Researchers from Germany find the well-known beauty bias is actually flipped when attractive job candidates are appraised by a same-sex evaluator. Researchers from the U.S., separately, show a similarly negative effect when good-looking people have their apologies judged by their own gender. |
It isn't easy being beautiful — at least, not all the time.
Two new studies have identified a surprising penalty for good looks, with implications for professional and personal settings alike.
Researchers from Germany find the well-known beauty bias is actually flipped when attractive job candidates are appraised by a same-sex evaluator. Researchers from the U.S., separately, show a similarly negative effect when good-looking people have their apologies judged by their own gender.
"There are a lot of studies that show attractive people make more money, are more likely to get hired and get lighter sentences in court when they're convicted of crimes. But this shows the benefits might not be across the board," says April Phillips, co-author of the American research.
Phillips' study, to appear in a forthcoming issue of the journal Personal Relationships, found that a beautiful woman's apology was judged by other women as less sincere than the exact same mea culpa of a less attractive female.
Not surprisingly, the opposite effect was seen when the apology was evaluated by men, with the woman's beauty increasing the likelihood that she'd be let off the hook.
"Forgiveness is a multi-faceted process," says Phillips, an associate professor at Northeastern State University in Oklahoma. "This is the first step in showing that the acceptance and effectiveness of an apology varies based on things other than the quality of the apology or the relationship you have with the other person."
Phillips suggests the effect has much to do with the "overall mate value" of the other person. She explains that men would want to forgive a beautiful woman so the possibility of a relationship wasn't eliminated, whereas a woman might see her as a threat and thus be less open to a pardon.
This premise is explored in the German research, published in the August issue of the journal Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin.
The study found beauty biases with job candidates were partially mediated by a desire for social contact. That is, the evaluators wanted to be friends and co-workers with the attractive opposite-sex applicants, but not the attractive same-sex applicants.
Notably, this effect didn't hold true for evaluators with high self-esteem. Study co-author Maria Agthe explains that people's "responses were driven primarily by a desire to avoid perceived self-threats posed by attractive same-sex targets."
The research is among the first to demonstrate that although there exists a positive beauty bias in hiring practices, it can work in the opposite direction when the applicant is being judged by a member of his or her own gender — despite evaluators' belief that they aren't susceptible to appearance-based prejudice.
"These findings have implications for potential biases in the way organizations hire or accept people, make decisions about salaries and promotions, and so on," says Agthe, a post-doctoral researcher at The Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich.
"Organizational decision-makers often are faced with difficult choices among candidates who possess similar levels of qualifications, and even small preferential biases based on appearance might end up having a critical impact.
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