Republican Voters Prefer Candidates Who Have Conservative‐Looking Faces: New Evidence From Exit Polls

Research shows people share common political facial stereotypes: They associate faces with political ideologies. Moreover, given that many voters rely on party affiliation, political ideology, and appearances to select political candidates, we might expect that political facial stereotypes would sway voting preferences and, by extension, the share of votes going to each candidate in an election. And yet few studies have examined whether having a stereotypically conservative‐looking (or liberal‐looking) face predicts a candidate's vote shares. Using data from U.S. election exit polls, we show that the Republican voters within each state are more likely to vote for a candidate (even a Democrat) the more that person has a stereotypically Republican‐looking face. By contrast, the voting choices of the Democratic voters within each state are unrelated to political facial stereotypes. Moreover, we show that the relationship between political facial stereotypes and voting does not depend on state‐level ideology: Republican voters in both right‐leaning (“red”) and left‐leaning (“blue”) states are more likely to vote for candidates with conservative‐looking faces. These results have several important practical and theoretical implications concerning the nature and impact of political facial stereotypes, which we discuss.     

Voter Preference and Emotion: Using Emotional Response to Classify Decided and Undecided Voters1

This study tested the utility of using the emotioneliciting qualities of candidates to classify both decided and undecided voters. Based on Mehrabian and Russell's (1974b) theoretical perspectives, a hypothesis was developed that emotional response to candidates could be used to discriminate between voters. Three hundred eighty-six registered voters in Bexar County, Texas, were randomly polled. These voters were asked a series of attitude and behavior questions. Of special interest for this study were questions about the Texas Governor's race between Bill Clements and Mark White. Voters were asked to identify their preference for either man and to respond to questions that tapped the emotioneliciting qualities of each candidate. The results indicated that the emotioneliciting qualities of the political candidates could be used to discriminate both decided and undecided voter preference. Specifically, over 90% of the decided voters and 80% of the undecided voters were accurately classified. This was seen as important for two reasons. First, it supported the claim that emotions may play an important role in voter preference. Second, it suggested a method for discriminating between voters even when voters were unable to immediately identify their own candidate preferences. Also of importance was the finding that the emotioneliciting quality scales became a “clarification” tool for some voters who were “on the fence” about the two candidates. After these voters responded to questions about thek feelings, candidate preference could be more clearly verbalized. A refinement of the “emotion-eliciting quality” instrument was suggested for future research.     

The “Clean for Gene” Phenomenon: The Effect of Students' Appearance on Political Campaigning1

Field experiments investigated the relationship between a political campaigner's dress and appearance and his campaign effectiveness. In one study deviant, “freaky” appearing campaigners attempting to hand out innocuous leaflets in a shopping center had a lower acceptance rate than did more conventionally dressed campaigners. Those shoppers who did accept leaflets from “freaks” were more likely to throw them away unread. The first experiment suggested that deviant-appearing campaigners have difficulty communicating information to potential voters, but it was argued that, in another sense, they convey all too much information. Knowing only that the campaigners for one candidate were deviant and “hippy” in appearance as compared to the conventionally dressed campaigners supporting a second candidate, voters in a second experiment were willing to ascribe more radical opinions to the deviants' candidate. Voters then used their inferences as the basis on which to select a candidate. The rationality of inferring beliefs from appearances is discussed in terms of correspondent inference theory.     

Understanding Voter Vengeance

This article proposes that, in electoral contexts, decision makers may experience a desire for vengeance or a desire to “get even” with an entity, such as a political candidate, in response to a perceived wrongdoing. This article draws on research from the domains of psychology and sociology to develop a theoretical framework for examining factors that may influence the extent to which voters exact revenge on political candidates with their voting behavior. The results of 3 experiments are reported in which voters are shown to exact revenge on a candidate who has won an earlier round of elections by defeating a favored candidate. This process is mediated by damage to self‐identity and is strengthened by perceived share of blame attributed to the perpetrator candidate. This research shows how vengeful voters are delighted when a perpetrator candidate later performs poorly while in office. This research also shows how making salient a shared affiliation with the perpetrator candidate (such as race or university major) can attenuate vengeful voting behavior. The research builds on a growing body of work that explores negative and potentially counterproductive emotions in choice contexts.     

