Emily Perron

February 24, 2017

COM 380

Brief Reading 3

The article Beauty Cant Be Beat by Glenn Wilson and David Nias proposes that a

persons attractiveness is a powerful factor in determining friends, and romantic partners.The

article spoke particularly on appearance and perceived personality traits such as modesty,

sociability, kindness, and outgoingness. Even children indicated to like better-looking peers,

compared to homely kids. Teachers also predict that better-looking kids are better behaved and

have a higher IQ.It has also been found that attractiveness also factors into student happiness,

self-esteem, and well-being, and marital quality and shorter prison sentences. Additional research

shows that this is more applicable to females, however, it is found that people seek out partners

of similar attractiveness.

The article can be loosely related to Sheldons body types - which suggest that body type

influence personality. The class material also refers to the Halo effect, which describes the

tendency to attribute positive qualities based on attractive people. This study demonstrates that

attractiveness leads people to assume information about a persons approachability and

likeability, even from a young age, and it also supports the matching hypothesis- that we seek

people of similar attractiveness.

These findings are unfortunate but consistent - I have seen studies claiming the same

thing and have learned the same thing in a previous class. These habits go against efforts to raise

a society to not judge a book by its cover. The most disappointing finding of the study is that

the attitudes of society are affecting even the youngest citizens despite efforts to teach them not
to. This also makes me think about society and how America publicize crime and draws attention

to race. I fear that these habits cause individuals to fall victims to expectancy theory- making

expectations, and just meeting those expectations- based on appearance. If this is the case it is no

wonder why we use body types to study personality. Even when these theories are remarkably

accurate - we are failing to give individuals an equal chance of finding happiness and success.

The article does a good job with collecting data from different manipulations: blind dates,

photos, and school settings. These consistent findings build a great argument of societys failure.

This study would be interesting to follow as online dating becomes more of a social norm and as

more kids use a virtual classroom to interact with teachers and peers.

Beauty Cant Be Beat by Glenn Wilson and David Nias describes the remarkable

influence on perceived attractiveness and opinions of a person. Their findings support that body

type influence personality, how we treat others, and what we look for in a partner. The

conclusions made in the study are supported by other studies and adds to convincing findings.

Despite how accurate these findings are, it shows human error and poses threat to individual

success.