Answer: so they can be on fleek.
Have you ever looked in the mirror and wondered why those fuzzy little caterpillars are hanging out on your forehead? As human beings evolved, we lost a significant amount of hair that once covered our entire bodies, but we grew concentrated patches of hair above our eyes. Why?
They act as a detour
The most important job an eyebrow can have, is protecting the eye. We rely a lot on our sight. We need it to spot a gazelle running on the plains of Africa. We use it to navigate our way through the woods at night when we’re running from a hungry lion. Or, in more modern times, we need it for those thirteen and a half hour periods where we binge watch the first two seasons of Sex and the City (not that I’ve ever done that).
As far as evolutionary purposes go, eyebrows are nature’s deterrent. When sweat runs down your face and threatens to spill its saltiness into your eyes, your eyebrows force the sweat elsewhere, leaving your eyes clean and salt free.
They’re helpful little communicators
You ever make eye contact with somebody across the room, you look up ever so slightly, and you raise your eyebrows judge a smidgen as a flirtatious gesture? Well, you are acting on 200,000 years of human evolution coming into play to tell a potential partner you’re interested.
Scientists who study nonverbal communication say that eyebrows are really useful for communicating anger, surprise, and happiness. Some people also have the ability to raise a single eyebrow at a time, signaling they don’t understand or they would like to know more. If you’re one of these people, your eyebrows are more effective communicators are more evolved than the rest of us lowly people.
Additionally, those who rely on sign language use eyebrows for very complex nonverbal gestures.
So bear in mind friends, when you’re having a conversation with somebody, your mouth isn’t just doing the talking, your eyebrows are too.
[Featured Image Credit: Nicola Sapiens De Mitri]