When Physical and Vocal Attractiveness Differ

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O R I G I N A L P A P E R

When Physical and Vocal Attractiveness Differ:

Effects on Favorability of Interpersonal Impressions

Miron Zuckerman • Veronica Sinicropi

Published online: 13 January 2011 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC 2011

Abstract Previous research has shown that targets whose physical and vocal attrac-

tiveness do not match (one channel being high and the other being low in attractiveness)

elicit more negative impressions. The present study replicated this result and showed that

the mediator and, hence, the reason for this effect is not simply a perception that the face

and voice are discrepant but rather some disappointment with the less attractive channel.

The finding that perceivers are overly disappointed with the less attractive channel is

consistent with a large literature indicating that effects of negative events such as unat-tractive face or voice are stronger than effects of positive events.

Keywords Physical/vocal attractiveness Discrepancy Disappointment

Starting with the ‘‘What is beautiful is good’’ article by Dion et al. (1972), a large body

of research has found that physically attractive people are viewed more positively, i.e.,

they are credited with more socially desirable personality traits (for reviews, see

Berscheid and Walster 1974; Feingold 1992; Hatfield and Sprecher 1986). Additional

studies even raised the possibility that more attractive people actually develop more

favorable self-images (Adams 1977; Snyder et al. 1977). Applying the concept of an

attractiveness stereotype to the vocal domain, Zuckerman and Driver (1989) proposed

that similar to attractive faces, attractive voices also may elicit more positive interper-

sonal impressions. They found that judges were able to agree on whether voices are

attractive or not and that more attractive voices were associated with more favorable

impressions of targets’ personality. Subsequent work replicated these results, showing

that vocal attractiveness produced effects that were comparable in magnitudes to effects

of physical attractiveness (e.g., Berry 1990, 1992; Zuckerman et al. 1990; Zuckerman

and Hodgins 1993).

J Nonverbal Behav (2011) 35:75–86

DOI 10.1007/s10919-011-0106-5

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Several studies by Zuckerman and his colleagues (e.g., Miyake and Zuckerman 1993;

Zuckerman et al. 1995; Zuckerman and Hodgins 1993) have shown, however, that targets

whose physical and vocal attractiveness do not match (i.e., they are high in physical

attractiveness but low in vocal attractiveness or vice versa) elicit relatively less favorable

interpersonal impressions than targets whose physical and vocal attractiveness do match.The goal of the present study was to examine possible reasons for this effect. Below we

describe the paradigm used in the investigations of attractiveness effects from both video

and audio inputs. We then present evidence regarding the consequences of discrepancy

between physical and vocal attractiveness, how those can be interpreted, and the potential

reasons for these effects.

Given the evidence of attractiveness effects originating in two separate channels, the

next step was to examine their combined influence. At least seven studies (see Table 1)

addressed this question, all using similar design and methodology. In each study, a number

of target persons were videotaped while making a short statement that was neutral in

content. One group of judges rated each target’s physical attractiveness based on the visual

components of videotapes. A second group of judges rated each target’s vocal attrac-

tiveness based on the audio components of the videotapes. A third group of judges rated the

targets’ personality attributes from the full videotaped segments (picture plus voice). These

latter ratings were scored in the direction of high social desirability and then averaged

(Cronbach alphas, representing interrater reliability, were .78 or higher).

In all of the studies, the question of interest was whether the personality scores could be

predicted from physical attractiveness, vocal attractiveness, and their interaction. The

typical findings showed two main effects, such that both higher physical attractiveness and

higher vocal attractiveness resulted in more favorable impressions. Once again, the mag-nitude of the effects from the two channels was similar although reduced from those

obtained in the single channels (e.g., the effect of physical attractiveness on personality

impressions obtained from face plus voice was smaller than the corresponding effect

obtained from only the face). Somewhat unexpectedly, most of the studies also found a

Physical 9 Vocal attractiveness interaction. Table 1 presents this effect (significance and

effect size) for each of the studies. In six of the seven studies, the interaction was

Table 1 Significance and size (correlation coefficient) of the Physical 9 Vocal attractiveness effect on

favorability of impressions in seven studies

N a

F r

Zuckerman and Driver (1989)

