The science of the selfie: 'left is best'

Left is best when it comes to taking a selfie with a new study of 2000 photos revealing most prefer snapping the left side of the face.

It was good enough for the Mona Lisa and Melbourne researchers have now revealed why people prefer to take selfies of their left cheek.

The La Trobe University study revealed 40 per cent of people prefer to take snaps of the left side of their face when taking a selfie - because it's more emotionally expressive.

"This left cheek bias has historic links. Previous research shows subjects of famous photographic and painted portraits, such as the da Vinci's Mona Lisa, are more likely to face the artist showing their left side," researcher Dr Annukka Lindell said on Tuesday.

"The theory is that left cheek poses are intuitively perceived as more emotionally open and expressive than right cheek poses."

The study looked at 10 selfies taken by 100 men and 100 women, some of whom took the 10 pictures in fewer than 24 hours.

Overall 40 per cent like the left, 30 per cent preferred the right side and 20 per cent took their photo front on.