Formidable Facial Structures Inform Perceptions of Men’s Ability to Protect Offspring

To identify men motivated and able to protect their offspring, selection could have favored perceptual acuity toward morphological features diagnostic of men’s formidability. One route through which formidability inferences emerge is facial width-to-height ratio (fWHR), a facial structure heuristically associated with physical prowess. We conducted four experiments across demographically diverse samples to determine how fWHR informs perceptions of men’s parental abilities and motives. Perceivers ascribed more effectiveness in protecting offspring in high-fWHR men (Study 1). Perceptions of their strength underpinned this ascription (Study 2). Inferences of men’s paternal ability tracked both configural and featural processing (Study 3) and expected motivations for protection (Study 4). Results contribute to a functional perspective of fWHR to understand inferences of the motivational costs and benefits in parenting in men.