Study 1 200 3.83 .14

Study 2 200 .00 .00

Zuckerman et al. (1990) 110 5.84* .23

Hodgins (1991) 32 5.96* .45

Miyake and Zuckerman (1993) 76 12.7*** .38

Zuckerman and Hodgins (1993) 32 120.09*** .63Zuckerman et al. (1995) 110 5.18* .22

76 J Nonverbal Behav (2011) 35:75–86

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significant or close to significant. The combined effect across the seven studies is highly

significant, z = 5.03, p\ .001 , average r = .30.

Interestingly, Alicke et al. (1986) found similar interaction effects when they super-

imposed images of attractive and unattractive faces on images of attractive and unattractive

bodies. The composite face plus body images were rated on physical attractiveness,intelligence, sociability, and morality. Two of the ratings (physical attractiveness and

sociability) showed Face 9 Body interactions that parallel those presented in Table 1 (the

results for intelligence and morality were not significant but in the same direction; a

combined score of all four ratings was not examined).

To illustrate the direction of the Physical 9 Vocal attractiveness effect, the top part of

Table 2 presents positivity scores as a function of physical and vocal attractiveness from

the Miyake and Zuckerman (1993) study. Each score represents a composite of five ratings

with higher scores reflecting more socially desirable impressions. According to these

authors, the interaction showed that ‘‘…the effect of one type of attractiveness was more

pronounced for higher levels of the other type of attractiveness’’ (p. 422). They also noted

that the ‘‘…pattern of the means supported a synergistic model, i.e., ratings were relatively

high in the high physical-high vocal attractiveness cell …and relatively low in all the

remaining cells’’ (p. 423). Similar interpretations were offered for the Physical 9 Vocal

attractiveness in the other studies included in Table 1. The direction of the Face 9 Body

interactions obtained by Alicke et al. (1986) were identical to those presented in Table 2.

The precise nature of the Physical 9 Vocal attractiveness effect can be better under-

stood by calculating the interaction residuals (Rosenthal and Rosnow 2008, Chapter 17). In

this procedure, mean scores are viewed as consisting of grand mean, main effects, and

interaction effects. Removing the grand mean and the main effects yields the interactionresiduals—see lower half of Table 2. They show that the discrepant cells, reflecting high-

low and low–high combinations of physical and vocal attractiveness, showed a relative

deficiency in positivity. Note that this interpretation is consistent with the one that was

offered earlier—the interaction residuals augment or detract from the main effects, making

one effect more pronounced at a higher level of the other effect. Additionally, the direction

of the residuals is such that they diminish the mean scores of the discrepant cells, making

them closer to the mean of the low–low cell, which then produces a synergistic pattern.

However, although the present interpretation of the Physical 9 Vocal attractiveness effect

is consistent with all previous interpretations, it does raise a theoretical question that was

not addressed before: Why do discrepant levels of attractiveness make interpersonalimpressions less favorable?

Table 2 Positivity mean scores

and residual scores by physical

and vocal attractiveness (adapted

from Miyake and Zuckerman

1993)

Vocal attractiveness Physical attractiveness

Low High M

Scores

Low 5.14 5.33 5.24High 5.09 6.21 5.65

M 5 11 5 77 5 94

J Nonverbal Behav (2011) 35:75–86 77

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Experiment 1a

In Experiment 1a, we tested the hypothesis that when face and voice differ in their

attractiveness, they appear as if they do not belong together. In other words, perhaps people

assume that a person’s vocal attractiveness should match that person’s physical attrac-tiveness. As such, mismatching or discrepancy between the channels per se gives rise to

negative responses. According to this rationale, perception of whether the face and voice

match should mediate the Physical 9 Vocal attractiveness effect on interpersonal

impressions.

Method

Participants

The target persons for this and the following study were a subgroup, selected randomly

from among the undergraduates who appeared in the videotapes that were used in the

studies displayed in Table 1. Judges in this and the following study were undergraduates

who took part in the study for course credit; they signed consent forms before they started

and were debriefed after completion.

