10/14/18

Which of these politicians would you vote for? They're the same, right? Not exactly. In an experiment, Danish Researchers modified the real face to make it look more dominant or more feminine.

Those subtle changes made a difference, says Princeton University psychology professor Alexander Todorov. Right-wing voters were more receptive to the message of this politician, when the message was paired with this more dominant looking face.

And liberal voters were more persuaded, when the same message was accompanied by this other image of a more feminine-looking leader. That's one example from Todorov new book, Face Value.

He describes the unconscious judgments we make based solely on looks, and how those judgments have consequences like deciding elections, for example.

Todorov has found he could predict most races with a single test. He showed subjects actual campaign photos of opposing candidates, and asked which one is more competent.

The candidate, judged more competent based solely on a picture, was the one that won the election 70 percent of the time. I was certainly surprised, because this is a really important race.

There's tons of money going into it and there are lots of other variables. And yet we were able to predict a large percentage of the elections.

Todorov says the effect is strongest on voters who know the least about political issues. That's not completely irrational, he says.

You can say that people looking for the right information competence in the wrong place appearance, because it's easy, and that's the kind of the story of a lot of the psychology of decision making.

To a large extent, we make lots of judgments to rank and short cuts. For example, studies have found people who look more trustworthy get loans at lower interest rates.