Beautiful People

Do they get worse grades? – Beautiful people usually do better in life, but sometimes they’re at a DISadvantage.

For instance, attractive people are usually at a slight advantage when it comes to getting a job. But a new study finds that for women in traditionally masculine fields, such as director of finance, mechanical engineer or construction supervisor, being beautiful can be a problem.

LiveScience.com quotes researcher Stefanie Johnson as saying, “In these professions being attractive was highly detrimental to women. In every other kind of job, attractive women were preferred. This wasn’t the case with men, which shows that there is still a double standard when it comes to gender.”

Stereotypes not only affect how members of certain groups perform on tests, they also can prevent actual learning. This doesn’t just happen in the classroom either–it can affect things like learning how to drive a car or play golf (although Tiger Woods finally broke the race barrier in that sport).

Take women and math, for instance. Social psychologist Robert J. Rydell says, “If women do not learn relatively simple skills early on, this could spell trouble for them later on when they need to combine a number of more simple skills in new, complicated ways to solve difficult problems. For example, if a young girl does not learn a relatively simple principle of algebra or how to divide fractions because she is experiencing threat, this may hurt her when she has to use those skills to complete problems on geometry, trigonometry, or calculus tests.” So she ends up fulfilling the stereotype.

There seems to be a double standard when it comes to supporting this website as well. If only more of the people who profess to love our great radio shows and edge news would put their money where their mouth is and SUPPORT us, there’s a chance we might still be here tomorrow! Despite having no advertising on other media, we have 60% more readers and listeners than we did a year ago, through word-of-mouth alone. Now if only more of you would subscribe today, we just might be OK.

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Art credit: Dreamstime.com

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