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Underground > Art, Fashion & Design >

Is there any correlation between physical attractiveness/dress sense and unpleasantness in people?

  
  

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All Acting Regiment
14:36 / 18.04.07
So let's hear the question again:

Is there any correlation between physical attractiveness/dress sense and unpleasantness in people?

Now, that's obviously a hugely problematic question, and to be honest I'm not entirely sure where I want this thread to go. So perhaps I should just point out the obvious problems with my starting question -

a) What actually is physical attractiveness?
b) " " " dress sense?
c) Are the above two not actually the same thing, and also simply = confidence?
d) What is "unpleasantness"?

Even after all these, though, I still feel as though there's something worth looking at here. The grand majority of people who look good - who look "sexy" or accomplished in whatever way - often seem to be (and I think there's a lot in that seem) very unpleasant, with a very high opinion of themselves and little regard for the thoughts and feelings of others - as if somehow knowing how to play the signifier game (in fashion, in how to dress for their body type, in knowing how to move/dance) creates this barrier of disdain for people who score lower in all those categories.

Yet I've met very attractive people who were also wonderfully friendly and pleasant. And of course, the fact that these notional unpleasant people appear so is probably a register of how little I know them.

Gosh, this is far too subjective and wooly. Does anyone have anything to add? I put it here because of its relevance to personal style and fashion, but if it feels more like a conversation thread, that's also fine.
 
 
Glenn Close But No Cigar
16:07 / 18.04.07
The grand majority of people who look good - who look "sexy" or accomplished in whatever way - often seem to be (and I think there's a lot in that seem) very unpleasant, with a very high opinion of themselves and little regard for the thoughts and feelings of others - as if somehow knowing how to play the signifier game (in fashion, in how to dress for their body type, in knowing how to move/dance) creates this barrier of disdain for people who score lower in all those categories

Really think this isn't on, old thing. No idea whether you can dress / dance / have a conventionally attractive face or body, but I can imagine somebody who did not possess these attributes feeling that those who did looked down on them. Perhaps that somebody would be better of reflecting on whether the pretty, stylist, dancey people feel disdain for them, or whether they'd actually come to that conclusion because were projecting the disdain they felt for themselves?

Confidence isn't the same an unduly high opinion of oneself. People who draw confidence from their prettiness etc. are sometimes pretty inside, and sometimes not. One does not always drive the other.

You're right about one thing, though. This is for convo, and is maybe a SBR thread.
 
 
Hallo, Paper Spaceboy
16:12 / 18.04.07
The grand majority of people who look good - who look "sexy" or accomplished in whatever way - often seem to be (and I think there's a lot in that seem) very unpleasant, with a very high opinion of themselves and little regard for the thoughts and feelings of others...

Generalization leading into the "Plain girls have great personalities! / Sexy girls are mean!" stereotypes. While certainly some people are aware of their physical attractiveness enough to feel superior as a result of it, this is not across the board and has more to do with their self-image (which is, I'd suggest, occasionally a self-delusion) than their attractiveness.

Referring to "the grand majority" seems dodgy to me on a number of levels, and makes me wonder how much of this is informed by media portrayals of "good looking" and "not good looking" people - which would be worth looking at. Hollywood portrayals seem to be a particular touchstone for this discussion, and there's always the omnipresent ugly=smart and beautiful=stupid stereotypes that tend to go hand in hand with this.

I know a number of people who have a particular relationship with fashion (because of emphasis placed or not placed on it during upbringing / artistic leanings / etc) and happen to be quite attractive physically from my point-of-view are really quite sweet and caring.
 
 
miss wonderstarr
16:17 / 18.04.07
I think one of the key problems with trying to draw up any such correlation would be the difficulty in pinning down what "good looking" and "attractive" means. Sure, there are some generally-accepted conventions, rules and templates, but as sexual attractiveness is so complex and subjective, I think it'd be very difficult indeed ~ to the point of it being impossible and pointless, perhaps ~ to establish any link between that and people's behaviour.

And then you'd have to try to pinpoint mean or disdainful behaviour, of course ~ I think it's pretty rare outside teen cheerleader movies for anyone to be just plain nasty as a personality trait.