Stimulus Materials

Each videotaped segment depicted a target person from the shoulders up, reading a

statement that was neutral in content (e.g., describing reactions to a movie, landscape,interest in a job, etc.). All segments were digitized and cut to 10 s durations (the literature

on thin slices of behavior indicates that such a duration is sufficient for the purpose of

forming impressions about the depicted targets; see Ambady and Rule 2007). One hundred

and twenty segments, displaying 60 male and 60 female targets, were randomly selected

and divided into three 40-segment blocks, each comprised of 20 male and 20 female

segments. Because rating the segments is fairly tedious, each of the judges was assigned to

work on a single block.

Measures and Procedure

The entire procedure was administered by a computer, using the MediaLab program (Jarvis

2006). Judges worked individually. They first read a brief description of their task and,

when ready, started the first segment, answered the question(s) assigned to them and then

proceeded to the next segment. Order of segments within each block was random, deter-

mined separately for each judge.

Each judge performed one out of four rating tasks that involved rating of physical

attractiveness, vocal attractiveness, personality, and face-voice matching. Seven-point

scales were used for all rating tasks with the appropriate anchors. Physical attractiveness

was rated from only the visual portions (no voice) and vocal attractiveness was rated fromonly the audio portions (no picture) of the videotapes; anchor points for both measures were

1 = not attractive, 7 = attractive. The top two lines of Table 3 show the number of judges


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Personality was rated from the full videotapes (picture-plus-voice) on 10 adjectives

representing the five NEO-PI factors: creative, conforming (openness), responsible, care-

less (conscientiousness), cheerful, pessimistic (extraversion), cold, considerate (agree-

ableness), calm, and worrier (neuroticism). Anchor points for each adjective were 1 = not

characteristic, 7 = very characteristic (see Table 3, line 3, for number of judges and

reliabilities). A procedure adapted from Colvin et al. (1995) was used to transform the

personality ratings into favorability scores as follows: An additional group of 12 judges

rated each of the 10 adjectives on ‘‘How favorably or unfavorably would you regard a

person who possessed that trait?’’ (1 = very unfavorably, 7 = very favorably). For each

target person, the 10 average personality ratings were correlated with the 10 favorability

ratings of each judge. These correlations were transformed into Fisher zs and then averaged

across judges; higher mean correlations represented a more favorable view of the targets

(see Table 3, line 4, for reliabilities).

Judges of ‘‘face-voice matching’’ were told that the face and voice in each segment may

belong to the same person or to two different people. For each segment, they were asked to

rate whether the face and voice match (belong to the same person) or do not match (belong

to different people); anchor points were 1 = do not match, 7 = match. Averages across

judges served as the matching scores for the target persons (see Table 3, line 5, for numberof judges and reliabilities).

Results and Discussion

Physical and vocal attractiveness were not related (r = .02). Blocks (dummy coded) and

gender of targets did not have any significant effects in this and the following study and

were thus removed from all analyses. Three regression analyses were conducted. The first

examined whether we again found a Physical 9 Vocal attractiveness effect on favorability

of impressions. Accordingly, favorability was regressed on physical and vocal attractive-

ness (both centered here and in all following regression analyses), entered simultaneously

in the first step, and then on Physical 9 Vocal attractiveness. The effects of both physical

Table 3 Number of judges and reliability (Cronbach alpha) for measures used in Experiments 1a and 1b

Measure Block 1 Block 2 Block 3

N Reliability N Reliability N Reliability

Physical attractiveness 10 .83 10 .85 9 .81

Vocal attractiveness 10 .78 10 .80 11 .78

Personalitya 12 .69 12 .62 12 .64

Favorability 12 .79 12 .80 12 .80

Matching 15 .74 17 .76 14 .74

Facial disappointment 18 .80 12 .84 19 .87

Vocal disappointment 15 .85 14 .78 13 .72

a Median correlations are presented; ranges were .55–.88 for Block 1, .59–.80 for Block 2, and .58–.87 for

Block 3


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partial r = .27. The top part of Table 4 presents the predicted favorability scores derived

from the regression equation for high and low physical and vocal attractiveness (one

standard deviation above and one standard deviation below the means, respectively). Thebottom part of Table 4 presents the residual scores. The results replicate the finding that a

discrepancy between physical and vocal attractiveness is associated with a relative loss of

positive impressions.

