Flicking through the channels the other night, I was struck by the array of aggressive smiles and slightly unnerving appearances.

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Luminescent, gum guard-like grins and oversized, ultra-white piano keys. Faces made strangely uncanny by cosmetic ‘perfection’.

I can't help but notice the growing absence of real teeth or unaltered smiles in film and television, especially reality TV. Even in period pieces, actors meant to be living in Medieval or Victorian settings where dental hygiene was nonexistent have gleaming rows of perfect pearly whites.

Somewhere along the way, something has gone wrong.

Obviously, dentistry has come a long, long way since then, and it goes without saying that people have the right to make choices about their own bodies.

We live in a deeply image-conscious society. It would be naive to think attractiveness doesn't bring both social and professional advantages.

But I worry that our obsession with good looks has made us lose sight of what actually looks good. A narrow cosmetic ideal has begun to masquerade as........

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