Appearance isn’t everything

You’re so vain.

But aren’t we all?

It’s impossible to avoid the pervasive importance of… You’re so vain.

But aren’t we all?

It’s impossible to avoid the pervasive importance of appearance in our society. But who gets to decide what beauty is and what qualities make us desirable?

This summer, I went home for a weekend to visit my best friend Cari. Because there’s very little to do in our hometown, we made our ritualistic midnight shopping trip to Wal-Mart. While we were picking out necessities for the upcoming school year, we noticed several creepy guys following us around the store.

We were picking out drying racks for clothes when one of the creepers approached us. I was setting my drying rack up in the middle of the aisle to make sure it wasn’t broken as he walked around me, directly up to Cari, saying:

“I just wanted to tell you that you are beautiful.”

And she is. We’re almost complete opposites — she’s short, has amazing curves, blonde hair and green eyes.

I could tell she was taken aback and felt slightly embarrassed, because as I did a creepy stalker-like dance behind his back, she tried to take herself out of the spotlight and say that I was beautiful, too. Stalker glanced at me, then turned back to her and shrugged.

“Yeah, she’s OK.”

Cari saw red. She proceeded to ream him out and tell him exactly how sleazy he was. I ended up having to pull her away and drag her down the aisle after thanking him for complimenting her. Once we were out of sight, I stopped and almost collapsed with laughter. She stared at me, almost shocked at my reaction. I couldn’t pinpoint why I found it so funny, but I found his honesty, well, refreshing. I guess there have to be a couple of fish in the sea not taking the lure.

But the consequences of appearance aren’t always so innocent. Countless studies have shown that good-looking people generally have it much easier in life than those less attractive.

I recently studied the importance of looks in one of my classes. We spent a class period or so watching an old episode of 20/20 that focused on this very subject. The 20/20 team gathered a group of actors to set up a range of situations, including a woman having car problems on the side of a road, a job interview and a fake court trial. The results were astounding.

When a very good-looking actress was standing on the side of the road with her car that had run out of gas, three men brought her containers of gasoline before one man even offered to bring one to an average-looking actress that was placed in the same scenario.

When the same two women were placed side by side in front of a table to collect donations for cancer research, the good-looking woman received 50 percent more monetary donations than the average-looking woman. How frightening it is that good looks can entice people to donate more money to charity.

The better-looking actors and actresses were consistently offered the job positions that their average-looking counterparts also interviewed for. When the employers were questioned about their choices afterwards, many claimed the better-looking candidates were “smarter” and “more personable.” Clips of their interviews contained most of these candidates merely responding “yes” and “no” to the interviewer’s questions.

But that wasn’t the scariest part. 20/20 set up two mock court trials for a store robbery with two juries who thought it was a real trial. In one trial, the average-looking defendant was found guilty. In the other, the good-looking defendant was found not guilty. In both trials, the defendants didn’t even speak. When the juries were questioned about their decisions afterward, they admitted that the better-looking defendant seemed like “a nice guy” or the type that wouldn’t commit such a crime simply because of his appearance.

So are we born with the knowledge of what is attractive and what isn’t? Or do we learn it as we grow and mature? A study at the University of Exeter found that babies as young as a day old tend to fixate longer on attractive faces, suggesting it is an innate quality. In the 20/20 episode, two groups of first-graders unanimously voted the better looking of two substitute teachers as the “smarter” and “nicer” teacher.

I think it’s a bit of both. We are born with an eye for beauty, but our society nurtures that preference by rewarding attractiveness. And I think it’s a shame. Looks attract, but fade. And personality keeps — smarts and a sense of humor endure.

Remember that next time you look surface-deep.

Put down that mirror and e-mail Jessica at jrp32@pitt.edu.