The Effects of Counterstereotypic Gender Strategies on Candidate Evaluations

Voters do not associate female candidates with feminine stereotypes, but voters also do not associate female candidates with the qualities most valued in political leaders such as experience and knowledge. Current research offers conflicting conclusions on whether female candidates benefit from breaking with feminine norms or face a backlash for being too aggressive and not likable enough. Using a series of experiments, I show how counterstereotypic gender strategies, including women emphasizing masculine trait competencies, improve evaluations of female candidates along both masculine and feminine leadership dimensions. These results offer novel insights into how female candidates can overcome perceptual deficits among voters that they lack critical masculine leadership qualities. I also show that female candidates can overcome these biases without losing on traditional feminine strengths such as warmth and likability. However, counterstereotypic female candidates can face a “likability” backlash from out‐partisan voters. These findings suggest counterstereotypes may be more beneficial for female candidates in a primary election context when voters are copartisans rather than general elections where candidates often need cross‐partisan support.     

Gender, Physical Attractiveness, and Electability: An Experimental Investigation of Voter Biases

In an examination of the impacts on electoral success of candidate gender, candidate physical attractiveness, prestige and responsibility of office sought, and voter characteristics, 219 college students evaluated six challengers to an incumbent in either a mayoral or county clerk's race. Challengers represented men and women of high, moderate, and low physical attractiveness. Male, but not female, voters discriminated against female candidates. While physical attractiveness accentuated perceptions of masculinity in a man and femininity in a woman, the appeal of an attractive (i.e., more feminine) woman seeking a masculine-stereotyped position was not damaged by the so-called "beauty is beastly" effect. However, attractiveness was less consistently an asset for female candidates than it was for male candidates. Male, but not female, candidates directly benefitted from being physical attractive and were also more positively evaluated to the extent that they were perceived as highly masculine. These findings not only contribute to understanding of the joint impacts of sex-role and attractiveness stereotypes, but call into question survey findings pointing to the demise of sexism in electoral politics.     

The Mediating Role of Information Search in the Relationship Between Prejudice and Voting Behavior

Evidence on the extent to which prejudice serves as a barrier to black and Latino candidates for office is mixed. Some research has found that black and Latino candidates are disadvantaged in terms of their chances of winning election and that they are evaluated differently by voters, while other findings suggest that this may not be the case. This article examines the effects of racial prejudice on candidate evaluation and voting behavior. It uses a unique experimental design to test for direct effects of prejudice on candidate evaluation and voting behavior, as well as indirect effects of prejudice on these variables via the information that subjects seek out. I find that subjects higher in symbolic racism are less likely to vote “correctly” when their preferences most closely align with a black or Latino candidate and that they rate minority candidates more negatively than their white counterparts. I also find that subjects high in prejudice search for less information about minority candidates and that this less robust information search mediates the relationship between prejudice and candidate evaluation and vote measures. Results also suggest that increased information search may mitigate the effects of prejudice on correct voting.     

Candidate Voice Pitch Influences Election Outcomes

A growing literature in psychology shows that human voice pitch—perceived “highness” or “lowness” as determined by the physiology of the throat—influences how speakers are perceived. This leads to the prediction that candidate voice pitch influences voters. Here this question is addressed with two studies. The first is an experiment conducted with a large national sample of U.S. adults. The results show that men and women prefer to vote for male and female candidates with lower pitched voices. The second study examines the outcomes of the 2012 U.S. House elections. When facing male opponents, candidates with lower voices won a larger vote share. However, when facing female opponents, candidates with higher voices were more successful and particularly so in the case of male candidates. In synthesizing research on the human voice and voter behavior and triangulating evidence from a controlled experiment and a large observational study of actual elections, this article illustrates that candidate voice pitch influences election outcomes.     

女性面孔吸引力的加工及其对男性诚实道德行为的影响:一项ERP研究

研究考察了不同女性面孔吸引力情境对男性被试诚实道德决策行为的影响,同时采用ERP技术对社会情境中面孔吸引力的信息加工方式特点进行探究。结果发现,高面孔吸引力记录员情境中被试倾向更加真实地报告自己的预测结果而表现出更多诚实的道德决策;ERP结果则发现高吸引力记录员面孔较之于低吸引力记录员面孔在反应提示界面在大脑中后部诱发更大的早期N200成分。结果提示,在与面孔审美评价无关的社会情境中个体面孔的吸引力信息能够被快速识别与自动化加工,同时也会直接促进他人自身的道德行为水平。     

The Effects of Scandalous Information on Recall of Policy‐Related Information

Political observers often criticize the news media's focus on scandalous activities of candidates as distracting voters from the “real issues.” However, the extent to which such a fondness for scandal influences voters remains unclear. The present study examines whether exposure to scandalous information about a candidate interferes with memory for policy‐related information. Two possibilities are considered. One possibility is that scandalous information attracts substantial attention and processing from individuals thereby interfering with previously stored campaign information. A second possibility argues that conceiving of memory as organized in associative networks suggests that scandalous information facilitates, rather than interferes with, recall of policy‐related campaign information. Based on data from a longitudinal experiment, I conclude that exposure to scandalous information is less hazardous to voters than is often suggested by political observers.     

