When posing for photos, we’re all guilty of aiming to get our “good side” in the shot. It’s a totally normal mind-set to believe that one side of our face looks more flattering than the other, especially when it comes to selfies. No, we’re not paranoid about this because it turns out that science actually has our back on the whole stigma.
A study conducted by Annukka Lindell of La Trobe University in Melbourne suggests that we all do in fact have a “good” side. How so? Well, Annukka did as many of us do in our free time and went through a photo deep dive, scouring more than 2,000 posts on Instagram—not that we’ve gone that far down the hole. It turns out that we selfie-snapping human beings are huge fans of our left side, with 41% of people in favor of their left cheek. In comparison, 31.5% prefer the right side, 19.5% pose straight forward and 8% don’t have a preference.
If you’re wondering why the left side of our face gets more love than the right side, it’s because the left is more emotionally expressive. According to the research, people opt to pose on their left side when expressing emotion and on their right when they’d like to conceal emotion. It’s certainly interesting and a relief to know that we’re not neurotic and our photo habits are somewhat normal after all.