To use myself as a rough-n-ready example, I'm sure some people think I'm very attractive, some think I'm moderately so, and some can see nothing attractive in me whatsoever. Some people probably think I'm a lovely, kind individual, some think I'm a queen bitch; many probably acknowledge that I can be both.

So I'm afraid both your categories are kind of... slippery.
 
 
miss wonderstarr
16:26 / 18.04.07
I'm thick though because actually you've acknowledged that in your first post. However, I think they're such hard qualities to pin down that it may be absurd to try to seek some mathematical correlation between such fluid terms.
 
 
MattShepherd: I WEDDED KALI!
16:39 / 18.04.07
Is there any correlation between physical attractiveness/dress sense and unpleasantness in people?

Not that I've noticed.

"Better looks = greater self-confidence = more graciousness"

is a formula that applies as well as

"Better looks = feeling of superiority = jerkiness".

Similarly,

"Unattractive = more focused on the intangible = delightful"

is a formula that applies on par with

"Unattractive = bitter and oblivious to social mores = unpleasant".
 
 
Quantum
17:07 / 18.04.07
Well, I'm sexy as all hell and dance like a demon, dress to kill and yet I'm still pleasant and lovely to be around. Yet here in Brighton there are lots of beautiful stylish people who are just mean and up themselves, so I don't see a connection between one and t'other TBH.
 
 
Princess
17:29 / 18.04.07
I'm sexy *and* friendly *and* I've got rocking shoes.
 
 
Olulabelle
19:39 / 18.04.07
I know a number of people who have a particular relationship with fashion (because of emphasis placed or not placed on it during upbringing / artistic leanings / etc) and happen to be quite attractive physically from my point-of-view are really quite sweet and caring.

Because you took the time to explain in that sentence, it seems as if you feel surprised about beautiful people being nice. The words 'sweet' and 'caring' feel a little bit as if you're talking down to those 'pretty' people.

I could be reading that wrong, but it felt slightly as if you were the clever dude with his 'sweet', 'caring' pretty friends.

As for the rest of it, I suppose that it's possible you may be confusing nastiness for confidence. Lots of unconfident people see people who have confidence as a threat. The people with the shy dispositions, the ones who stand with their shoulders hunched in the corner are not the people who are going to get noticed. If you're confident and beautiful then of course people are going to notice you. And yes, people might perceive you as louder, more 'annoying'. It doesn't mean you are.

I think often it's the people without the confidence who have the problem. I think they project a lot of insecurity onto the ordinary behaviour of confident people.
 
 
Hallo, Paper Spaceboy
23:22 / 18.04.07
Lula: Because you took the time to explain in that sentence, it seems as if you feel surprised about beautiful people being nice. The words 'sweet' and 'caring' feel a little bit as if you're talking down to those 'pretty' people.

I'm not sure who you're addressing, Lula -- that quotation was what I said, but much of your post seems directed at Allecto. I certainly did not mean to condescend to the physically attractive, but was teasing out my statement -- which was part of a whole post on the issue -- which was meant to point out the problem with Allecto's opening topic-starter. I'm not sure where exactly the tone you're seeing in "sweet" and "caring" is coming from, because it was not part of my intent.
 
 
johnny enigma
11:53 / 24.04.07
Personally, I can't find someone physically attractive if I find them unpleasant, and the opposite is also true - if someone has a nice personality, I'm more likely to find them physically attractive. And I've no idea why.........
 
 
Olulabelle
21:32 / 24.04.07
Papers, so sorry. I was confusing you with Allecto. The first bit directed to you, the second about Allecto's opening post.
 
 
Katherine
07:53 / 25.04.07
I have been thinking about this thread for a couple of days and I wonder if part of it because of how an attractive person makes you feel and therefore how you perceive their words and actions?
 
 
All Acting Regiment
13:42 / 25.04.07
I think often it's the people without the confidence who have the problem. I think they project a lot of insecurity onto the ordinary behaviour of confident people.

Now this here is OTM. I hate to use anecdotes and dredge up stuff people have no obligation to know about me, but you remember The Bastard Rockist Flatmates I ranted about quite a lot back in the convo? A lot of that going on there, methinks (their "hating the trendy dicks/slags", refusal to even try to comprehend current popular music as music made by human beings, positions I might have occupied at thirteen but now find...pitiful).

