<p>Generally speaking, do you think professors prefer physically attractive students? Let's discuss.</p>
<p>I don’t think they really care. Why would they? One’s looks don’t really affect their academic performance, so imo, I don’t think it matters. </p>
<p>I mean, it’s always nice to see a good looking person, but a lot of times, inner beauty shines through and makes just as equal of an impression as outer beauty. You can sometimes really see and feel benevolence in some people, and at least for me, that increases their overall appeal. </p>
<p>Good professors? No. I’ve never encountered anything that seems like that in my college career.</p>
<p>Everyone prefers attractive people.</p>
<p>But not in the sense that they will give them better grades or give them an unfair advantage.</p>
<p>This article might surprise some of you:
<a href=“Teachers Give Better Grades to More Attractive Students: Study | TIME.com”>http://healthland.time.com/2013/12/10/teachers-give-better-grades-to-more-attractive-students-study/</a></p>
<p>I can look up for more articles, but I think this is adequate for now. Besides, you can also look for more if you wish.</p>
<p>Many professors do tend to favor attractive-looking students.</p>
<p>Who doesn’t like an attractive person?</p>
<p>But a professor prefers their definition of an enjoyable student. Looks don’t mean jack squat if they don’t like what comes out of the student’s mouth. </p>
<p>That article doesn’t look very scholarly to me. Sure it has some numbers and some big names, but I think I’d trust it more if it came from a respectable science journal or something. </p>
<p>But at any rate, even the article itself suggests that this correlation (and not necessarily causation) could be because the more attractive kids have boosted confidence levels. To me, that points more towards what’s inside of you, and like Niquii said, that supports the idea of a more enjoyable person. Because who would prefer a downtrodden, murky person to a smiling, confident one ? </p>
<p>Studies have shown that good looking people get breaks in pretty much all areas of life. Why would college professors be any different? I think most everyone on this thread agrees that it shouldn’t be so. But I am sure it is. Would you ever know if the prof bumped the good looking person from a C+ to a B- in the final grade (unless you were that good looking person)? And even if it was you, you wouldn’t really know if it was because of your looks.</p>
<p>I will make a couple comments in my role as a college writing professor that I believe (I can’t really know) are as true of my colleagues as they are of me.</p>
<ol>
<li><p>In class, I will respond more to students who respond to me. I do my best to draw out quiet students, but there is only so much I can do. That said, some students who participate are obnoxious or distracting. Students observing class discussion may imagine I am favoring such students when in fact I am merely being polite and hoping they will shut up soon. Further, while there is often a match between good students and students who participate, it is by no means exact. Active students frequently earn bad grades or even fail my class. Another student in class may have no way of knowing this. Student comments sometimes complain that I have have “pets.” I don’t. When I call on people who have hands up, I have a small but consistent pool to choose from. Those students, I suppose, are the ones others perceive to be my pets. The rest of the time I work my way alphabetically through the roster, or using some other method to ensure a kind of random distribution. As to “attractive” students, I suspect that the more active participants tend to be more attractive, but that’s probably the roughest correlation of all. And as I’ve indicated above, there is no clear path linking active students to good grades in the first place.</p></li>
<li><p>In my classes, most of your grade is based on your writing, and I will have graded several assignments before matching names to faces. If there were a relationship between looks are grades, my grade sheet should indicate a shift in grading patterns after about week three of a semester. It doesn’t. That is, the attractive students don’t suddenly start getting better grades at a rate greater than that of plainer students.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>I don’t think my looks have effected me in college. Though it definitely has from elementary through to high school. Mostly it just caused teachers to treat me badly. But there were a couple teachers that I know didn’t give me my deserved grade because of it. </p>
<p>I was just thinking about this a couple days ago. College is the first time in my life where I feel like my looks haven’t mattered and I’m being treated like an equal. It feels fantastic. Because of this, college classes and my homework are the first things I’ve looked forward to in my entire life and they make me happy. Before this I’ve always dreaded another day and had trouble just getting out of bed. I’ve done well in most of my grade school classes too, but it’s just not the same when the professors recognize my hard work instead of making snide comments about my appearance, homework, answers in class, or anything else they can think of. </p>
