There are people we trust instinctively and those we do not, says the research. More often than not, this decision is based on physical appearance.
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GUILDFORD, U.K.: A new study has found that subconsciously we are more likely to trust people with similar facial features to our own, but less likely to be physically attracted to them.
There are people we trust instinctively and those we do not, says the research. More often than not, this decision is based on physical appearance.
Using computer graphics, a team led by Lisa DeBruine from the University of Aberdeen in Scotland, manipulated faces so they looked more or less similar to participants in their study. Effectively, the faces either resembled siblings or not, said DeBruine.
Take a chance
One experiment involved the participant deciding whether they would trust another person to make an important decision about money which could go in their favour or not.
“We found that normally people trusted the other player 50% of the time but when the face was manipulated to look like them then trust increased to 73%,” said DeBruine – probably because we perceived these hypothetical people to be relatives.
In a follow-up investigation, the team wanted to find out when the appearance of genetic relatedness might be seen as bad thing. Again, using computer graphics, faces of the opposite sex to the (heterosexual) participants were manipulated to look more or less like a sibling.
Good looks
The study subjects were then asked to assess the faces for both trustworthiness and physical attractiveness.
“When we tested for trustworthiness, we found those that looked like them were more trustworthy than average, but when judging the same faces for physical attractiveness, participants thought the similar faces were less attractive.”
The results are interesting because they seemingly contradict other studies which have shown that we sometimes select mates who resemble ourselves.