Personally, I can't find someone physically attractive if I find them unpleasant, and the opposite is also true - if someone has a nice personality, I'm more likely to find them physically attractive. And I've no idea why...

That's interesting. How does it work if you've never heard a person speak/have no idea of how pleasant you find them?

I have been thinking about this thread for a couple of days and I wonder if part of it because of how an attractive person makes you feel and therefore how you perceive their words and actions?

You mean, that if person A finds person B attractive, then person B (+ their words/actions) gets seen by A as a challenge, or a threat (because of the head-rearing biological neccesity to mate with them felt by A)? I think that might be a workable model.
 
 
HCE
14:07 / 25.04.07
But even confidence is a bit unpredictable, isn't it? It depends on what situation you're in, whether you've had enough to eat, whether you're on good terms with your companions, have an exam coming up, whether a passing car has just splashed muddy water on your good shoes.

If I have seen any correlation, it is that if somebody has gone to some trouble to look nice and feels successful at that, that person will be happy about it, in a good mood, while people who fail to find an outfit that satisfies them will sulk.
 
 
Shrug
09:55 / 26.04.07
I think the reasons people are unpleasant (or even appear unpleasant to others) are so vast as to be completely unquantifiable.

None of which means this thread can't have an interesting trajectory, of course, but it is, nevertheless, a quite bothering suggested binary wherein the correalation of "dress sense/attractiveness=unpleasantness" could easily be replaced by "intelligence=unpleasantness" or "hair colour=unpleasantness" etc.

In fact my gut reaction, which I've refrained from posting up until now, was the pretty flip "Yes and No and don't be so silly."

Which once again isn't to piss on anyone's chips overly. But honestly.

(I also realise that I'm not being very helpful. Apologies)
 
 
All Acting Regiment
14:35 / 26.04.07
No, no, it's a good point. Sometimes stupid questions need to be asked just to stab them, though.
 
 
Cailín
15:54 / 26.04.07
There might be something to a relationship between the amount of effort a person puts into his or her appearance (attractiveness being another kettle of fish entirely, and altogether too subjective to really gauge, not to mention that I personally feel that, once you get a certain point, the more effort you put in, the worse you look), and how they interact with someone who puts in more or less effort. This is one of the rare cases where we can actually catch a glimpse something of a person's priorities on the outside, and it's not hard to jump to conclusions about the person they might be, thus colouring the way we deal with one another.
Those who put a lot of effort into their appearance (I mean on a daily basis) are often perceived as self-centered. Ergo they may be seen as stuck-up, unpleasant, and generally full of themselves.
The reverse of that is that those who spend little time tend to be branded as sloppy. Ergo they may be seen as simple, gross, and generally lacking in ability.
I think both sides of the equation are hyper-aware of how they might be perceived and may take up a defensive posture
at the outset.
I think of myself as somewhere in the middle - I am tidy and relatively well-dressed, but I don't wear make-up very often and I have one of those low-to-no-maintenance haircuts. And I often catch myself looking at the super-put-together, manicured and coiffed type and sneering - mainly because my responsibilities prevent me from being self-indulgent, and being responsible is, to me anyway, a pretty desirable trait in a person.
On the other hand, I've had spa salespeople get pretty ugly with me when I refuse to buy some special package deal they're selling: "Oh. Okay. So you don't take care of yourself. Forget I asked."

The moral of the story: I think the nastiness goes both ways.
 
 
This Sunday
00:40 / 27.04.07
(Some) People seem to respond weirdly to someone who is dressed well or at least, who is dressed in a way that clearly fits them and makes them notably different from other surrounding individuals in a stylish, attention-drawing manner. They treat it as a sort of authority and/or react to the person as though they're snooty, snotty, or otherwise trying to be something. This includes someone wearing a leopard-print skirt, or anything that's cut in a way that's not just having limb or neck-holes.

I've watched guys convince themselves women are after them because the guy went to a woman's house, sometimes unexpectedly, and they! Were wearing! Shorts! At least one time there were two women! In shorts! Clear case of dramatic and needy seduction, yes.

A friend of mine was just threatened over her job for wearing a leopard-print skirt. She agreed to never wear it again. Her tops were too low-cut. She agreed to fix that. And she shouldn't wear flannel, anymore, because it was distracting. She agreed while realizing she didn't actually own any flannel and so couldn't have possibly worn any to work.