<p>I was wondering if this lack of bullying will continue onto the work environment where my co workers and bosses will be educated people. Because looks definitely matter among the uneducated blue collar type of jobs. But then again, grade school teachers are educated and they can be real ■■■■■■ bags, so maybe it wont.</p>
<p>Somewhat tangent to this thread:</p>
<p>Will a professor occasionally be a “matchmaker” for his students? Especially when the students are graduate school students who tend to have more interactions with the professors?</p>
<p>^That is a weird question… I mean, you find people who like to play matchmaker in all professions, I guess. </p>
<p><a href=“With a Full Quiver, Senator Schumer Is Quick to Release Cupid’s Arrows - The New York Times”>With a Full Quiver, Senator Schumer Is Quick to Release Cupid’s Arrows - The New York Times; </p>
<p>But why would a college professor be more or less likely to do that? I find Senator Shumer’s actions a bit creepy, and would feel that same way about a professor…</p>
<p>^ A very kind professor who regularly invites his students to Thanksgiving dinner (if they stay on campus) once inquired DS’s “opinion” toward another fellow student.</p>
<p>If a teacher prefers physically attractive students, he/she better take that secrete to their grave or when they change jobs, because that is a good reason for investigation and possible termination if something inappropriate originates from that. He/she is a professional and must act accordingly @ all times.
Students on the other hand, should not even entertain the idea of using their physical attributes to make it in college, because you will fall FLAT ON YOUR FACE sooner or later.</p>
<p>I had one class where they asked you not to put your names on your paper (instead to put your student ID) to ensure that there could be no bias. That seemed a bit silly to me, but apparently going to extremes to ensure there can be no bias is something that some take very seriously. </p>
<p>There were a few HS teachers who played favorites on the basis of attractiveness whom I never had. One ended up being barred from ever teaching in NYC again after being found guilty of sexually abusing a student. </p>
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<p>One department at my LAC did that with an older Prof who was found to have had a substantiated pattern of biased grading going back many years and student complaints to match. </p>
<p>Not only were exams to be taken using student ID#s, the exams were graded by two other Profs in the department along with that Prof to ensure such biased grading was eliminated to the extent possible. </p>
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<p>That made me chuckle. I had my dad as a prof. The second semester of grad school, he told me about another grad student, newly arrived from Wisconsin, he thought I might like. I thought, “Sure, Dad, whatever…” That grad student and I were engaged within three months! So Dad was a pretty good matchmaker. That was 29 years ago - we celebrate our 28th wedding anniversary on Saturday.</p>
<p>The preference might not be conscious at all:</p>
<p><a href=“Log in | Psychology Today”>http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/wired-success/201208/im-successful-because-im-beautiful-how-we-discriminate</a></p>
<p>“According to Dr. Gordon Patzer, who has concluded 3 decades of research on physical attractiveness, human beings are hard-wired to respond more favorably to attractive people: “Good-looking men and women are generally regarded to be more talented, kind, honest and intelligent than their less attractive counterparts.” Patzer contends, “controlled studies show people go out of their way to help attractive people—of the same sex and opposite sex—because they want to be liked and accepted by good-looking people.” Even studies of babies show they will look more intently and longer at attractive faces, Patzer argues.”</p>
<p>Maybe this a bigger deal in majors with more subjective grading, but in egineeerjng and other STEM majors there isn’t much wiggle room in the math. Not to mention I don’t think the Prof could match most names to a face from a lecture. </p>
<p>I taught a few college courses some years back. Although there are studies that suggest that attractive people are treated differently in general, I don’t think I had any bias related to a student’s physical appearance. I did, however, enjoy students who appeared to pay attention, asked thoughtful questions and participated appropriately in class discussions. When I graded papers that were graded subjectively, I didn’t pay attention to the student’s name until after a grade was assigned and grades were being recorded. That was not specifically to avoid bias based on student appearance or any other attribute, but in an honest effort to get the grading done as quickly and objectively as possible. I suspect most professors are much more influenced by academic performance than by appearance, but there must be at least a few who are more visually oriented. </p>