In the second regression analysis we examined the Physical 9 Vocal attractiveness

effect on matching scores. Accordingly, matching scores were regressed on physical and

vocal attractiveness (first step) and on their interaction (second step). Neither physical nor

vocal attractiveness influenced the matching scores, ps[ .29, but their interaction was

significant, F (1, 116) = 15.17, p\ .001, partial r = .34. The predicted matching scores

from high and low levels of physical and vocal attractiveness (one standard deviation

above and below the means) supported the hypothesis. Face and voice were viewed as

more matched when physical and vocal attractiveness were both high or both low (4.87 and

4.75, respectively) than when the former was higher or lower than the latter (4.35 and 4.38,

respectively).

The third regression analysis examined mediated moderation, i.e., whether matching

mediated the effect of the Physical 9 Vocal attractiveness on favorability. Accordingly,

the first regression analysis was repeated except that matching was added to the equation in

the second step (along with the Physical 9 Vocal term). The results showed that matching

did not influence favorability, F \ 1, whereas the Physical 9 Vocal attractiveness did,

F (1, 115) = 7.09, p\ .01, partial r = .24. The perception that the face and voice do notmatch, while clearly associated with a discrepancy between physical and vocal attrac-

tiveness, failed to explain why such discrepancy is associated with lower positivity.

Experiment 1b

Perhaps it is not discrepancy per se that influences positivity ratings but the affective

reaction to the less attractive channel by virtue of its association with a more attractive

channel. Specifically, in a high physical/low vocal attractiveness combination, the voice

does not measure up to the face and may thus elicit some disappointment; conversely, inthe low physical/high vocal attractiveness combination, it is the face that might be found

Table 4 Predicted favorability

scores and residuals from physi-

cal and vocal attractiveness

Higher scores indicate more

favorable impressions


Low High

Scores

Low .16 .23

High .13 .50

Residuals

Low .07 -.07

High -.07 .07


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as the standard and consequently perceive the less attractive channel (voice) as overly

deficient, which in turn leads to less favorable impressions.

Note that judges’ impressions could have reflected the opposite tendency, namely, they

could have felt overly compensated by the more attractive channel and thus rate the

discrepant messages relatively more favorably. However, the pattern of results clearlyshows that the discrepant messages are dragged down by their less attractive component

rather than the other way round. In this model, therefore, the more attractive channel sets a

high standard, the less attractive channel fails to match up, and the perceiver feels dis-

appointed. It follows that the mediator for the Physical 9 Vocal attractiveness should be

disappointment with the less attractive channel. To account for the interaction, such dis-

appointment should be particularly pronounced when the gap in attractiveness between the

two channels is larger. In other words, there should be a Physical 9 Vocal attractiveness

effect on disappointment. In addition, controlling for disappointment should reduce or

eliminate the Physical 9 Vocal attractiveness effect on favorability of the personality

impressions.

However, the operationalization of ‘‘disappointment with the less attractive channel’’

posed a problem. We could not have asked judges to rate each segment on disappointment

with the less attractive channel because the phrasing is difficult to understand and loaded

with demand characteristics. We therefore asked one group of judges to rate disappoint-

ment with face (voice was not mentioned) for each face-plus-voice segment, and another

group of judges to rate disappointment with voice (face was not mentioned) for each face-

plus-voice segment. Thus, the questions themselves did not invite or imply a comparison

between face and voice. We planned to use the two measures to construct a single index of

disappointment with the less attractive channel.Past research has shown cross-channel effects in impressions of attractiveness, e.g.,

impressions of vocal attractiveness obtained from face-plus-voice were influenced by

physical attractiveness (obtained from the video portion of the videotape), and impressions

of physical attractiveness also obtained from face-plus-voice were influenced by vocal

attractiveness (obtained from the audio portion of the videotape; Zuckerman et al. 1991). In

the present study, disappointment with a single channel (face or voice) also was rated from

face-plus-voice. Therefore, it was expected that each disappointment measure would be

correlated with attractiveness of the same channel (e.g., the less attractive the face, the

larger the disappointment with the face) but also, albeit to a lesser extent, with the opposite

channel (the less attractive the voice, the larger disappointment with the face). In otherwords, we expected disappointment with a particular channel (e.g., face) to be related to

lower attractiveness of the same channel (face) and also (although more weakly) to lower

attractiveness of the other channel (voice).