I used to have a roommate who complained - a lot - that I wore shirts with 'all these buttons everywhere' and then complained because I wasn't buttoning all the buttons.

I've seen people come to the conclusion that people who wear glasses only do so because it makes them seem like something. And people who, unlike the shorts thing but very like any low-necked top both female and male, leap at the idea that someone who wears glasses regularly not having them on or taking them is a sign they're trying to seduce them.

For me, I can't be bothered to keep a standard of upkeep going, and somedays bother to shave, brush my hair until it stops poking out all over, wear a three-piece and matching socks, while just as often I do half of those and half of the pulling things into little bands and rolling them back until I can operate, whether I look horrible or not. I don't have the daily routine thing.

And people, weirdly, seem to think I'm trying to pick up on them if they wake me up and my hair's down, my glasses are off, and I'm sort of befuddled by air currents and sentences involving more than two nouns. Or that I'm being a jerk if I wear cufflinks or take out a handkerchief for any reason.

When I get to know people I find myself assuming their general style of dress/presentation is great if they're a good sort of person. People who annoy me could wear nothing by YSL and Cavalli in stunning compositions and I'd probably react distastefully to the clothes even though it's got nothing to do with them. I'm petty and simple like that.

What I find really interesting, is the sort of people who can take a compliment on a clothing item, and those for whom their clothes and accoutrements are not to be spoken of. Always seemed a bit jerky to me, getting pissy because someone likes the collar of a blouse or the faux flaps with the red stenciling pattern on a pair of white jeans. There should be a latinate psychology term for that, meaning people who dress to be seen but not by you or something.
 
 
All Acting Regiment
11:43 / 29.04.07
Someone who wears glasses regularly not having them on or taking them off is a sign they're trying to seduce them.

Weeeeeell...
 
 
Olulabelle
20:24 / 29.04.07
I think making assumptions about people and what clothes they have on in relation to their reaction to you is ridiculous, and I can't see how anyone could do that with any sense of real validity in their minds. Opening the door with your shorts on or hair down has to be entirely unrelated to an unexpected caller. Doesn't it? I really can't quite get my head around someone who thinks it 'must' relate somehow to them. Isn't the issue there surely self-absorption, and therefore a little bit separate to this discussion?

I do know it's quite easy to make assumptions about people, especially well-presented people. As a child I used to envy the girls with beautiful clean fingernails, because I always looked as if I needed a good wash. I did wash! I just looked dirty all the time.

I still see some women as being beauitfully presented, their nails are always perfectly clean, or polished and they never forget to wax or whatever. And they always have their make-up on. I wish I could do that, but I quite frankly can't be arsed to do my nails everyday. Often I think it's to do with jobs. Some of them are probably important city people, where appearances matter. I'm a jeweller. I don't sit in an office, I saw metal and melt metal and put things in acid. My hands are dirty and my clothes are deliberately old. The city person and me, we're not the same people and we don't have the same lives so it's ridiculous to compare.
 
 
Tsuga
22:23 / 29.04.07
It doesn't seem like anyone has discussed the way attractive people are treated within society, in that regardless of their character they are often complimented or treated with deference, put higher on the monkey ladder. People are paying attention all the time, and what a burden that would be. Whether or not you are a fantastic person or a shitheel is generally beside the point (other than in reality, which many people often forget).
But, a lifetime of that fawning crap from people could certainly effect a personality, no matter how decent or intelligent the person is.
Dress sense is a different beast, I think, in that perhaps "attractive" people are dressing more to show that off or cover it, and "less attractive" people may make themselves more attractive or feel more attractive to get that attention or hide what they or others perceive as unattractive. There certainly are many different motives and permutations of show/hide.
 
 
This Sunday
22:42 / 29.04.07
'Attractive' is a bit of a suspect term, though. It's very hard to deal with, because we live in a world where some people dig skeleton-thin and some go gaga for big meaty types. I think of attractiveness much more in terms of behaviour and body-language than I do physical features. I mean, my grandfather thinks Julia Roberts looks like an alien, a friend thinks she looks FAS, and yet we're sold that she's beautiful beyond. I tend to find people who appear bitter to be unattractive, but that's got nothing to do with the size of their nose, their bust, or their jewelry.

