MODERATOR’S NOTE: Please remember that embedded images, and links to photos, are not allowed. I deleted one post and responses to it.
I would actually suggest a different experiment for my alma mater as the parameters I posted previously may not result in nearly as interesting of an experiment to run there as opposed to say…at a more mainstream college campus like Princeton, Vanderbilt, Northwestern, UAlabama, Stanford, the UCs except Berkeley or Santa Cruz, Wellesley, etc.
Let’s see…maybe if a student wore a formal suit and tie with pictures/quotes from folks like Milton Friedman, Richard Nixon, Ayn Rand, fancy brand name clothes and accessories which scream upper/upper-middle class consumerism* or those which are associated with plays/movies considered culturally appropriative of non-Western cultures, wearing campaign paraphernalia of the two mainstream political parties* in the US during election time or not when I attended, wore outfits made of raw/cooked meat, or came to class eating a 20 oz piece of steak or other meat…especially non-organic or worse…something from a fastfood chain like McDonalds/Burger King/etc.
- With the possible exception of Burberry if one wears their outfits ironically to reference their popularity among those in the British Chav subculture commonly associated with "being low class" and juvenile delinquency/criminality.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/4381140.stm
** I.e. Miss Saigon, Memoirs of a Geisha, etc.
*** Both parties including the Democratic Party would have been considered too conservative/establishment for most of the student body there when I attended.
Can’t follow footnotes on CC on my phone very well…
I wouldn’t be surprised if people are more confident on the Internet than in real life, even without anonymity.
I must have been better looking than I thought…
I work with one of those 0.1 percenters, a woman now in her early 50s. If you were around in the 80s, odds are you have seen pictures of her in a bikini draped over a car hood or laying on a the deck of a boat. It has made for some interesting conversations.
She freely talks about those years of expecting men to give her something for nothing based on the way she looks. There is no need to try to rationalize it as greater confidence or any number of related things, it really was strictly based on her appearance.
So, are college women with high grades or recognition from mentors now assumed not to have really earned these things unless they are deemed unattractive? That seems kind of sexist to me.
What I find most interesting about this is that all of you seem to have missed the point. It’s not about attractive women getting better grades. It’s about unattractive women getting worse grades.
“The attractiveness gap in grades appears to result more from lower grades for less attractive women than from higher grades for the most attractive women. When the researchers divided the women into three groups – average, more attractive and less attractive – they found a very small (and not statistically significant) gain for the above average attractiveness women. But for the least attractive third of women, the average course grade was 0.067 grade points below those earned by others, a statistically significant gap.”
That said, these are awfully small differences.
No, that post was a joke. Clearly you didn’t get it.
This is actually false. I know this one kid who looks like a duck that was accepted to MIT and all Ivy Leagues. If anything, attractive college applicants are less likely to get into college, because colleges like to see how ugly your child is on the outside and the inside. Good luck!
But how can one deem “attractiveness”? And what constitutes “1 standard deviation” of attractiveness? To me, there seem to be too many hasty generalizations and sub-par evidence to make a conclusive blanket-statement.
The article states that attractiveness was determined in this way:
In our culture, weight is a major determiner of whether someone will be considered attractive. However, this study doesn’t take weight into account except insofar as you can tell someone’s weight from their face.
Student ID photos are also unreliable because they can be obtained in different ways depending on the school and the student’s choice. For example, at my school you can either upload a pre-existing picture or get your picture taken by the school (in the style of a driver’s license picture). I chose the former, so my student ID picture is the best picture that has ever been taken of me. I went to a salon for my hair and makeup, even though I never wear makeup or do my hair in real life. My nose looks less weird than it usually does, and my mouth is closed so you can’t see the potentially off-putting flaws in my teeth. On the other hand, if the school took my picture I would look less attractive than I normally do.
I got great grades, and I can assure you I was not particularly attractive. Of course, I did attend an engineering school … 
I’m glad that this is only for females!
Admissions sometimes takes girls partly on looks. The same thing for guys, but to a lesser extent. I would think pretty girls would get lower grades if they didn’t play ball.
My D2’s colleges had no idea what she looked like, I think. She did not interview. She got in everyplace she applied, including UChicago, Swarthmore, Harvey Mudd and several other schools with great merit aid. She happens to be very attractive, but they couldn’t know that. @sattut, do you have any evidence to support your statement? It seems like an off the cuff opinion, but by all means share your data sources if you have them.
My D does say that commonly men in STEM assume she is stupid because she is pretty. She actually has gotten quite good at letting them make a few condescending remarks, then speaking up on whatever academic topic they are covering with in-depth knowledge and articulate opinions. She enjoys the stunned looks that follow.
Don’t students submit a photo for the SAT test? How do you know if schools cannot have access to them?
(trying to increase the level of college admissions paranoia)
I would be creeped out if I found out I got A in ochem because my professor found me attractive…
I see a lot of comments could use a refresher on some of the ways that psychology research work.
- Psychology research, and therefore the study referenced in this article, deals with averages. Sure, maybe you or your friend had higher grades than the supermodel who sat next to you, but the plural of anecdote is not data. This study is saying that, on average, attractive people make very slightly higher grades than their less-attractive peers.
- Although I am definitely not an expert, I expect that the great majority of discrimination seen in grades of attractive people is not purposeful. Maybe the professor is grading papers and, without noticing it, gives a more attractive student a slightly higher grade. Or maybe the professor gives grades for participation, and overestimates the amount of class participation that an attractive student has contributed. We are much more prone to make such mistakes than we usually believe. If that is surprising to you, I highly recommend the book "Thinking Fast and Slow", which is a really solid, simplified explanation of a lot of cool and applicable psychology concepts.