‘First impressions’ are a popular topic in social psychology. They are researched because the initial judgments of others are consequential in everyday life (such as job interviews, first dates, ...justice outcomes). In the context of broader concerns about the credibility of psychological science, first impressions research has developed commendable initiatives for improving reliability (open stimulus databases, international collaborations, replication studies and reanalyses). However, these initiatives can impact the validity of studying how people form first impressions. There is a long history of critiquing the usefulness of passive-observer judgments of controlled, reduced, presentations of people—and these concerns are still relevant today. Here, we highlight the praiseworthy practices improving reliability in first impressions research, before moving on to identify persistent methodological concerns in the field. This includes inadequate stimulus sampling and diversity, constrained participant response options, limited consideration of study context, and limitations of atomised presentations of target people. We identify how these methodological limitations impact theory development, how we might be over/underestimating everyday experience, and even misunderstanding social differences in autism and mental health. Finally, we identify opportunities for methodological reform, focusing on codifying instead of controlling interactions, promoting inductive, participant-led, methodologies, and asking for stronger theory development and clarity on ‘can’ vs. ‘do’ research questions. Overall, we praise reforms for improving the reliability of first impressions research, but improvements to making scientific predictions about first impressions require renewed consideration of validity.
Highlights
First impressions research has responded to the replication crisis in many ways, including making stimulus sets open, sharing data for re-analysis, replication studies, and worldwide collaborations.
However, the validity of common paradigms might be questioned given the asocial nature of participants observing and forced-responding to restricted, atomised, stimuli.
We need to consider validity in first impressions as we lack models which can be readily applied to everyday experiences—and we may even be misunderstanding social differences such as in autism and mental health.
We encourage researchers to consider validity and ask if they are studying ‘can’ or ‘do’ questions.
People's treatment of others (humans, nonhuman animals, or other entities) often depends on whether they think the entity is worthy of moral concern. Recent work has begun to investigate which ...entities are included in a person's moral circle, examining how certain target characteristics (e.g., species category, perceived intelligence) and judge characteristics (e.g., empathy, political orientation) shape moral inclusion. However, the relative importance of target and judge characteristics in predicting moral inclusion remains unclear. When predicting whether a person will deem an entity worthy of moral consideration, how important is it to know who is making the judgment (i.e., characteristics of the judge), who is being judged (i.e., characteristics of the target), and potential interactions between the two factors? Here, we address this foundational question by conducting a variance component analysis of the moral circle. In two studies with participants from the Netherlands, the United States, the United Kingdom, and Australia (N = 836), we test how much variance in judgments of moral concern is explained by between‐target differences, between‐judge differences, and by the interaction between the two factors. We consistently find that all three components explain substantial amounts of variance in judgments of moral concern. Our findings provide two important insights. First, an increased focus on interactions between target and judge characteristics is needed, as these interactions explain as much variance as target and judge characteristics separately. Second, any theoretical account that aims to provide an accurate description of moral inclusion needs to consider target characteristics, judge characteristics, and their interaction.
People usually engage in (or at least profess to engage in) altruistic acts to benefit others. Yet, they routinely fail to maximize how much good is achieved with their donated money and time. An ...accumulating body of research has uncovered various psychological factors that can explain why people's altruism tends to be ineffective. These prior studies have mostly focused on proximate explanations (e.g. emotions, preferences, lay beliefs). Here, we adopt an evolutionary perspective and highlight how three fundamental motives — parochialism, status, and conformity — can explain many seemingly disparate failures to do good effectively. Our approach outlines ultimate explanations for ineffective altruism, and we illustrate how fundamental motives can be leveraged to promote more effective giving.
Deceiving others is generally viewed as immoral. However, most people lie on a daily basis. This article examines the psychological consequences for the liars themselves, as they are participating in ...what is generally perceived as immoral behaviour. More specifically, this article focuses on the effects of lying on the liar's self‐esteem and affect. We tested if lying, in comparison to telling the truth, lowers people's self‐esteem and increases negative experienced affect. In total, three cross sectional and one longitudinal studies were conducted (N = 783). Results showed that lying decreased people's self‐esteem and increased negative affect, regardless of the type of lie (self‐centred vs. other‐oriented). Furthermore, lying on a given day decreased people's self‐esteem compared to their self‐esteem on the previous day and to their average level of self‐esteem across 5 days.