More importantly, however, we predicted that disappointment with the less attractive

channel should be particularly pronounced when the gap between physical and vocal

attractiveness was larger and should also mediate the relation between Physical 9 Vocal

attractiveness and less favorable impressions.

Method

Ninety-one undergraduates participated in the experiment in exchange for course credit.


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a face (or voice) less appealing than expected. Participants rated their disappointment on a

7-point scale that was anchored by 1 = not disappointing and 7 = disappointing. We did

not explain to participants why or how a face (or voice) should appear less appealing than

expected. In addition, the instructions directing participants to rate disappointment with

faces did not mention anything about the voice and the instructions directing participants torate disappointment with voices did not mention anything about the face. Each judge rated

only one type of disappointment. The bottom two lines of Table 3 present the number of

judges assigned to each block and the internal reliability of the ratings. Averages across

judges served as the disappointment scores for each target.

Results and Discussion

As expected disappointment with the face was correlated with physical attractiveness,

r = -.57, p\ .001, but also with vocal attractiveness, r = -.24, p\ .01. Likewise,

disappointment with the voice was correlated with vocal attractiveness, r = -.49,

p\ .001, but also with physical attractiveness, r = -.24, p\ .01. The variable of interest,

disappointment with the less attractive channel, was computed as follows: For targets

whose physical attractiveness (after standardization) was lower than their vocal attrac-

tiveness (after standardization), disappointment with the less attractiveness channel was

defined as disappointment with the face; for targets whose physical attractiveness was

higher than their vocal attractiveness, disappointment with the less attractive channel

was defined as disappointment with the voice.

For the purpose of discriminant validity, we also calculated a variable that was titled

satisfaction with the more attractiveness channel. Using the same disappointment ratings,this variable was operationalized as disappointment with the face when face was more

attractive than the voice, and disappointment with the voice when voice was more

attractive than the face. Clearly people should be less disappointed (i.e., more satisfied)

with more attractive face or voice but the important question is whether discrepant com-

binations of face and voice elicited particular satisfaction with the more attractive channel.

Disappointment with the less attractive channel was regressed on physical and vocal

attractiveness, entered simultaneously in the first step, and then on Physical 9 Vocal

attractiveness. In accordance with the correlations reported above, higher disappointment

was related to both lower physical attractiveness and to lower vocal attractiveness,

ps\ .001. More importantly, the Physical 9 Vocal attractiveness was significant, F (1,116) = 11.05, p\ .001, partial r = .30. The predicted disappointment scores for high and

low physical and vocal attractiveness and their residuals (see Table 5) suggest that

Table 5 Predicted disappoint-

ment scores and residuals of the

less attractive channel from

physical and vocal attractiveness


Low High

ScoresLow 3.33 3.10

High 3 65 2 26


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disappointment with the less attractive channel was more pronounced when the gap

between the more and less attractive channels was more pronounced.

The regression analysis reported above was repeated but now with ‘‘satisfaction with the

more attractive channel’’ as the dependent variable. As could be expected, satisfaction (i.e.,

less disappointment) was related to higher physical and vocal attractiveness, ps\ .02;

however, the Physical 9 Vocal attractiveness was not significant, F = .07. Clearly, when

vocal and physical attractiveness diverge, perceivers are overly disappointed with the less

attractive channel; they don’t feel compensated or overly satisfied with the more attractive

channel.