I'm a bad example for this, though, clearly. I remember, realizing how bad, when walking with someone, months back, and passing a woman as we entered a store. I was immediately struck by this woman's poise; she carried herself proudly and pleasantly. And I mean struck, like struck daffy. And the person with me was agog, mouth-dropping, panicking. When we got inside, they explained, her eyes were very unsymmetrical, one high up and one low on her face. They felt horrible for reacting in such a way, and were trying not to. And I hadn't even noticed, I just thought she held herself well.

I find flirty attractive/enticing and find myself unintentionally doing things that might be considered flirty often. I bat my eyes and smile, I like looking at people when communicating. But I don't just flirt with people who look like they should be on the cover of a fashion or Hollywood magazine. I find myself doing it with people who are, themselves, flirty.

I used to think I had a problem with 'boyish' looking guys. Because some of them I'd run across recently had seemed really punchable to me. But, thinking about it, I realized it was their smugness that bothered me, not their physical features. Other 'boyish' type men don't bother me in the same way.

Other people are all about a certain bodypart in certain arrangement or measurement. How's that work out for you, those of us here who do have those tendencies? I can't imagine really being zonked out over a particular breast or jaw size, or the shape and color of the sexual organs of X. Clearly it does work for some people, and I have wondered if I'm missing out.

But it's the variety of the different types people go for that keeps the 'attractive' from being anything more than a media sell, that doesn't even reflect well in real life.
 
 
This Sunday
19:21 / 30.04.07
Not to continually hijack the thread, but I wanted to address: Isn't the issue there surely self-absorption, and therefore a little bit separate to this discussion?

I think, in terms of making a correlation between attractiveness and unpleasantness, the only route that I could take would be an it's all in the head route. And, yes, there's some definite self-absorption going on, but I've known a lot of guys who sprung to it immediately. Shorts, decolletage, and lipstick are worn for them and them, alone. Even when they're unexpected. And there's also enough people out there who presume on other fronts; we all do, in some way, I'm sure. A friend of mine has some weird, semi-arbitrary rule about guys in Misfits shirts all being assholes and women in them being invariably witty, adventurous and fun. It's a stupid guideline, but she adhere's to it in the face of logic. Other people respond weirdly to jewelry, and decide that men with an earring are gay, showing off, or desperate to appear trendy. Or a gay, show-off pirate desperate to appear trendy.

We all read into people's clothes to a degree, and that read is almost always self-absorbed. Because, while you may recognize that some kid's necklace is a roleplaying accessory from a White Wolf thing, someone else may just think it's some cute keepsake of a love long gone, or that it's some new emo thing and they should rush out and buy one too. And none of those reads needs to be right, or even right to have an effect.
 
 
Olulabelle
20:53 / 30.04.07
Dress sense is a different beast, I think, in that perhaps "attractive" people are dressing more to show that off or cover it, and "less attractive" people may make themselves more attractive or feel more attractive to get that attention or hide what they or others perceive as unattractive. There certainly are many different motives and permutations of show/hide.

But it is very easy to appear plain and dull if you do not make any effort, when you are standing next to an ordinary looking person who has made a great deal of effort indeed.

Take, for example, (because it is very relevant to this discussion, even though simplistic) the current Ugly Betty - Betty character. Obviously utterly beautiful, she is given unattractive clothes and crap hair and she seems somehow less so. But if you see her 'dressed up' then she becomes beautiful again.

'Ugly' Betty:



Beautiful America Ferrara:



Actually, you know what? I might have just ruined my own point. I actually prefer her in the first picture!
 
 
All Acting Regiment
15:47 / 02.05.07
There's also a difference there between smiles - both staged to some extent, as are all, but in the first one she's affecting, in character, the submissive, underconfident smile, whereas in the second one she's doing a Power Smile. It's interesting how smiles can be used in those two different ways, but a frown will tend to always seem unnatractive - either miserable and weedy or brutal/beastly.
 
 
Shrug
18:15 / 02.05.07
Is the line where confidence crosses over into disdain be an easier lens through which to view the original question?*

*And apologies for my earlier rant Allecto, you were of course completely correct in your reply.
 
