Comparison of Facial Profile Preference between Male and Female Laypersons

Background: The face is a key to human physical attractiveness. Facial attractiveness is a main motive for encouraging patients to seek oral care. Orthodontic treatment can influence facial aesthetics in many ways, such as by providing well-aligned teeth, an attractive smile, and a pleasing facial profile. Purpose: The purpose of this study was to compare preferred facial profiles of subjects with bimaxillary protrusion produced by a 3-D facial light scanner between male and female laypersons. Materials and Methods: Lateral cephalograms and digital 3-D facial images were recorded for 40 Thai subjects aged 17-39 years with skeletal Class I or mild skeletal Class II jaw relationships, bimaxillary dental protrusion, and no previous orthodontic treatment. The 3-D images were modified to retrocline the maxillary central incisors 30° and retrude them 3 mm. The 3-D images were captured at 0%, 25%, 50%, 75%, and 100% of profile change. The mandibular central incisors were correspondingly retroclined and retruded in harmony with the maxillary central incisors by maintaining normal overjet and overbite. Twenty-one male and 24 female laypersons viewed all images of the subjects and ranked the facial profile of each subject as most to least preferred. The position of the upper and lower lips in relation to the E-line was measured on the most preferred images. The data were collected and compared between male and female laypersons. Results: The majority of laypersons chose the images at 50% of profile change, -2.01 mm for the upper lip to E-line, and -1.57 mm for the lower lip to E-line as the most esthetic preferences. There were no significant differences in preferred facial profiles or lip position between male and female laypersons. Conclusions: The male and female laypersons preferred the same facial profiles and slightly retruded upper and lower lip to E-line positions. Keywords: Bimaxillary protrusion, three-dimensional scanner, facial esthetics