Study finds fatter women over 40 look younger
http://www.news.com.au/story/0,27574,25268095-36398,00.html
THINK all that sweating at the gym is making you look younger? Think again.
A new study has found that people aged over 40 look younger when their faces are fatter.
The study, published on the Plastic and reconstructive surgery website compared 186 pairs of identical twins and found that dropping one dress size could age a woman by an average of four years.
Identical twins share all their genes and so any differences in their looks must be determined by lifestyle, rather than DNA.
Rajiv Grover, secretary of the British Association of Aesthetic Plastic Surgeons, told the Daily Mail: "It's not wrinkles and lines that make people look older, it's changes in the shape of the face.
"People have this thing about being thin. It perhaps gives them a slimmer body but they certainly age in the face more quickly."
During the study the body mass index (BMI) of each twin was calculated by dividing their weight by their height. The ideal BMI for an adult is between 18.5 and 25. A BMI of over 30 is classified as obese.
"'The twins were divided into groups based on a four-point BMI difference," Researcher Dr Bahaman Guyuron told the Daily Mail.
"A BMI higher by four points was found to result in a younger appearance of between two and four years in women over 40 years old."
But don’t step off that treadmill just yet – if you are under 40 gaining weight will make you look older.
Suffering from depression also had an ageing effect, as did divorce, smoking, drinking and sunbathing.
