Today, young people who watch television, surf the Internet or visit public places such as shopping malls, outlets and squares are constantly exposed to posters, photos or videos featuring people with seemingly perfect faces, bodies and complexions. Young children and even toddlers and babies are exposed to cartoon characters with pretty symmetrical faces, beautiful albeit disproportionate, humanly impossible bodies, voluptuous curves, and extremely thin waists. Images of beauty abound in our society, parents must not only recognize that images are everywhere and explain to their children the importance of physical appearance in our society. Even though parents want to avoid appearing superficial and prefer to live in an ideal world, where physical appearance is not a primary factory for judging others, the truth is that human beings seem programmed to prefer beauty. This was demonstrated in a study in which babies just a few days old could clearly distinguish what was attractive from what was not. "Psychologist Alan Slater of the University of Exeter showed images judged by adults to be more or less attractive to babies aged an average of 2 1/2 days and found that babies invariably looked longer at faces than adults had rated it more attractive Babies are born with an eye for beauty Infants just a few hours old will choose to look at an attractive face rather than an unattractive one” (Parker). importance of appearance, and parents might as well bring the topic up for discussion so that children can understand the information about appearance with a caring adult and not have to figure it all out on their own. same For example... middle of paper ...... need to be there for their children, be positive and be the first person their child would want to go to if they need advice or help. help so that his The child would not fall into the wrong hands and would not see his mental self enslaved to the norms of society to simply “fit in”. Works Cited Deans, Emily, MD. “Evolutionary Psychiatry.” Psychology Today. December 11, 2011. Web. April 11, 2014. Parker, Randall. “Babies prefer to look at beautiful faces.” FuturePundit.Biological Mind, September 7, 2004. Web. April 21, 2014.Peters, Ruth A., Ph.D. "Teaching Children What It Really Means to Be Attractive" Today, July 9, 2007. Web. April 13, 2014. Thompson, Derek. “The financial benefits of being beautiful.” The Atlantic.Atlantic Media Company, January 11, 2014. Web. April 13, 2014. Tucker, Abigail. “How much is attractive worth?” » Smithsonian. Smithsonian Magazine, November 2012. Web. April 13. 2014.