Research into COVID-19 susceptibility and outcomes are critical, but claims must be carefully evaluated to inform policy decisions. In a recent series of articles, Manning and Fink 1–3 use ...national-level data to describe associations between case-fatality ratios and male and female finger ratios (2D:4D), a suggested measure of prenatal androgen exposure, as well as angiotensin-converting enzyme (ACE) allele and genotype frequencies. The authors suggest that 2D:4D is linked with ACE variant prevalence, and that higher male 2D:4D is associated with higher case fatality ratios, and point to 2D:4D as a useful prognostic measure for COVID-19 susceptibility. A critical review and robust Bayesian analysis of the hypothesis is described here, finding no conclusive evidence of COVID-19 mortality and 2D:4D, nor associations between 2D:4D and ACE1 allele or ACE2 genotype frequency. This absence of evidence is present for data taken from the second wave of COVID-19 in October 2020. Problematic theoretical grounding, individual-level conclusions drawn from national-level data, and issues with statistical inference in the original articles are discussed. Taken together, the current data offer no clear utility of 2D:4D in determining COVID-19 outcomes.
•Higher COVID-19 mortality has been linked to national-level 2D:4D in males.•National 2D:4D has also been linked to ACE polymorphisms.•Original studies over-rely on p-values for evidence, with weak theoretical support.•Bayesian analyses show inconclusive evidence for 2D:4D and ACE links.•Bayesian analyses also show inconclusive evidence for 2D:4D and COVID-19 mortality.
•We study the effect of Airbnb hosts’ appearance on the price of their listings.•An analysis of 1,020 listings in New York shows a positive effect of attractiveness.•We also find that Black hosts ...charge lower prices for similar listing.•This suggests that hosts’ appearance influences consumers’ apartment preferences.
Online peer-to-peer markets, such as Airbnb, often include profile photos of sellers to reduce anonymity. Ert, Fleischer, and Magen (2016) found that more trustworthy-looking, but not more attractive-looking, Airbnb hosts from Stockholm charge higher prices for similar apartments. This suggests that people are willing to pay more for a night in an apartment if the host looks trustworthy. Here, we present a pre-registered replication testing how photo-based impressions of hosts’ attractiveness and trustworthiness influence rental prices. We extend previous investigations by (a) controlling for additional features related to price (e.g., the apartment’s location value), (b) testing for an influence of other host features, such as race and facial expression, and (c) analyzing a substantially larger sample of apartments. An analysis of 1,020 listings in New York City showed that more attractive-looking, but not more trustworthy-looking, hosts charge higher prices for their apartments. Compared to White hosts, Black (but not Asian) hosts charge lower prices for their apartments. Hosts who smile more intensely in their profile photo charge higher prices. Our results support the general conclusion that people rely on profile photos in online markets, though we find that attractiveness is more important than trustworthiness.
Faces play a central role in person perception. People spontaneously judge others' personality based on their facial appearance and these impressions guide many consequential decisions. When do ...people rely on facial appearance? In five studies (N = 1936, four preregistered), we test whether reliance on facial appearance depends on the goal of impression formation (i.e., on which trait dimension targets are evaluated). Trait impressions are, to a large extent, based on the resemblance of facial cues to emotional expressions. As emotional expressiveness is a central component of sociability, we hypothesized that people would more readily perceive sociability in faces. We find that facial appearance is seen as more indicative of a person's sociability than their morality or competence (Study 1, n = 338), and this was particularly true for sociability traits that are characterized by emotional expressions (e.g., enthusiasm, playfulness; Study 2, n = 162). We find the same pattern when examining the influence of facial cues on judgment and decision-making. People are more confident in the accuracy of their trait impressions when judging sociability (Study 3, n = 527), they value information on the facial appearance of job candidates more when looking for a sociable employee (Study 4, n = 390), and they view reliance on facial appearance when making hiring decisions as more appropriate and more effective when looking for a sociable employee (Study 5, n = 519). Together, our results provide converging evidence that people view facial appearance as especially relevant for judging a person's sociability.
People spontaneously judge others’ personality based on their facial appearance and these impressions guide many important decisions. Although the consequences of personality impressions are well ...documented, studies on the accuracy of personality impressions have yielded mixed results. Moreover, relatively little is known about people’s accuracy awareness (i.e., whether they are aware of their judgment accuracy). Even if accuracy is generally low, awareness of accuracy would allow people to rely on their impressions in the right situations. In two studies (one preregistered), we estimated perceivers’ accuracy and accuracy awareness when forming personality impressions based on facial photographs. Our studies have three crucial advantages as compared to previous studies (a) by incentivizing accuracy and accuracy awareness, (b) by relying on substantially larger samples of raters ( n
Study 1
= 223, n
Study 2
= 423) and targets ( k
Study 1
= 140, k
Study 2
= 1,260 unique pairs with 280 unique targets), and (c) by conducting Bayesian analyses to also quantify evidence for the null hypothesis. Our findings suggest that face-based personality impressions are not accurate, that perceivers lack insight into their (in)accuracy, and that most people overestimate their accuracy.
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