Democrats and Republicans Can Be Differentiated from Their Faces

[kpete]

Democrats and Republicans Can Be Differentiated from Their Faces

Individuals' faces communicate a great deal of information about them. Although some of this information tends to be perceptually obvious (such as race and sex), much of it is perceptually ambiguous, without clear or obvious visual cues.

Here we found that individuals' political affiliations could be accurately discerned from their faces. In Study 1, perceivers were able to accurately distinguish whether U.S. Senate candidates were either Democrats or Republicans based on photos of their faces. Study 2 showed that these effects extended to Democrat and Republican college students, based on their senior yearbook photos. Study 3 then showed that these judgments were related to differences in perceived traits among the Democrat and Republican faces. Republicans were perceived as more powerful than Democrats. Moreover, as individual targets were perceived to be more powerful, they were more likely to be perceived as Republicans by others. Similarly, as individual targets were perceived to be warmer, they were more likely to be perceived as Democrats.

These data suggest that perceivers' beliefs about who is a Democrat and Republican may be based on perceptions of traits stereotypically associated with the two political parties and that, indeed, the guidance of these stereotypes may lead to categorizations of others' political affiliations at rates significantly more accurate than chance guessing.

Nicholas O. Rule*, Nalini Ambady

Department of Psychology, Tufts University, Medford, Massachusetts, United States of America
Abstract Top
Background

Individuals' faces communicate a great deal of information about them. Although some of this information tends to be perceptually obvious (such as race and sex), much of it is perceptually ambiguous, without clear or obvious visual cues.
Methodology/Principal Findings

Here we found that individuals' political affiliations could be accurately discerned from their faces. In Study 1, perceivers were able to accurately distinguish whether U.S. Senate candidates were either Democrats or Republicans based on photos of their faces. Study 2 showed that these effects extended to Democrat and Republican college students, based on their senior yearbook photos. Study 3 then showed that these judgments were related to differences in perceived traits among the Democrat and Republican faces. Republicans were perceived as more powerful than Democrats. Moreover, as individual targets were perceived to be more powerful, they were more likely to be perceived as Republicans by others. Similarly, as individual targets were perceived to be warmer, they were more likely to be perceived as Democrats.
Conclusions/Significance

These data suggest that perceivers' beliefs about who is a Democrat and Republican may be based on perceptions of traits stereotypically associated with the two political parties and that, indeed, the guidance of these stereotypes may lead to categorizations of others' political affiliations at rates significantly more accurate than chance guessing.


Thus, Democrats and Republicans were perceived to possess different personality traits based on the appearance of their faces. Participants who were naïve to the differences in the targets' political affiliations rated the Republicans' faces as appearing more powerful than the Democrats' faces. More important, the perceptions of who were Democrats and Republicans in Study 2 were significantly related to particular traits. The faces of targets believed by more perceivers to be Republicans were seen as more powerful whereas the faces of targets believed by more perceivers to be Democrats were seen as more warm. The uneven distribution of men and women across the two parties in the sample did not affect these results. Moreover, perceptions of Power from the targets' faces partially mediated the relationship between the targets' actual and perceived political affiliations, suggesting a mechanism responsible for perceivers' judgments. These data therefore suggest that participants' categorizations of targets as Democrats and Republicans may relate to stereotypes of Democrats as warm and Republicans as powerful <24>, <25>.

much more:
http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0008733

[Demoiselle]

1. No illustrations?

I tried to find some....couldn't.
And I have another quibble. Well, actually, it ain't a quibble for me. The authors consistently use the word "Democrat" as an adjective, as in "Democrat students."
Other than that....well, I'd still like pictures.

[Warpy]

2. I suggest a better word for "powerful" might be "domineering."

After all, college students aren't likely to be powerful, not even if they're set to inherit multiple millions at the age of 21.

Every workplace bully I've ever known was a Republican. Many of the bosses were Democrats.

[Aramchek]

3. or possibly 'meatheaded'?

[donco6]

5. Thuggish? n/t

[unblock]

10. exactly. the trait is a willingness to inflict pain on others for their own greed.

that's not power; that's selfishness, insecurity, and good evidence of a tiny dick.

powerlust is not powerful.

[yowzayowzayowza]

11. Authoritarian.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conservatives_without_Conscience

[Lorien]

4. A friend of mine who is a journalist says the same thing

He says that he can almost always guess if a person is a Dem or a repug before he interviews them just by looking at their faces. He maintains that repugs "look like a wall that no new information can penetrate."

[Skittles]

12. HE IS CORRECT

[patrice]

6. Add perception of power to findings by Milgram and Zimbardo and you have why you should vote

for Democrats, despite of their flaws.

[gateley]

7. We process so much info subconsciously (subliminally?) without

even being aware that we're doing so. There was a recent book entitled "Blink" that wrote of this. It's fascinating.

[Marr]

8. My god, that was a lot of words to say something simple. :P

Our right-wing party tries to portray itself as strong, stoic, businesslike, etc. What passes for the left party in this country promotes a different image. These are just stereotypes, sold with with advertising and media.

You might also say people can accurately guess whether a smoker prefers Virginia Slims or Marlboros, by looking at their shoes. :P

[Quasimodem]

9. So what does an apolitical person look like?

Or is this like in psychology where there is no definition for sanity?

[Skittles]

13. .

[Sheepshank]

14. lol on first read I thought you said feces n/t

[woo me with science]

15. Really?