Men with feminine faces will be luckier in love as more women are attracted to them.

Most women prefer men with more feminine shaped faces and darker skin, according to a new research by psychologists at New York and Princeton universities.

But the investigation found that men typically also want women's faces to be feminine with plump lips and wide eyes, the journal Psychological Science reports.

Two groups of men and women were shown a selection of thousands of computer-generated faces of the opposite sex to rate, which had been manipulated to look either more masculine or feminine, the Daily Mail reports.

The computer model tested 50 dimensions of facial features, including nose size, plumpness of lips and facial colouring.

The scientists found that more men want women's faces to have a feminine shape, while women want men's faces to have a feminine shape, but darker skin.

The findings show that male and female attractiveness are not equal and opposite, according to the researchers.

The authors of the study also found that the appeal of average faces is less straightforward than previously thought.

Psychologists Christopher Said of New York University and Alexander Todorov of Princeton, who carried out the research, said attractiveness is more complex than had been found by previous studies.

While both men and women find average faces attractive, the most average faces are not considered the most attractive.