Sweatpants, hair tied, chilling with no makeup on...

Rihanna sans MAC - still pretty!

Sweatpants, hair tied, chilling with no makeup on // that's when you're the prettiest, I hope that you don't take it wrong... -Drake

On the regular I do not wear makeup. I think it looks great on other people, but it's rare for me to find something that I think looks good on me. You see that profile pic over there, sans makeup. The most I usually do is a lipgloss, MAC or Arbonne please, but even that is rare. So, yesterday when I read this article on CNN.com stating, Makeup Makes Women Appear More Competent, I paused.

In a study scholars from Harvard and Boston University took 25 female subjects, aged 20 to 50 that were white, Black and Latino and photographed them barefaced and in three looks that researchers dubbed “natural, professional and glamorous”. One hundred forty-nine adults (including 61 men) judged the pictures for 250 milliseconds each, enough time to make a snap judgment. Then 119 different adults (including 30 men) were given unlimited time to look at the same faces. The participants judged women made up in varying intensities of luminance contrast (i.e. how much eyes and lips stand out compared with skin) as more competent than women without makeup on, whether they had a quick glance or a longer inspection.

What in the Max Factor Hell! So now not only do I need to be smart as a whip and dressed to the nines, but now I need to get all made up, too to appear like I know what I'm doing? I'm no stranger to the phenomenon of attractive people getting certain perks in life and certain positive perceptions that may or may not be true, but now it's not just natural beauty, but manufactured beauty as well?

Personally, I like makeup...on other people. I don't like the idea that I could get my face all over my pretty white blouse or the fact that I'd have to reapply lipstick a million times a day because I snack at my desk. I buy loads of lipsticks and glosses because they are pretty, but their prettiness is usually relegated to the tube. And when I do deem it a situation worthy of me getting my fancy face on I usually choose the lipstick that most closely resembles the shade of my own lips. Does that make me any less competent, I don't thinks so.

Also, like Drake says my man prefers me fresh faced and natural. In fact I don't know a man that likes kissing a made up woman, there is lipstick on him that should be on you and usually he feels like he's just going to mess up your face. Guys also feel that with a woman without makeup he knows what he's getting, he's not going to have you spend the night and in the morning feel like he's looking at a different woman. Now that doesn't mean men aren't attracted to women who wear makeup, I just know that they're holding their breath for what they hope to see under it all.

What do you think about this study and are you a fresh faced beauty or a glossed up cutie?

Tmw. I'll be back with my If it Ain't White Series.  If you've missed it you can catch up here....