It pays to be pretty, starting in high school, research says

[Redfairen]

This discussion thread was locked as off-topic by pinto (a host of the Latest Breaking News forum).

Source: NBC News

A new research paper finds that attractive young adults enjoy a pay advantage over their less attractive peers, and that advantage starts building as early as high school.

“There may be this kind of snowballing effect across time,” said Rachel Gordon, a sociology professor at the University of Illinois in Chicago, and one of the study’s co-authors.

The researchers found that, starting as early as high school, more attractive people were rated as more intelligent and more promising. They also got higher grades and were more likely to graduate from college than their peers.

.......

That boost can have long-term consequences on how much money you earn. Past research has shown that that both women and men enjoy a wage bonus for having above-average looks, and can suffer a wage penalty if they have below-average looks. That’s along with other economic advantages prettier people enjoy.

Read more: http://m.today.com/money/it-pays-be-pretty-starting-high-school-research-says-2D11742024

[Roland99]

1. Read something similar many years ago, but mostly re: getting hired over others

[1000words]

2. What's interesting is it isn't necessarily something exploited ...

than it is something unconsciously rewarded.

[penndragon69]

3. And how much money did they waste to learn the OBVIOUSE ?

Another study that simply states the obvious that EVERYONE
already knew. The beautiful people ALWAYS get the most attention
and will be given things just because of their looks.

It's like publishing a study that says that it gets dark at night
because the sun has set.....NO SHIT !

[JDPriestly]

6. Do you think that "the beatiful people" think they are beautiful?

I think that especially young women all think they are ugly.

I am older and when I look at my pictures when I was young and thought I was hopelessly ugly, I see a rather attractive young woman. It is shocking to me because I really thought I was very plain.

I had a friend about my age. I thought she was absolutely beautiful. One day I found an old picture of the two of us together. We looked very much alike. It would have been hard to say which of us was prettier.

I can't identify with what I looked like when I was young.

What a waste of your youth if you always think the others are more attractive than yourself. My advice is to think more about others than about yourself, and other people will find you attractive. That's what I think based on my experience.

Don't judge yourself too harshly. You are probably better looking than you think. I don't mean this personally in any derogatory way about you, penndragon69. I just mean that for everyone out there. Don't worry about whether you are as goodlooking as you need to be. Just care about others.

[Tumbulu]

9. This is true for me as well

I was always so embarrassed about how I looked, how I felt that I did not fit in and that anyone who payed any attention to my appearance must have been mentally ill.

I look at pictures of me when I was young and I am just shocked. And even at my current age it is dawning on me that I am not bad looking.

So, why do we feel so bad about our looks, when we are not at all bad looking?

There always were people who seemed to trade on their good looks and these people truly disgusted me, it seemed so unfair.....and dishonest.

But this is a subconscious thing, I think.

[JDPriestly]

19. It is a matter of self-confidence.

At one point, I taught a junior-high Sunday school class. I noticed that the children from more affluent families, the ones who attended private schools and traveled with their grandparents, etc. were a lot more confident about themselves than those who did not enjoy those advantages.

Note to parents. Require your children to perform well and then give them credit for what they achieve.

You would be surprised at the parents who, from the get-go, do nothing but impose their own lack of self-esteem on their children.

Nothing other than crimes or cheating or taking from others or hating, nothing, not race, not money, nothing makes one person more beautiful or worth more than another. We all have talents and inner beauty no matter what. We need to explain that to our children. It would do more to rid our schools of bullies than anything else.

[tridim]

10. I was the same way, thought I was plain, but looking back I was above average.

It must be very common due to teenage self-image issues.

I found out much later, via reconnecting with classmates on facebook that I should have asked out most of the girls I had a crush on. They would have all said yes, even though I was sure at the time they didn't even know I existed.

Anyone have a time machine?

[CountAllVotes]

11. Same here

I went to your typical WASP school growing up. It was the blond haired girls with the blue eyes that were the winners.

No brown-eyed girls that were Catholics need apply for any of those "cheer leader" jobs, not that I particularly cared for such activities anyway.

I thought I was ugly.

However, I look at old pictures of myself and I was really a very attractive young woman.

How very sad indeed. It is too bad that no one ever told me this -- something I figured out when it was too late in retrospect as the damage had been done already.

[JDPriestly]

18. Yes. And girls with strict religious upbringings were taught not to think highly of

their own appearance or even talents back then. That has improved somewhat, but girls today are made to feel even worse about their looks than we were.

[CountAllVotes]

22. It got very weird abt. 1970 or so

At that time the rules at school had finally changed and we no longer had to wear a dress/skirt every day, we could wear pants once a week!

My father did not like this one bit and made me always wear a dress to school and told the principal to call him if he had noted I was not doing so.

As for my late father, I'll just leave it at that and yes, it was a shame that talented young women often got "left behind" I would say.

[JI7]

4. do they mean in type of jobs most people have ? because wealthy corporate types are rarely

attractive.

i'm guessing it's more the lower management that could benefit from being more attractive.

and other customer service people who are the faces that customers will mostly see.

[JDPriestly]

5. But what makes someone pretty or good-looking?

Sometimes it isn't so much the physical appearance as it is personality qualities or intelligence itself. Sometimes outgoing, self-confident people appear more attractive than shy people who may be afraid of exposing their personalities. The plastic physical appearance is to some extent shaped by the inner part of the person. People tend to think that optimistic people are more attractive than pessimistic people (in my experience).

Sometimes very intelligent people who are cautious seem, at first acquaintance, less intelligent than they are. Sometimes a person's "looks" grow on you as you get to know them.

I think this study sounds a bit superficial myself.

[bowens43]

8. Pretty sure it's physical....we are superficial.

[JDPriestly]

21. I think it is more than that. I think it is a matter in part of confidence

and welcoming others into their hearts. This is especially true as a person ages.

[Kingofalldems]

7. US and maybe the world is obsessed with beauty

Latest outrage I have seen, on the TMZ show one of the women there proclaimed she cannot be in a room with 'unattractive people'.

[1000words]

13. Yikes!

Nothing more unattractive than an ugly soul.

[Marrah_G]

12. Not news to anyone who group up in the less attractive group

[deurbano]

14. I had a sociology professor at Berkeley

who said people with inherited wealth have been more likely to be (conventionally) good looking because men (in the past, it was mostly men) who became wealthy – but were not necessarily considered handsome-- used their wealthy status to attract (conventionally) good looking women, who then tended to give birth to children who were likely to be more (conventionally) good looking than would have been the case if the men were limited to the women at their same level of (conventional) attractiveness.

[cosmicone]

15. In other research it is now conclusively proven

that water is wet, salt is salty and ice is cold.

[LanternWaste]

16. And the research which concluded that most studies, regardless of how esoteric, have a 77% chance...

And the research which concluded that most studies, regardless of how esoteric, have a 77% chance of being criticized by those who pretend to themselves that they're clever...

[cosmicone]

20. It is also proven

that 90% of the statistics is made up right on the spot .. hahahaha

[rocktivity]

17. Candidate for this year's "You Call This NEWS?" awards

"To Figure This Out, You Had To Do A Freaking STUDY???" Division


rocktivity

[CountAllVotes]

23. I've seen worse ...

far worse but I'll refrain.

[pinto]

24. Hi Redfairen,

We feel this is a research / analysis piece. Not late breaking news. Locking.