Why are beards resurging in 2020? History teaches us that men cooperate best if they shave. They stop shaving when times get tough.
Two weeks into work-from-home isolation and a trend has slid into my Zoom meetings. Men I have never seen with so much as a one-day growth are now sprouting beards. Maybe not the big bushy beards beloved by hipsters. At least not yet. But normally clean-shaven types have been letting things go.
Don’t go asking the bearded blokes awkward questions. It is worth remembering that the people who need to explain themselves here are the ones with razors in their hands. At least in the context of human evolution.
Facial hair represents what biologists call a ‘secondary sex trait’. Unlike the primary sex traits — genitals, eggs, and sperm — they aren’t necessary for sex and reproduction. They develop after sexual maturity and differ between females and males.
Secondary sex traits in the animal world include moose antlers, peacock tails, and the colours of the superb fairy-wren. Charles Darwin established, way back in 1871, that secondary sex traits function either to attract mates, or to aid in fights over territories, resources, and, ultimately, mates.
Beards to attract mates?
So do men grow beards to attract mates, or as some kind of non-verbal signal to male competitors? Despite plenty of confidently-splained folk theories, the scientific research is more nuanced and sometimes equivocal.
To read more, please go to the original version at Medium. This link will take you behind the paywall.
