Good conduct makes your face attractive: The effect of personality perception on facial attractiveness judgments

Abstract

Human facial attractiveness is related to physical features, such as averageness and symmetry. However, it is also known that facial attractiveness is influenced by a wide range of non-physical factors. Here, we examined the effect of the personality information of a target person. In Experiment 1, participants read a verbal description of a target person (high or low honesty), followed by a presentation of the target face and facial attractiveness rating. Honest personality enhanced facial attractiveness, replicating a previous report. This “honesty premium” effect was independent of pre-rated facial attractiveness (Experiment 1), target gender, participant gender, and target clothing (Experiment 2). Experiment 3 found that creative personality did not affect facial attractiveness, whereas aggressive personality of a male target decreased facial attractiveness. We did not find evidence that participants’ moods caused these effects. The results suggest that the “what is good is beautiful” stereotype is robust and that facial attractiveness is malleable and dependent on various physical and non-physical information.