Want to size up an opponent? Take a look at the width of his face. The wider it is, the better chance of him kicking your ass.
This unusual tidbit comes courtesy of a study in Aggressive Behaviour, which we swear is a real journal. Researchers evaluated 241 UFC fighters, looking at their face width and record. They found that having a wider face was correlated with more wins and lasting longer in the heptagon; this remained true despite race and body size.
Researchers then had people with know knowledge of UFC look at composite images of experienced and inexperienced fighters. The composites were created by averaging the faces of twelve fighters in each citatory. Subjects consistently rated the experienced fighters as the dangerous ones; remember, these people didn’t actually know that this was a composite image of experienced fighters. Next, subjects rated thin versus wide-faced fighters, and sure enough, the wide faces were rated as more dangerous.
Hopefully, this means nothing in your day to day life, but it’s worth noting that scientists think that wider-faced people may be more aggressive. Couple that with the fact that smiling fighters are more likely to lose, it seems like beefy and neutral is the way to play it.