 
Quantum
18:49 / 02.05.07
The problem with Ugly Betty is that she's obviously really beautiful, even after all the make-up people's attempts to hide it. In the fifties (where the ugly betty trope comes from if not much earlier) the beautiful girl would simply have her hair up in a bun and be wearing glasses. "Why miss Jones, you're beautiful!"

The thing that brought me here - we watched the Breakfast Club recently and the Ally Sheedy makeover scene makes me cry. She's so cool and attractive, and then they eighties her up into a disgusting doll conforming to the ideas of acceptable appearance at the time. Like Betty, the 'Ugly' character is very attractive and the 'Beauty' character just the same but wearing mainstream clothes.
 
 
This Sunday
18:58 / 02.05.07
The Breakfast Club is potentially one of the most insulting films of its time. On every level.
 
 
Shrug
20:39 / 02.05.07
DD, You see The Breakfast Club as you want to see The Breakfast Club... In the simplest terms, in the most convenient definitions. *titter*
 
 
Regrettable Juvenilia
05:54 / 03.05.07
There's also a difference there between smiles - both staged to some extent, as are all, but in the first one she's affecting, in character, the submissive, underconfident smile, whereas in the second one she's doing a Power Smile.

Could you explain this a little more? I have to say that honestly I can't see where you're getting this, and I've never heard the term 'Power Smile' before. Is there something specific about what America Ferrera is doing with her mouth in each photo, or is there a possibility that you might be projecting based on the other signifiers in each photo and your other ideas about the actress and the character she plays?
 
 
This Sunday
06:52 / 03.05.07
Those are both power smiles it's just there's less tooth showing (for obvious reasons) in the first. A 'power smile' is basically a modelling/presenting technique, the big, supertoothy smile, usually accompanied by the princess-wave. I don't know that it's terribly off-putting to everyone, because I know it isn't to me. When it looks pained, sure, but some people just happen to smile like that. Innate showiness or just the way their face works.
 
 
ONLY NICE THINGS
09:30 / 03.05.07

The thing that brought me here - we watched the Breakfast Club recently and the Ally Sheedy makeover scene makes me cry. She's so cool and attractive, and then they eighties her up into a disgusting doll conforming to the ideas of acceptable appearance at the time. Like Betty, the 'Ugly' character is very attractive and the 'Beauty' character just the same but wearing mainstream clothes.

Doesn't this kind of make the point that the premise of this thread is hopelessly flawed, though? Because not only are ideas of beauty acculturated, but even within that culture ideas of beauty change with time, with peer group, with media exposure, with whim or proclivity. "Teen Movie", obviously generally a shagging embarrassment, has a rather good recurring joke riffing on She's All That, where the ugly duckling selected to be the prom king's date is obviously beautiful, but has her hair in a ponytail and wears glasses. Each time the possibility of making her presentable is mentioned, the incredulous reaction is "But she wears glasses. And her hair up! How could you possibly ever hope to correct those deformities?"

"Pretty in Pink", "The Breakfast Club", "Some Kind of Wonderful" - these all demonstrate that to our sensibilities the socially-excluded loner look from the 80s is more in tune with our sensibilities than the perception of socially acceptable beauty pushed in the 80s.
 
 
Regrettable Juvenilia
09:45 / 03.05.07
Yes - which is why even the now common observation that not only is the actress who plays Ugly Betty not actually ugly, but that she doesn't even appear ugly (to the person making the observation) when dressed and made-up in character, is an observation that is actually one level of sophistication down from the show itself. Ugly Betty isn't under any illusions that Betty is ugly. Instead, one of the things that the (highly stylised, camp, tongue-in-cheek) show is about is culture clash - often the kind of culture clashes that arise from racial, geographical and class differences (white/Latina, blue collar/moneyed, Uptown Manhattan/Brooklyn, for example). So in fact it's very away that subjectivity is all - something that, as Haus states, this thread doesn't really seem to start out with a very keen awareness of.
 
 
Olulabelle
10:31 / 03.05.07
Yes clearly the show isn't under illusions that Betty is ugly, and neither are the viewers. That's the whole point of the programme isn't it? But the idea is that some of the people in the show think she is, because she wears unfashionable clothes and has braces.

I do think people are trying to have some awareness of the levels of subjectivity in atractiveness here in this thread. What makes you think it isn't happening?
 
  

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