The Influence of Physical Attractiveness on Belief in a Just World

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

3-8-2018

Publication Title

Psychological Reports

First page number:

1

Last page number:

14

Abstract

Previous work has consistently found that belief in a just world is strongly correlated with societal privilege. In the present study, we examined the influence of physical attractiveness on belief in a just world. We hypothesized that physically attractive individuals would be stronger endorsers of belief in a just world, whereas less attractive individuals would be less likely to endorse belief in a just world. Both self-rated attractiveness (experiment one) and attractiveness rated by other persons (experiment two) were found to predict endorsement of belief in a just world. Additionally, both attractiveness measures were found to have a relationship with participant’s level of life satisfaction. These findings suggest that physical attractiveness powerfully affects our subjective experience as a human and that just-world beliefs are driven, at least in part, by personal experience with inequality.

Keywords

Attractiveness; Halo effect; Individual differences; Just-world beliefs

Disciplines

Psychology

File Format

pdf

File Size

228.74 KB

Language

English

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