mates.
While there exists a wide range of diversity, certain hairstyles
have universal characteristics associated with higher mate
value. According to the sexual selection theory, the weight,
length and texture of hair signals the bearer’s physical health."

"Meskó and Bereczkei (14) took portraits of women
(subjects were asked to pull their hair back and fix it with clips,
so the hair was barely visible), evaluated them by male raters
according to attractiveness, than with the help of a computer
program applied six different hairstyles (short, medium-length,
long, disheveled, knot (bun) and unkempt) to each portrait.
Male participants had to rate this stimulus material on scales in
four dimensions of attractiveness (youth, femininity, sexual
attractiveness, health). When analyzing the data, answers
given to the most and the least attractive faces – based on their
„basic face” – were compared. According to the results, only
long and medium-length hair improved significantly the
evaluation of the female subjects’ physical attractiveness, the
other four styles yielded no significant effect on attractiveness."

Orion782

Woman: LONG HAIR.

Very, very, very few women can pull off short hair. Sorry ladies who think it's "cute"...it's really not. Even if you do look decent with it, I can bet you 99% of the time, you'd look BETTER with long hair.

Truth.

That's not "truth." It's a stereotypical generalization.

Nope, it's actually scientifically based. We talked about this in our anthropology class at my university, and I wish like heck I still had the notes from that class...

I'm not talking about what YOU think looks best on you, I'm talking about letting an unknown group of men look at two pictures of the same woman with short and longer hair. This is not to say she looks "bad" with short hair, just that she will comparatively look BETTER with longer hair. Evolutionary characteristics ensure that long hair is going to win out. There will be "some" who like it shorter, but the male gender will overwhelmingly choose the longer haired version of the same woman.

In this instance the preference of the men is dictated by societal trends NOT evolutionary benefit. Big hips, big boobs = better mother. THIS is evolutionary. NOT hair length.

Incorrect, my dear. http://www.meskonorbert.hu/wp-content/documents/Mesko.et.al.2012.EIIC.pdf

Our results show that long hairstyle has a significant
effect on the evaluation of female attractiveness. Our findings,
to be discussed from an evolutionary perspective, are the
following:
1. More attractive female faces are characterized by widerset
eyes, smaller chin and more pronounced cheekbone
regions than less attractive ones. We associate these facial
features by a characteristic configuration of the cues of
youth (neoteny) and of maturity (estrogen markers).
2. Hairstyle influences facial attractiveness to an important
measure. Long hairstyle significantly affected male
participants in their ratings of female physical appearance.
In both groups and in various dimensions, long hair lead
to higher evaluations of facial attractiveness than did tiedback
hair that reveals the biologically given facial
features.
3. Long, loosely worn hair was associated with a higher
overall increase in attractiveness in the case of those faces
that were rated as less attractive in the previous study.

Our results indicate that long hair has a significant effect
on the perceived attractiveness of the female face in the
different dimensions of beauty, but this effect does not seem to
be „universal”: it is partially different for the more attractive
than for the less attractive faces. As a result of the long hair,
for the less attractive faces the levels of perceived sexiness,
femininity and health were enhanced, with the level of
maturity remaining unchanged. For the more attractive faces it
was the level of sexiness that remained stable, perceived
femininity increased, but both perceived maturity and
perceived health showed a decrease.

Grammer et al. (23) speculated that
the general function of head hair (along with pubic hair and
the hair in the armpit) is to contain and distribute the
pheromones produced in the apocrine glands. According to
this theory, long female hair is attractive to men because it
provides a larger surface for this distribution, thus it is
associated with the optimal level of female sexual
pheromones.
The primary aim of our study was to investigate the
connections between female attractiveness and hairstyle from
an evolutionary perspective; we did not focus on the cultural
and historical context.

sillygoosie

TL;DR

I assume it has something to do with not being able to drag a short haired woman back to the cave. Either way, I still don't care what men (or women) prefer.

BusyRaeNOTBusty

Woman: LONG HAIR.

Very, very, very few women can pull off short hair. Sorry ladies who think it's "cute"...it's really not. Even if you do look decent with it, I can bet you 99% of the time, you'd look BETTER with long hair.

Truth.

That's not "truth." It's a stereotypical generalization.

Nope, it's actually scientifically based. We talked about this in our anthropology class at my university, and I wish like heck I still had the notes from that class...

I'm not talking about what YOU think looks best on you, I'm talking about letting an unknown group of men look at two pictures of the same woman with short and longer hair. This is not to say she looks "bad" with short hair, just that she will comparatively look BETTER with longer hair. Evolutionary characteristics ensure that long hair is going to win out. There will be "some" who like it shorter, but the male gender will overwhelmingly choose the longer haired version of the same woman.

In this instance the preference of the men is dictated by societal trends NOT evolutionary benefit. Big hips, big boobs = better mother. THIS is evolutionary. NOT hair length.

