October 23, 2018

Mandom has discovered that the impression of“cleanliness” in young men is closely related totheir skin state
Mandom Corporation (headquarters: Osaka City, President & CEO: Motonobu Nishimura; hereinafter referredto as “Mandom”) has been engaging in research on the impression of the skin to provide skincare products that
improve the impression of one’s appearance.
To date, our research has shown that the “impression of youthfulness” in middle-aged men is affected bybrightness of skin, with skincare improving the skin’s appearance. A viewer’s impression may therefore be affectedby this factor. Interestingly, we found that a viewer uses the cheeks of subjects to give their impression of thesubject’s youthfulness.
In this study, we examined the relationship between facial appearance of a young man and the appearance of
his skin. Of the numerous items that influence one’s impression of another individual’s face, a viewer’s impressionof “cleanliness” was found to closely relate to the appearance of the skin (how good or bad the apparent conditionof the skin is). Aligning with our previous results, viewers were mainly focused on the cheek and forehead than anyof the other facial impression items when they assessed the young man’s “cleanliness”. Among the characteristicsof skin appearance as evaluated by a specialist panel (*1), irregularity in skin, pores and skin color was closely
related to cleanliness. In addition, when these parameters were set to good/bad conditions, the impression of“cleanliness” was significantly higher when the condition of the skin was good than bad.
The results of this research were presented at the 23rd JFACE Annual Conference (Forum Kaogaku 2018) held
between September 1 and 2, 2018.
1. For the impression of a young man’s face, “cleanliness” is closely related to skin state
Photographs of 55 young men (16 to 29 years old) under the same conditions were taken and used to create
facial images where background/hairstyle information was removed. These facial images were then presented to 35
third-person men and women (age, 20+ to 40+) who were asked to evaluate 13 facial impression items(“cleanliness”, “sincere” etc.) and 11 items reflecting skin status (“appears transparent”, “appears smooth” etc.) for
each facial image; this was performed according to the VAS method (*2) to derive a mutual correlation. Among thefacial impression items examined, “cleanliness” was observed to correlate with many of the items for theappearance of skin [Table 1].

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-1-2. Focusing on cheeks and forehead to evaluate “cleanliness”
To elucidate the region of the face that viewers use to evaluate “cleanliness”, we used an eye-tracker (*3) andmeasured the gaze of 20 viewers (men and women; age, 20+ to 40+) who were analyzing 55 facial images of young
men as described above.
For the impression items “sincere” and “seems easy to talk to,” viewers focused on eyes and nose for a shorter
period of time than forehead and cheeks [Figures 1 and 2]. Since cleanliness is closely related to the appearance ofthe skin, we can deduce that viewers determine “cleanliness” by focusing on the cheeks and forehead which areregions where the appearance of an individual’s skin is evident.
3. “Unevenness”, “pores” and “skin color (brightness/irregularity)” are important contributors to theimprovement of the impression of “cleanliness”
To examine the type of characteristics associated with “cleanliness” of skin, a specialist panel (*1) was
employed to perform a visual examination of the skin. We found that the impression score of cleanliness highly
correlated with unevenness, pores and skin color (brightness and irregularity), instead of facial hair and acne [Table2]. Therefore, using the five features, “non-smooth skin”, “uneven skin”, “conspicuous pores”, “brightness of skin”and “irregularity in skin color,” we combined the facial images depicting good and bad skin conditions of young
men to create 10 image patterns (i.e., same face, different skin conditions) for 30 young men [Figure 3]. We thenasked 36 viewers (men and women; age, 20+ to 40+) to give their impression of “cleanliness” using the simulatedimages. Significantly higher scores were obtained for the simulation images with better skin conditions than withbad skin conditions [Figure 4], suggesting that improving the appearance of the skin would improve the impressionof face cleanliness.
Owing to these results, Mandom will continue such studies and will apply all findings to the development ofskincare products to improve people’s impression of young men.
*1 This refers to a panel of five individuals who work in the skincare business and possess a common axis ofevaluation. Skin state as evaluated by this specialist panel is considered the “characteristics of skin appearance.”*2 Visual Analog Scale: A scale drawn on a straight line, with the left end marked “I think so” and the right end
marked “I do not think so”. Upon evaluation, the assessors mark their impression at a point along the straight line.
*3 Eye-tracker: the line-of-sight analyzer Tobii Pro X2-60 (Tobii Technology) was used.
[Reference Material]
Table 1. Correlation coefficient of the facial impression and skin condition item scores as evaluated by thegeneral panel.
Blue cells indicate a correlation coefficient >0.5.
Skin condition

Facial impression

RoughskinTransparent
skin

Skinwithtension

Shiny
skin

Dull
color ofskin

Cleanliness
SincereEasy to talk to-2-Eventexture
skin

Smoothskin

Glossyskin

Dry skin

Conspicuous
pores

ConspicuousacneFigure 1. Examples of the focal regions used to evaluate each impression.
SincereCleanlinessEasy to talk toRegions in red represent the main areas of focus.
Figure 2. Comparison of the time spent on each site during the evaluation of each impression.
Tukey-Kramer method, **: p<0.01; *: p<0.05.

Cleanliness
SincereTime (s)Easy to talk to
Data omitted for other parts

Eyes

Cheek

Nose

Eyebrow

Mouth

Forehead

Table 2. Correlation coefficient for cleanliness score and characteristics of skin appearance score asevaluated by the specialist panel.
Blue cells indicate a correlation coefficient >0.5 (descending order from left).
Characteristics of skin appearance evaluated by a specialist panel
Non-smoothskin

Irregular skincolor

Uneven skin

Brightness ofskin

Conspicuouspores-3-Redness ofskin

Amount ofacne

Conspicuous
razor rash

Yellownessof skin

Figure 3. Examples of simulation images where good/bad conditions of skin were combined using thecharacteristics of skin appearance (examples).
Non-smooth

Pores

Brightness of skin

Irregular color

BadGoodUnevenFigure 4. Comparison of average cleanliness impression score of simulation images.

Cleanliness impression score

For all characteristics, significant differences were found between good and bad skin conditions(t-test, ***: p<0.001).

Skin condition:
Good facial image

Bad facial image

UnevenNon-smooth

Pores

Brightness of skin

Irregular color

End of document.

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