Editorial standards

This page is the contract behind every guide on FaceShapes. It explains how claims are labeled, where our information comes from, what we will not publish, and what happens when we get something wrong.

How we label claims

Every substantive claim carries one of three tags, inline, where the claim is made:

• research-backed: supported by peer-reviewed research. The specific study appears in the numbered Sources list at the end of the article. If we cannot cite it, we do not tag it.
• mixed evidence: some formal support with meaningful caveats. We say what is uncertain instead of rounding up to certainty.
• convention: stylist tradition and professional consensus without formal studies. Convention is often useful. It is never presented as science.

When a popular claim is debunked, we say so plainly. The golden ratio face is the canonical example: widely repeated, not supported by the research, and labeled accordingly wherever it comes up.

Sourcing rules

• Claims about outcomes or biology cite primary sources: peer-reviewed journals, not other blogs.
• Sources are numbered, listed at the end of every article, and linked where a public version exists.
• Statistics we publish from our own measurement work are marked as ours, with methodology notes.

What we will not publish

• No attractiveness scores or ratings. We describe what styles do, not what faces are worth.
• No medical claims and no medical advice. Guides about skin or hair health cite dermatology sources and stop at the line where a clinician should take over.
• No fear-based framing about aging. We describe what a cut or frame does with gray texture or finer density. We do not moralize age in either direction.
• No AI-generated faces presented as photographs, and no stock imagery dressed up as original work. Our diagrams are drawn for the article they appear in.

How guides are made, including AI

Research and drafting use software tools, including AI assistance. Nothing publishes without a human editor doing the fact pass: checking every tagged claim against its source, verifying measurements, and editing for voice. The evidence tags are applied by the editor, not generated. Responsibility for what publishes here rests with the editorial team, reachable at the address below.

Updates

Every article shows its publication date and, when revised, an updated date. Cornerstone guides are rechecked at least every six months. If the evidence moves, the article moves.

Corrections

If we published an error, tell us: [email protected]. Verified corrections are fixed in the article, acknowledged in a note at the point of correction, and reflected in the updated date. We do not silently rewrite mistakes.