Lipstick Therapy

Here’s a question that you might not have asked yourself. Then again, if you are a woman and want to improve your academic performance, you might very well have asked yourself what it takes to gain an edge on your next test.

Now, serious researchers, who apparently had run out of subjects, have studied the effect that cosmetics have on a woman’s academic performance. To my knowledge they have not studied the effects that cosmetics might have on men’s academic performance.

The next is: a woman who wears makeup to her exam will score much higher than did those women who did not. One notes that when a woman is taking a test, she will assume that the other test takers will not be focusing on her appearance. 

The Daily Mail reports:

  

Women have long known how that extra flick of eyeliner or dash of lipstick can boost their confidence.

And now, it seems, it’s also more likely to help them pass exams.

Research shows that women who put on make-up before taking a test achieved ten to 20 per cent higher marks than those who did not wear any.

Psychologists say the result could be down to the ‘lipstick effect’, whereby using make-up boosts self-esteem and has a knock-on effect on memory, confidence and mental ability.

Naturally, you are normally skeptical about the stories you read in the Daily Mail. I understand. And yet, this report comes to us from the Harvard Medical School and from an Italian University, so it can’t be all wrong:

The researchers, from Harvard Medical School and Chieti University in Italy, said: ‘Women may use make-up to increase self-esteem by boosting their attractiveness; this makes them feel better during stress. Positive emotions increase information accessible in memory.’

A woman who is feeling stressed should put on some lipstick or maybe even a little eye liner. It will boost self-esteem, produce more positive emotion and allow her memory and rational faculties to function more effectively. 

Who knew?