Look at My Beautiful Friends

This topic submitted by Kimberly Richey (k_richey@hotmail.com) at 10:03 pm on 5/3/01. Additions were last made on Thursday, May 3, 2001. Section: Myers.

Look at My Beautiful Friends
By: Kimberly L. Richey
Abstract
The purpose of the study was to discover if there is a correlation between the physical beauty someone possesses and the friends they have. Do people who are found to be physically attractive also bear the extra burden of people placing higher expectations on them? We wanted to find if beauty was a factor in forming friendships, or staying in friendships. Is beauty an unconscious motivator?

Introduction
There often comes a time in a personÕs life where they begin to evaluate their life and try to see its worth. They look at their wealth, their career, their location, and finally the people they are surrounded by. This last category is possibly the most influential and important topic to any individual. No one can ignore the importance that a family has on any person, but a family is something we are born into, while friends are something that is left entirely to the individual to decide. Every person is given the opportunity to decide who he or she wants to associate themselves with and/or allow themselves to be affected by. This is the reason Jason and I were initially interested in the subject of friends.

This research pertains to everyone and benefits all by focusing on the reasons that friendships are formed. We hypothesized that physical beauty is the unconscious motive behind most, if not all, friendships. Beauty is an important factor in todayÕs society and it is in human nature to want to make contact with the people who can help you get ahead in life, and in this case, the most beautiful people are the ones that most people want to be friends with. After all, physical beauty is the first way we are allowed to judge someone, even before speaking to them, so naturally it plays a big role in whether or not you choose to continue a relationship with someone you have just been introduced to.

We also wanted to find if beauty was a staying factor in friendships. Since we hypothesized that beauty was an unconscious motivator to form a friendship, we also wondered if it was an unconscious reason to stay in a friendship, or if it was something that people stopped noticing after they had been friends for a long time.

We were initially going to approach the subject of jealousy and beauty in friendships but shifted our focus to mainly the aspect of physical beauty as a motivator for friendships. We realized that jealousy is usually the result of beauty, and by studying simply the role of physical beauty within friendships, we could also explore jealousy as an addendum if our hypothesis proved to be correct.
Through this research we also hoped to discover if people place higher expectations or associate different traits with people who appear more physically beautiful.

Relevance
We began our research by searching for past studies on friendships, so we could use these references to further our own study. We soon found that not much work on the aspect of physical beauty affecting friendships has been done. Most experts choose to focus on the subject of beauty in romantic relationships, not simply in friendships. Or even when we did find something simply on beauty it was focused on female beauty and completely discounted the males. Finding information that pertained to the questions we wanted to answer became increasingly difficult as we found that we would have to organize a study from scratch without a prior study to use as a guide.

Probably the most helpful information we found was located in Nancy EtcoffÕs book, Survival of the Prettiest, and Our Looks, Our Lives: Sex, Beauty, Power, and the Need to Be Seen by Nancy Friday.
EtcoffÕs book brought up numerous points that we found but failed to provide substantial evidence to her claims. This, while frustrating at first, left us open to try to answer the questions ourselves through research in other books and through questions in the survey we formed. One of the points she brought up was that ÒPeople have high expectations of beautiful adults and children, men and womenÓ (53). EtcoffÕs book initially proved to be futile for our study, after all, even in the index under ÒFriendships,Ó there are only two subsequent categories: Òmistaken as sexual interest,Ó and Òbetween womenÓ (320). Even these totaled only four pages in the entire book, and were not even what we were hoping to research. Even though EtcoffÕs book mainly focuses on the power beauty holds over men and women in sexual relationships, we found that some of her claims, such as the one about high expectations, could also be applied to friendships.

Another interesting point Etcoff makes is in a chapter entitled, ÒFamily Resemblance, or Why We Like People Who Look Like UsÓ (147). We found this discovery to be extremely interesting and included a section on our surveys to find if this was indeed true. Etcoff says, Òpeople are often attracted to faces that are strikingly similar to their ownÓ (147). Even though, this is meant to be applied to married couples, we also wondered if this couldnÕt indeed be true for close friends also.

This was also personally interesting to me because I had experienced a similar situation when I went on vacation with my best friend I had known for almost ten years. Even though we were both short in height and had brown hair, I never thought we looked very much alike. But as we roamed around Disneyland that week and on the busses and monorails, people continuously confronted us to ask if we were twins. We of course thought this was very funny, but we were also pretty confused. It came to my realization that after spending so much time together, it was possible that we had adopted each others mannerisms and not only did we seem to resemble each other but we were also probably using the same dialect and moving the same ways. This is why we decided to include the section comparing the physical characteristics of the friends.

