Physical Attractiveness1

https://doi.org/10.1016/S0065-2601(08)60037-4Get rights and content

Publisher Summary

This chapter discusses physical attractiveness in social interactions. Physical attractiveness is, in many ways, a homely variable. The physical attractiveness variable is unpretentious for at least two reasons. First, it is unlikely that it will be found to be orthogonal to other dimensions, primarily intelligence, socioeconomic status, and perhaps genetically determined behavioral predispositions associated with morphological characteristics. Second, it seems highly unlikely that physical attractiveness will ever form the core concept of a psychological theory, even a much needed social perceptual theory, which will illuminate the way to useful and interesting predictions about social relationships. The chapter focuses on recent social psychological evidence, which suggests that even esthetic attractiveness may be a useful dimension for understanding certain social phenomena, and, perhaps, for illuminating some personality and developmental puzzles as well. Perception of the physical attractiveness level of another appears to be influenceable by the affective and experiential relationship between the evaluator and the person whose physical attractiveness level is to be judged, as well as by factors unique to the evaluator and the setting in which evaluations are made, although none of these factors have been the subject of much study. The impact of physical attractiveness upon the individual has been highlighted in the chapter.

References (116)

  • BerscheidE. et al.

    Interpersonal attraction

    (1969)
  • Berscheid, E., Walster, E., & Campbell, R. Grow old along with me. Mimeograph copies available from the authors,...
  • BloodR.O.

    Uniformities and diversities in campus dating preferences

    Journal of Marriage and Family Living

    (1956)
  • BrislinR.W. et al.

    Dating and physical attractiveness: Replication

    Psychological Reports

    (1968)
  • ByrneD.

    The attraction paradigm.

    (1971)
  • ByrneD. et al.

    Continuity between the experimental study of attraction and real-life computer dating

    Journal of Personality and Social Psychology

    (1970)
  • ByrneD. et al.

    The effects of physical attractiveness, sex, and attitude similarity on interpersonal attraction

    Journal of Personality

    (1968)
  • CampbellD.T.

    The results of counseling: Twenty-five years later

    (1965)
  • CampbellD.P.

    The vocational interests of beautiful women

    Personnel and Guidance Journal

    (1967)
  • CampbellD.T. et al.

    Experimental and quasi-experimental designs for research

    (1963)
  • Cavior, N. Physical attractiveness, perceived attitude similarity, and interpersonal attraction among fifth and...
  • CaviorN. et al.

    Physical attractiveness self-concept: A test of Mead's hypothesis

    Proceedings of the 79th Annual Convention of the American Psychological Association

    (1971)
  • Cavior, N., & Dokecki, P. R. Physical attractiveness, perceived attitude similarity, and academic achievement as...
  • Cavior, N., & Lombardi, D. A. Developmental aspects of judgment of physical attractiveness in children. Developmental...
  • CentersR.

    The psychology of social classes: A study of class consciousness

    (1949)
  • ChristieR. et al.

    Studies in Machiavellianism

    (1970)
  • CliffordM.M. et al.

    The effect of physical attractiveness on teacher expectation

    Sociology of Education

    (1973)
  • CoombsR.H. et al.

    Sex differences in dating aspirations and satisfaction with computer-selected partners

    Journal of Marriage and the Family

    (1966)
  • CrespiL.P.

    Quantitative variation in incentive and performance in the white rat

    American Journal of Psychology

    (1942)
  • CrossJ.F. et al.

    Age, sex, race and the perception of facial beauty

    Developmental Psychology

    (1971)
  • DaileyD.A.

    The effects of premature conclusion upon the acquisition of understanding of a person

    Journal of Psychology

    (1952)
  • DannenmaierW.D. et al.

    Authority status as a factor in perceptual distortion of size

    Journal of Social Psychology

    (1964)
  • DarwinC.

    The origin of species by means of natural selection. The descent of man and selection in relation to sex

  • DionK.K.

    Physical attractiveness and evaluations of children's transgressions

    Journal of Personality and Social Psychology

    (1972)
  • Dion, K. K., & Berscheid, E. Physical attractiveness and social perception of peers in preschool children. Mimeographed...
  • DionK.K. et al.

    What is beautiful is good

    Journal of Personality and Social Psychology

    (1972)
  • EisenmanR. et al.

    Creativity, insolence, and attractiveness of female experimenters

    Perceptual and Motor Skills

    (1970)
  • ElderG.H.

    Appearance and education in marriage mobility

    American Sociological Review

    (1969)
  • Feldman, S. D. The presentation of shortness in everyday life-height and heightism in American society: Toward a...
  • FinckH.T.

    Romantic love and personal beauty, their development, causal relations, historic and national peculiarities

    (1891)
  • GallF.J. et al.

    Recherches sur le systeme nerveux

    (1809)
  • GellertE. et al.

    Children's awareness of their bodily appearance: A developmental study of factors associated with the body percept

    Genetic Psychology Monographs

    (1971)
  • GlassG.V. et al.

    Statistical methods in education and psychology

    (1970)
  • GoffmanE.

    On cooling the mark out: Some aspects of adaptation to failure

    Psychiatry

    (1952)
  • HarariH. et al.

    Situational influence on moral justice: A study of “finking.”

    Journal of Personality and Social Psychology

    (1969)
  • HartupW.W.

    Peer interaction and social organization

  • HelsonH.

    Adaptation-level theory: An experimental and systematic approach to behavior

    (1964)
  • HewittL.E.

    Student perceptions of traits desired in themselves as dating and marriage partners

    Marriage and Family Living

    (1958)
  • HochbergJ.E.

    Perception

    (1964)
  • HolmesS.J. et al.

    Personal appearance as related to scholastic records and marriage selection in college women

    Human Biology

    (1938)
  • Cited by (674)

    • What is a mate preference? Probing the computational format of mate preferences using couple simulation

      2022, Evolution and Human Behavior
      Citation Excerpt :

      Human mate choice is a very broad field of study. Researchers have long observed that people choose romantic partners non-randomly with respect to several dimensions, including physical attraction (Berscheid & Walster, 1974), similarity (Condon & Crano, 1988), familiarity (Saegert, Swap, & Zajonc, 1973), and others. Documenting the patterns and origins of non-random partner choice have been core research traditions in social psychology (e.g. Thibault & Kelley, 1959), behavioral genetics (e.g, Vandenberg, 1972), sociology (e.g, Mare, 1991), anthropology (e.g, Symons, 1979), and economics (e.g, Greenwood, Guner, Kocharkov, & Santos, 2014).

    • Do Attractive People Get a Better Deal? An Experimental Study

      2024, International Journal of the Economics of Business
    View all citing articles on Scopus
    1

    Preparation of this paper was facilitated by National Institute of Health Grant MH 16729, and National Science Foundation Grants GS-35157X and GS-30822X. We should also like to thank Dr. John Arrowood and Dr. Marshall Dermer for their helpful comments.

    View full text