When Does Gender Count? Further Insights into Gender Schematic Processing of Female Candidates' Political Advertisements

In this study we explored viewers' responses to advertising by female political candidates. Gender schema theory provided the basis for developing a better understanding of the circumstances when voters evaluate female candidates and how cognitive representations of what women are like influence viewer responses. Results showed general support for the predictions derived from gender schema theory. That is, participants did seem to rely on gender schema in making judgments, a form of inference making known as “default processing,” when information was absent. Results also indicated that participants relied more on gender schematic processing when the advertisement elicited positive emotions and less on gender schematic processing when exposed to an attack ad. For comparison, viewers' responses to male candidates' political advertising were also examined. We conclude with a discussion of the implications of these findings for political campaigns.     

Perceptions of self-disclosers: Effects of sex and physical attractiveness1

Five experiments were conducted to study perceptions of self-disclosure by attractive and unattractive males and females. Results showed that highly disclosing females were preferred over females with medium or low self-disclosure when their self-disclosure was about a parental suicide or about sexual attitudes. Highly disclosing females were evaluated less favorably than females with medium self-disclosure when their self-disclosure was about aggressive feelings of competitiveness. Highly disclosing males were evaluated less favorably than males with medium and low self-disclosure on all disclosure topics. Disclosers with high physical attractiveness were evaluated more favorably than disclosers with low physical attractiveness, but there was considerable variation among subject populations.     

Visual Political Communication: The Impact of Facial Cues from Social Constituencies to Personal Pocketbooks

Voters often use visual cues such as facial appearance when forming impressions of political candidates. Originally, psychological research on appearance‐based politics focused on understanding whether or not these facial cues were consequential for political judgments. As this sub‐field of study has expanded, the focus has shifted to understanding how and what facial cues voters utilize in their decision‐making. From this perspective, inferences about political candidates are characterized by a number of interrelated appearance‐based cues such as facial competence, physical attractiveness, and ingrained gender stereotypes that manifest in politicians' appearance. Importantly, this expanded research focus now includes a broader range of evaluative judgments that are influenced by candidates' facial appearance. Here, we provide an overview of the research on the use of appearance‐based cues in political decision‐making including initial information gathered about candidates, the evaluation of candidates' potential to be effective leaders, and the decision of whether or not to support candidates in an election.     

Attractiveness and Facial Competence Bias Face‐Based Inferences of Candidate Ideology

Can voters infer candidates' political orientations from their faces? We report evidence that observers make systematic judgment errors, ascribing their own political views to attractive or competent‐looking candidates. Subjects judged headshot images of student candidates running in university elections (Experiment 1), as well as professional politicians from state election races in Germany (Experiment 2), according to whether the person(s) displayed held ideologically leftist or rightist views. While prediction accuracy was above chance level in both experiments, candidate attractiveness (Experiment 1) and perceived competence (Experiment 2) increased a subject's likelihood of attributing her political views to a candidate. These findings suggest that the value of face‐based inferences in choosing the candidate who best represents one's views is more limited than previously assumed. They also suggest that good looks may help extremist candidates in presenting themselves as more moderate.     

The effects of physical and vocal attractiveness on impression formation of politicians

In order to investigate the nature of the combination of varying levels of vocal and physical attractiveness on the perception of hypothetical political candidates, 90 adults rated photographs of target politicians on scales for the dimensions of competency, trustworthiness, qualification, and leadership ability. It was hypothesized and confirmed that the halo effect (higher ratings for highly attractive targets) elicited by physical attractiveness is stronger and more robust than the halo effect elicited by vocal attractiveness; however vocal attractiveness did impact the perception of the candidates by lowering the ratings associated with candidates that were presented as highly attractive but possessing an unattractive voice. This work was sponsored by the Jean D. Smith Center for Democracy and Citizenship at the New Hampshire Institute of Politics at Saint Anselm College. We are grateful to Donald Bucolo for helpful comments.     