Incorrect, my dear. http://www.meskonorbert.hu/wp-content/documents/Mesko.et.al.2012.EIIC.pdf

Our results show that long hairstyle has a significant
effect on the evaluation of female attractiveness. Our findings,
to be discussed from an evolutionary perspective, are the
following:
1. More attractive female faces are characterized by widerset
eyes, smaller chin and more pronounced cheekbone
regions than less attractive ones. We associate these facial
features by a characteristic configuration of the cues of
youth (neoteny) and of maturity (estrogen markers).
2. Hairstyle influences facial attractiveness to an important
measure. Long hairstyle significantly affected male
participants in their ratings of female physical appearance.
In both groups and in various dimensions, long hair lead
to higher evaluations of facial attractiveness than did tiedback
hair that reveals the biologically given facial
features.
3. Long, loosely worn hair was associated with a higher
overall increase in attractiveness in the case of those faces
that were rated as less attractive in the previous study.

Our results indicate that long hair has a significant effect
on the perceived attractiveness of the female face in the
different dimensions of beauty, but this effect does not seem to
be „universal”: it is partially different for the more attractive
than for the less attractive faces. As a result of the long hair,
for the less attractive faces the levels of perceived sexiness,
femininity and health were enhanced, with the level of
maturity remaining unchanged. For the more attractive faces it
was the level of sexiness that remained stable, perceived
femininity increased, but both perceived maturity and
perceived health showed a decrease.

Grammer et al. (23) speculated that
the general function of head hair (along with pubic hair and
the hair in the armpit) is to contain and distribute the
pheromones produced in the apocrine glands. According to
this theory, long female hair is attractive to men because it
provides a larger surface for this distribution, thus it is
associated with the optimal level of female sexual
pheromones.
The primary aim of our study was to investigate the
connections between female attractiveness and hairstyle from
an evolutionary perspective; we did not focus on the cultural
and historical context.

So why isn't long hair on men better from an evolutionary perspective? Don't they need to distribute pheromones as well? In the past long hair WAS preferred on men? What changed? We shower too much and use artificial scents. I doubt pheromones have any effect for men or women.

And still, I don't particularly care what most men find attractive.

ummlovelovesyou

I have an afro...always will.

Neither short or long...just a ball of massive fluff. :embarassed:

BootCampC

should I just get a crew cut or keep what I have for now?

bkw99508

I used to wear my hair fairly short when I was younger. When I met my husband I had longish hair and since he prefers it longer....and I really don't mind...I keep it long.

As for my preference on a man, the best answer is "it depends on the man". There are men who are sexy beasts when they are bald. Then there are the shaggy haired men who have that boyish charm. The take-charge kind of guy with well groomed shorter hair.

The only style of hair I do not like is the greased backed slick type.

NextPage

I like long to medium hair length on men - never got that whole "Fabio" thing. On women I love long hair unless it is long "looking like a horse's mane security blanket shaggy". In my next life I want to have shoulder lengthen black thick shiny hair. Myself I have short hair and everyone, including folks who generally prefer long hair, have said I look better with short hair. Wash and finger dry hair is certainly handy for getting out of the house quick.

CJ_Holmes

< going through a crisis over hair so this is interesting reading.

I spent my life in long curly hair, until I got to 40 and I believed that women over 40 shouldn't have long hair, its just looks ...... well "child like", IN MY OPINION, like they are hankering for a youth thats gone (IMO) so I got it cut.. SHORT, very short, the type of short that takes 5 mins in the gym ... easy

The response..everyone loves the short hair, expect my best friend of 30 years, a good friend of 15 years and my Mum.

And now 90% of this thread say long a woman... I'll ask the people who said that, does it matter on age ? Or should I just grow my curls back *slump*

Eh, people have trouble thinking creatively and tend to stick with sterotypical gender trappings. If you're trying to be appealing to the widest range of men possible on the internet, then grow your hair, otherwise rock what you like! I also have curls, and I think I generally look better with short hair. I get daily compliments and a lot of attention with this cut. Probably cause I feel like a badass and I strut. You have to own it!

lmhbuss

I was raised in a household where women were not permitted to cut their hair (my parents did allow monthly trims which they performed to get rid of split-ends). When I graduated highschool my blond hair was almost to my knees. The hair itself was beautiful....but it looked like shiz on ME. Since my hair is a decoration of ME, as soon as I got to college I made the boldly rebellious decision to cut it all the way up to my waist. My mother cried. A few months later I cut it all the way up to my chin. I look better with shorter hair. The hair itself stops being the focus of my appearance and people can actually seee ME. Plus, when your hair is past your *kitten* you are constantly sitting on it, shutting it in car doors, etc. It's a pain.

T_Roc

both

ashandstuff

Don't even talk to me unless you have this hair cut.

TheRoadDog

I've been bald for so long (40 Years), I can't picture myself any other way. I don't care how other men groom themselves, but, as for women, I love long hair. Hard to pull short hair during sex.

IrishHarpy1

Long hair has no expiration date

THANK you!!! I'm pretty tired of people telling me that I'm not "acting my age" because I'm 45 and have long hair. Really? And no, I'm not "hanging on to my lost youth" -- quite frankly, I look HIDEOUS with short hair. I also like the versatility of ponytails/braids/updos/etc. and you just can't do that with hair that's too short.