Never bring a mustache to a beard fight…
Like freshman Kaylob Tatsch, more and more students are growing out their facial hair. What are the advantages? One recent study says it’s all about dominance.
April 13, 2015
When you think of a dominate man you may think of a really built, muscular man. Maybe with some huge arms and a beard. That’s right a beard! Guys with beards are becoming trendier. You can thank the gorgeous men like David Beckham and Ryan Gosling for making short beards look good and the entire family of Duck Dynasty for bringing the mountain man beard to the streets.
You might be wondering how facial hair makes a man more dominant. Researchers have concluded that men are growing beards to appear more attractive to women and more dominant to other men through a study on monkeys. Yep you read that right, monkeys.
At the University of Western Australia researchers showed that the more competition a monkey has to deal with the more elaborate their features become. This might include elongated noses in proboscis monkeys, cheek flange in orangutans, white/silver hair in hamadryas baboons, and (you guessed it) beards on humans.
It seems that men in larger social groups flaunt more conspicuous ornaments (meaning they want to stand out more) than males in small groups. To back up their theory, researchers started to look back in time to find when beards and moustaches were as popular as the ones today. Between 1842 and 1971 British men were flaunting outrages beards and moustaches. It was because during this time there were a lot more men competing to attract a girl and marry her.
But have no fear! For the women who don’t like the big bearded face, like all the great trends in 2015, this too shall pass. Long live the razor burn!
“You definitely feel you have a higher standard.”- Jarryd Kissel
Is history just simply repeating itself? Here at Bellwood plenty of students and teachers are expressing themselves through beards and mustaches. You see the gambit of facial hair expression, from Mr. Webreck’s billowing beard to the more subtle stuble sported by Randy Zitterbart.
“I feel like I’m more of a man because I can grow facial hair. I don’t mean to sound mean but…” said freshman Jack Showalter