Another book that proved to be very important to our study was Physical Appearance and Gender: Sociobiological and Sociocultural Perspectives by Linda A. Jackson. Jackson lists seven hypotheses that stem from the sociobiological perspective, many of which proved to be very helpful and also corresponded with some of the questions we had already been trying to answer. The following two hypotheses were eventually proven to be correct by the answers the respondents gave in the survey we conducted.

ÒHypothesis 6: Facial attractiveness is negatively related to same-sex attraction. This relationship is stronger for females than for males. Attractive people, especially females, are less liked by same-sex others than are less attractive people.Ó
ÒHypothesis 7: Attractive people, especially females, are perceived as possessing more valued personal characteristics than are less attractive people.Ó (56)
Despite the hypotheses, Jackson readily admits Òthere is surprisingly little research on the relationship between facial attractiveness and actual same-sex friendships. What little evidence of a relationship exists is either indirect or inconsistentÓ (136).

Nancy FridayÕs book also proved to be helpful for the same reasons that EtcoffÕs was. We had initially chosen this book because a lot of it focused on the subject of envy and jealousy, which is what our poster also was focused on. Our concentration moved away from that subject, however, and the book was not very useful for our new focus.

Even a book called ÒLook at my Ugly Face!Ó Myths and Musings on Beauty and Other Perilous Obsessions with WomenÕs Appearance sounds as if it would be extremely helpful to our study. Instead it mainly consisted of the author, Sara Halprin, discussing her life and realizing that she was obsessed with beauty and it was all a result of how she grew up and the environment she had been exposed to.

While we could take little from her stories that would further our research, this last point is still helpful, even if it is a bit obvious. We, even as young children, are taught to look our best at every moment because it matters what we look like to other people. This is probably one of the reasons that we unconsciously search out physically beautiful friends, because we are taught that it is the beautiful people in life that can get ahead.

Society alternately teaches us that it is important not to worry too much about your appearance because ÒitÕs whatÕs on the inside that counts.Ó Society also shows us, however, that it is supposedly important to wear makeup and buy trendy clothes in order to beautify ourselves and fit in. Our research focuses on these truths that society teaches us, and allows us to discover if we truly do need to be beautiful to get anywhere in life. The research answers a larger question that is important to everyoneÕs life. Do we exist in a dichotomous society where we must be beautiful without trying? Is beauty actually important to human nature? How large of a factor is beauty in deciding whom we choose to associate ourselves with?

Methods
We began our study by researching through various materials found either in King library or Lane Public library. We found various subjects related to friendships that we were interested in exploring. We then conducted a survey for the class with a variety of Òtest questionsÓ to see which questions would work well on a final survey to be later distributed to other college students. The class contributed suggestions and ideas that were considered when the survey was revised. Due to an unfortunate incident however, the original questions were not available to be included.

The revised survey that was submitted is included with this paper. The results of the revised survey were used to gather statistical data, which was in turn used to draw conclusions for the research. The revised survey explored questions which asked people to rate the physical beauty of one female and one male stranger, to rate their own physical beauty, and also the physical beauty of their closest friend (in non-romantic relationships only). We had originally planned to survey 50-100 people within the age range of 18-25, however, due to time constraints and unfortunate incident only 28 surveys were able to be collected from college campuses mainly in the eastern United States. This process was completed through email. The respondents consisted of 16 females and 12 males.

One female and one male were chosen for the pictures to be rated by the survey respondents. These two participants took three separate pictures each in which they altered some part of their physical appearance. On the survey, the reader was asked not only to rate the male and female strangerÕs physical beauty, but also to pick which person looked most responsible, which one they would most like to be friends with, and which seemed most trustworthy.

The second part of the survey consisted of questions relating personally to the reader, in which they were asked about the closest friendship they currently had. They were asked how long they had known the person, if there had ever been any jealous feelings on either side of the friendship, and also what level of trust was present in the relationship. They were then asked to rate the physical beauty of themselves and their friend and then, in more specific details, to list the physical characteristics each possessed (hair color, eye color, height and ethnicity). We wanted to see how physically similar most people are in relation to their closest friend.

