People 'categorise women using their hair colour'

Women are often categorised by their hair colour, one expert has claimed.

According to a Garnier hair colourist people automatically make presumptions about women's personality traits on the basis of the generic tone of their hair, with blondes appearing more light-hearted and brunettes coming off dark and mysterious.

The comments follow research recently published in January 2009 by Garnier Nutrisse on hair colour, which claimed that 76 per cent of people believe that brunettes are more intelligent than blondes or redheads, while 40 per cent of people think that brunette women are most ambitious and 35 per cent of people think that redheads are most ambitious.

Interestingly, three per cent of women changed their hair colour when they got their first job.

Trevor Halls, Garnier hair colourist, said: "We all have choice. We do have the choice to change our hair colour and you look at people and the media has such a big impact on how people want to view themselves.

"They look at [celebrities] as iconic and people wish to emulate them, thinking 'gosh, I could be her and all I have to change is my hair colour'. People have the choice and the product and you put them together and you can get a new look. It is about change."

In November 2008 research done for Andrew Collinge by Tickbox.net was published, revealing that 49 per cent of men think blondes make the best girlfriends with 21 per cent saying they prefer brunettes, while 52 per cent said brunettes made the best wives, followed by blondes (18 per cent), then black hair (17 per cent) and then red hair (ten per cent).

Another 51 per cent considered brunettes to be most trustworthy, versus 13 per cent of blondes, and 53 per cent consider brunettes to be most reliable, versus 12 per cent of blondes.

When it came to relationships, 49 per cent consider brunettes to be most loving, versus 18 per cent of blondes, and 51 per cent consider brunettes to have a greater maternal instinct, versus 15 per cent of blondes.

Trevor Halls, Garnier hair colourist, commented on which hair colours will be the most popular during 2009.

He said: "Brunette came out on top in the survey and what is great about brunettes is you can have different shades of it. For example, the colour we are calling 'shade of the nation' is a light mahogany chestnut, the colour of Davina McCall's hair."

He also gave his opinion on how hair colour could affect a woman's professional career.

"It's interesting because if you had to pick someone out in a crowd, you would instantly say, 'that blonde or that red head'. It's a generic tone that we categorise people in and people like, to a degree, to be in a category," explained Trevor.

"Blonde likes to be a blonde, a brunette likes the fact she's dark and mysterious and a redhead likes to know there is a foxy bit about her."