First Impressions of Personality Traits From Body Shapes

Summary & key facts

Researchers showed people a set of computer-made male and female bodies and asked them to rate many personality traits. Raters tended to sort bodies along two main ideas: whether a body looked to them like a person with positive versus negative traits, and whether a body looked to them like an active, confident person versus a passive one. The study found many different body shapes linked to particular trait impressions. Some traits, especially extraversion (being outgoing) and conscientiousness (being responsible), were the easiest for people to agree on from body shape. The results describe how people form first impressions from bodies, but they do not prove that body shape actually tells us a person’s real personality.

Key facts:

• The study used three-dimensional computer models of male and female bodies and had people rate those bodies on many personality traits.
• Raters organized their impressions mainly along two dimensions: valence (whether traits seemed positive or negative) and agency (whether the person seemed active, confident, or capable).
• Many different body shapes were linked to specific trait impressions, showing a wide variety of body-trait stereotypes.
• A limited set of measurable body features could reliably predict the personality ratings people gave.
• People agreed most about body cues for extraversion (being outgoing) and conscientiousness (being responsible), followed by cues for openness to experience.
• The study describes how people form first impressions from body shape, but it does not show that those impressions match the person’s actual personality.

Abstract

People infer the personalities of others from their facial appearance. Whether they do so from body shapes is less studied. We explored personality inferences made from body shapes. Participants rated personality traits for male and female bodies generated with a three-dimensional body model. Multivariate spaces created from these ratings indicated that people evaluate bodies on valence and agency in ways that directly contrast positive and negative traits from the Big Five domains. Body-trait stereotypes based on the trait ratings revealed a myriad of diverse body shapes that typify individual traits. Personality-trait profiles were predicted reliably from a subset of the body-shape features used to specify the three-dimensional bodies. Body features related to extraversion and conscientiousness were predicted with the highest consensus, followed by openness traits. This study provides the first comprehensive look at the range, diversity, and reliability of personality inferences that people make from body shapes.

Topics

Aesthetic Perception and Analysis Evolutionary Psychology and Human Behavior Fashion and Cultural Textiles

Categories

Experimental and Cognitive Psychology Psychology Social Sciences

Tags

Agreeableness Alternative five model of personality Artificial intelligence Big Five personality traits Big Five personality traits and culture Body shape Computer science Conscientiousness Developmental psychology Extraversion and introversion Openness to experience Personality Personality psychology Programming language Psychology Social psychology Trait