The effects of physical and vocal attractiveness on impression formation of politicians

In order to investigate the nature of the combination of varying levels of vocal and physical attractiveness on the perception of hypothetical political candidates, 90 adults rated photographs of target politicians on scales for the dimensions of competency, trustworthiness, qualification, and leadership ability. It was hypothesized and confirmed that the halo effect (higher ratings for highly attractive targets) elicited by physical attractiveness is stronger and more robust than the halo effect elicited by vocal attractiveness; however vocal attractiveness did impact the perception of the candidates by lowering the ratings associated with candidates that were presented as highly attractive but possessing an unattractive voice. This work was sponsored by the Jean D. Smith Center for Democracy and Citizenship at the New Hampshire Institute of Politics at Saint Anselm College. We are grateful to Donald Bucolo for helpful comments.     

Ambiguity of acceptance,social desirability,and dating choice

Male subjects differing in social desirability (likableness, physical attractiveness) chose a date from an array of females of three levels of physical attractiveness. Choices were made under two conditions: one where acceptance was assured regardless of whom subject chose; the other where acceptance was left ambiguous. The findings were as follows: (a) subjects selected a more physically attractive female when assured of acceptance than when acceptance was left ambiguous; (b) subjects estimated that highly physically attractive females were less likely to accept them as a date than were either moderately physically attractive or physically unattractive females; (c) subjects' self-ratings of their likableness were not related to the physical attractiveness of their choices under either choice condition nor to their estimates of their chances that the females would accept them as a date; and (d) subjects' self-evaluated physical attractiveness, although unrelated to the physical attractiveness of the subjects' choices, did relate to subjects' estimates of their chances of acceptance. Highly physically attractive subjects estimated their chances of acceptance as better than did subjects who considered themselves low in physical attractiveness. The implications of the findings for the “matching hypothesis” are discussed.     

No Place for a Woman: Evidence for Gender Bias in Evaluations of Presidential Candidates

In the 110th Congress, 16% of United State Senators are women. In contrast, the role of President of the United States of America has always been occupied by a man. As such, being a man is the one common attribute to all successful presidential candidates, rendering “male” a necessary qualification for the role. The gender-incongruency hypothesis predicts that gender bias is less likely in domains such as the Senate where women are relatively more prevalent. However, in the case of the presidency, the potential exists for gender bias against women presidential candidates. Using an experimental, single-candidate, design we tested the hypotheses that young voters would similarly evaluate a man and woman candidate for Senate (Study 1) but negatively evaluate a presidential candidate's resume ascribed to a woman, compared to the same resume ascribed to a man (Study 2). Results confirmed the gender-incongruency hypothesis and suggest that although bias may be less evident in evaluations of some Senate candidates, gender bias remains a significant obstacle for women presidential candidates.     

Is There Really a Beauty Premium or an Ugliness Penalty on Earnings?

Purpose

Economists have widely documented the “beauty premium” and “ugliness penalty” on earnings. Explanations based on employer and client discrimination would predict a monotonic association between physical attractiveness and earnings; explanations based on occupational self-selection would explain the beauty premium as a function of workers’ occupations; and explanations based on individual differences would predict that the beauty premium would disappear once appropriate individual differences are controlled. In this paper, we empirically tested the three competing hypotheses about the “beauty premium”.

Design/Methodology/Approach

We analyzed a nationally representative and prospectively longitudinal sample from the National Longitudinal Survey of Adolescent Health (Add Health).

Findings

The results contradicted the discrimination and self-selection explanations and strongly supported the individual differences explanation. Very unattractive respondents always earned significantly more than unattractive respondents, sometimes more than average-looking or attractive respondents. Multiple regression analyses showed that there was very weak evidence for the beauty premium, and it disappeared completely once individual differences, such as health, intelligence, and Big Five personality factors, were statistically controlled.

Implications

Past findings of beauty premium and ugliness penalty may possibly be due to the fact that: 1) “very unattractive” and “unattractive” categories are usually collapsed into “below average” category; and 2) health, intelligence (as opposed to education) and Big Five personality factors are not controlled. It appears that more beautiful workers earn more, not because they are beautiful, but because they are healthier, more intelligent, and have better (more Conscientious and Extraverted, and less Neurotic) personality.

Originality/Value

This is the first study to show that: 1) very unattractive workers have extremely high earnings and earn more than physically more attractive workers, suggesting evidence for the potential ugliness premium; and 2) the apparent beauty premium and ugliness penalty may be a function of unmeasured traits correlated with physical attractiveness, such as health, intelligence, and personality.