Validation of Ideal Breast Characteristics With Breast Augmentation Patients

Abstract

BACKGROUND: Breast augmentation procedures are one of the most commonly performed aesthetic procedures in the United States. Little work has focused on the general public's overall perception of the ideal breast or has validated them with patient photographs. OBJECTIVES: To validate crowdsourced perceptions of breasts with their alignment to the aesthetics of breast augmentation patients. METHODS: A prospective cross-sectional study was performed using participants enrolled through the AmazonMechanical Turk crowdsourcing platform (Amazon Web Services, Amazon, Seattle, WA) to obtain participant opinions ofhow closely patient breasts aligned with previously obtained results of 4 ideal breast characteristics. Outcomes were reported based on the correlation between breast attractiveness and alignment to ideal breast characteristics, both before and after breast implant procedures. RESULTS: 2306 responses from 737 participants reported patient photograph alignment with ideal breast projection proportion (1.0) as having the highest correlation to opinions of heightened aesthetic beauty (R = 0.98, P < 0.001), and ideal nipple direction (front) as having the lowest correlation to aesthetic beauty (R = 0.90, P < 0.001). Younger age groups (18-24) and participants with a high school diploma or less rated patients as less attractive, while married and wealthy individuals reported higher attraction levels. CONCLUSIONS: Crowdsourcing can be a useful tool for aesthetic surgery preferences and has helped reveal key takeaways. The importance of the 4 breast characteristics has been validated, with alignment to all 4 characteristics tested having a high correlation to preferences. Differences in preference across demographic groups are a topic to further investigate.