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To tattoo or not tattoo: Testing the limits of beauty in body art

German survey respondents rated images of tattooed models as less beautiful than images of the same models with no tattoos. However, younger people, tattoo artists and those with body art tolerated more ink, according to a study published in the open-access journal PLOS ONE on December 11, 2024 by Selina M. Weiler and colleagues from Helmut Schmidt University/University of the Federal Armed Forces Hamburg, Germany.

Tattoos are a millennia-old practice estimated to adorn up to one in four people in the world today. The 1950s saw a resurgence of this once-marginalized medium in Western culture, with widespread acceptance blossoming into the 1990s. Though scientists have inquired after body art's impact on perceived personality traits, the relationship between tattoos and perceived beauty is unclear.

Weiler and colleagues recruited 487 German adults to rate images of two models with various degrees of temporary tattoo coverage: baseline (no coverage), light, moderate, heavy, extreme and extreme+facial. The tattoos followed natural, geometric and animal-inspired designs and did not include writing, religious or political text. Participants rated the perceived beauty of each image using a 7-point Likert scale.

The images with no tattoos were the highest rated overall, while images with facial art were the lowest rated.

Weiler and colleagues examined three characteristics among the participants: age (used as a proxy for social norms around tattoos), existing tattoos and tattooing expertise (i.e., at least seven years of experience as a professional tattoo artist). Their observations included:

• Respondents younger than 50 rated the extreme images as more beautiful than did older respondents.
• Tattooed participants chose higher beauty ratings for more tattooed models.
• Experts rated images with heavy, extreme, and extreme+facial tattoos higher than did nonexperts.

Facial tattoos received the least positive reception overall—even among the experts, who ranked the extreme coverage option highest as a group.

According to the researchers, these results may suggest that tattoos' modern cultural acceptance has propelled the art form beyond "the height of [its] fascination." Future research may delineate more than two age categories, capture a more complete spectrum of tattoo designs and explore the possible influence of factors like sexual orientation.

The authors add, "The extent of tattoo coverage alters aesthetic appreciation of human stimuli, with responses varying by social norms, tattoo status, and expertise."