Infant's Social Responses to Attractiveand Unattractive Faces: More Evidence for a Rudimentary Stereotype

Document Type

Article

Journal/Book Title/Conference

Developmental Psychology

Volume

26

Publication Date

1990

First Page

153

Last Page

159

Abstract

Two studies were conducted to examine infants' social responses to attractive and unattractive faces. In Study 1, 60 12-month-olds interacted with a stranger who wore a professionally constructed attractive or unattractive mask. The infants showed more positive affective tone, less withdrawal, and more play involvement with the stranger in the attractive condition. In Study 2, 43 12-month-olds played with an attractive and an unattractive doll. The infants played significantly longer with the attractive doll. These results extend and amplify earlier findings showing that young infants exhibit visual preferences for attractive over unattractive faces. Both visual and behavioral preferences for attractiveness are evidently exhibited much earlier in life than was previously supposed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)

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