Results from Part 1 of the survey
The results of the survey are also displayed in bar graphs attached to the end of the paper.
á The majority of Males and Females agreed that male #3 was the most attractive
á The majority of Males and Females agreed that female #4 was the most attractive
á The majority of Males and Females agreed that the male they would most likely be friends with was male #3
á The majority of Males chose female #4 as the female they would most likely be friends with
á The majority of Females chose female #6 as the female they would most likely be friends with
á The majority of Males and Females agreed that male #2 appeared to be the most trustworthy
á The majority of Males and Females agreed that female #4 appeared to be most trustworthy
á The majority of Females chose female #4 to be the most responsible
á The majority of Males were tied between female #4 and #6 to be the most responsible

These results show:
á The majority of the males want to be friends with the female picture they found most attractive, while the majority of females, wanted to be friends with the female picture they found to be the 2nd most attractive. Possibly the females are more intimidated at the idea of having a friend who could be considered more attractive than themselves. If their friend was more attractive then they were then it could result in more jealous feelings and in competition for mates. This backs up the assumption most people hold that females are more concerned with appearance than males.
á The males wanted to be friends with the most attractive female because they were attracted to her. Her beauty would not result in competition or cause much of a hindrance in their relationship as compared to a female-female relationship.
á The majority of people surveyed agreed that female #4, also found to be the most attractive female, looked the most trustworthy among the female pictures. It is possible that the people placed higher expectations on the female who also appeared to be the most physically beautiful to them. This supports the hypothesis that higher expectations are placed on people who are more beautiful.
á The majority of people surveyed agreed that male #2 appeared the most trustworthy among the male pictures. Only two people answered that the most attractive male (male #3) was also the most trustworthy. This calls into question whether society places the same expectations on beautiful males as they do on beautiful females because most felt that the most attractive male could not be the most trustworthy.
á Among the majority of participants, female #4 was said to be the most responsible. This, again, brings up the question as to whether society is placing high expectations on a female who is beautiful.

Results from Part 2 of the survey
á Average Personal Rating: 6.8
á Mode: 7
á Standard Deviation: 0.91

á Average Rating for best friend currently: 7.96
á Mode: 7
á Standard Deviation: 1.3

á Average Rating for Best Friend initially: 6.72
á Mode: 7
á Standard Deviation: 1.4

á Average trust rating for best friend: 9.11
á Mode: 10
á Standard Deviation: 0.89

á Only one surveyor rated their own beauty higher than their best friend
á No one rated their best friends current beauty lower than their initial level of beauty
á The majority of respondents best friends were of the same sex
á No correlation was found between the level of trust for a friend and the level of beauty they were said to possess
á Traits shared with best friend:
á 39.3% of the respondents shared hair color
á 39.3% shared eye color
á 78.6% shared ethnicity
á 39.3% shared the same height (within 2 inches)

These results show:
á People are not very likely to rate themselves higher than their best friends. It is possible they are either being modest or think less of themselves in comparison to their best friend.
á Everyone felt, however, that their best friend had grown more beautiful the longer they had known them. It is possible that their personality traits were also being factored into their score of physical beauty and people gave their friends a higher rating because they were taking this into account, despite the fact that the question was about physical beauty.
á An overwhelming amount of respondents shared the same ethnicity, this seems to show that people are more attracted to people who are physically similar.

Discussion/Conclusion
I think most people chose not to rate their own physical beauty higher than their friends because they did not want to appear vain. Because this survey was collected through email, it was very easy to match the name of the person with their answers. For a future study, I would hand the surveys out in person instead of relying on email. I think people would tend to be more honest on the surveys if they didnÕt know the person handing it out, and if their name was not somehow attached to the questions they were answering.

The results I found to be the most interesting were the ones involving the attractive female. I was surprised that the females who took the survey did not also choose the most attractive female as the one they would like to be friends with. I was also surprised to learn that so many people placed high expectations on the attractive female. It really demonstrates an accurate view of society that says that physically beautiful people also have high expectations place on them, not only by people they know, but also by strangers.

While I am convinced that many of the same results would have occurred, I feel the study definitely could have been improved if more surveys would have been collected to ensure more accurate results. I really feel this study is important to everyone who encounters it. It forces people to realize how much importance they place on appearance. Hopefully while filling the survey out, some people realized that it is inane to place so much emphasis on appearance. It is more important to value what traits or characteristics a person holds then to value their appearance. Even though this study has shown that society has trained us to look at appearance, it is important to displace ourselves from that norm so we can begin to look beyond the surface.

References
Etcoff, Nancy. Survival of the Prettiest: The Science of Beauty. New York: Doubleday, 1999.

Friday, Nancy. Our Looks, Our Lives: Sex, Beauty, Power, and the Need to Be Seen. New York: Harper Publishers, 1993.

Halprin, Sara. ÒLook at my Ugly Face!Ó Myths and Musings on Beauty and Other Perilous Obsessions with WomenÕs Appearance. New York: the Penguin Group, 1995.

Jackson, Linda A. Physical Appearance and Gender: Sociobiological and Sociocultural Perspectives. New York: State University of New York Press, 1992.

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