We next examined whether disappointment with the less attractive channel mediated the

effect of Physical 9 Vocal attractiveness on favorability. The favorability scores were

regressed on physical and vocal attractiveness (first step) and on Physical 9 Vocalattractiveness and disappointment with the less attractive channel (second step). The results

provided support for mediated moderation. As shown in Fig. 1, disappointment with the

less attractive channel was associated with lower favorability scores, F (1, 115) = 13.09,

p\ .001, partial r = .32; however, the relation between Physical 9 Vocal attractiveness

and favorability, significant when disappointment was not controlled for, now only

approached significance, F (1, 115) = 3.64, p = .06, partial r = .17 (Sobel’s z = 2.46,

p\ .025).1

General Discussion

The results support the notion that when faced with a discrepant message, consisting of one

channel high in attractiveness and one channel low in attractiveness, perceivers are dis-

appointed by the less attractive channel and, consequently, form impressions that are more

negative than what would be expected by the main effects of the two channels. Stated

differently, the pairing of an attractive channel with an unattractive channel produces an

Physical x Vocal

Attractiveness

Disappointment with the

Less Attractive Channel

- .315**

Favorability

- .154***

(.135**) .087†

Fig. 1 Disappointment with the less attractive channel as the mediator of the relation between

Physical 9 Vocal attractiveness and favorability. All coefficients are unstandardized. The coefficient in

parenthesis does not control for the effect of the mediator. p = .059, ** p\ .01, *** p\ .001

1 Recall that disappointment with the less attractive channel was constructed from two separate variables:

disappointment with the face and disappointment with the voice. Conceptually, neither of these two vari-ables can fully explain the Physical 9 Vocal attractiveness interaction and neither can fully mediate the

effects of this interaction on favorability scores. Indeed, regression analyses showed that although disap-


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interaction that moves the overall impression in a negative direction. It was noted earlier

that in principle the interaction effect could have pointed in the opposite direction. Spe-

cifically, when judging a combination of one attractive and one unattractive channel, one

can be overly satisfied with the more attractive channel. However, study 1a (as well as

previous research summarized in Table 1) showed that discrepant messages result in morenegative impressions. Study 1b showed that judges are overly disappointed with the less

attractive channel; there was no evidence that they were overly satisfied with the more

attractive channel.

The present results are consistent with a large and strong body of evidence regarding the

greater power of negative events over positive ones (see a review by Baumeister et al.

2001). This general pattern was found in many areas that include the effects of bad vs.

good events on relationship and marital satisfaction, the effects of bad versus good

emotions, the ease and speed of learning bad versus goods things, the consequences of bad

versus good parenting, the ease of acquiring and difficulty of shedding bad versus good

stereotypes, etc. Indeed, Baumeister et al. (2001) claimed that because they could not find

counterexamples to the general trend, the greater strength of bad events seem to operate as

a general broad psychological principle. The pervasiveness of this phenomena and the lack

of exceptions impede attempts to identify when and why bad is stronger than good. The

only viable explanation is the speculation that responding more strongly to negative events

is more adaptive, allowing greater fitness with the environment.

Among the areas showing the bad-good asymmetry is impression formation. Anderson

(1965) was the first to show that judges forming overall impressions of target persons

weigh their negative traits more heavily. Other investigators (e.g., Hamilton and Huffman

1971; Hodges 1974; Vonk 1993) replicated these results, using bad versus good traits orbad versus good behavior information as determinants of overall impressions. Interpreta-

tions of the bad-good asymmetry in impression formation advanced the view that bad

information is less expected or more diagnostic (cf. Skowronski and Carlston 1989).

However, as pointed by Baumeister et al. (2001), the greater effect of bad information

seems to operate even when these explanations do not apply.

The present results complement but also add to the existing literature. To the best of our

knowledge, this is the first time that the greater weight of negative information has been

demonstrated with nonverbal stimuli (as opposed to descriptions of traits or behaviors). In

addition, we also identify a mediating mechanism—disappointment with the less attractive

channel. Whether this mechanism mediates the bad-good asymmetry in other areas is stillto be investigated. It seems plausible, however, that people may be disappointed with the

less attractive trait or with the more negative behavior when these are paired with more

positive traits or behaviors. Note that such mediation does not provide a causal interpre-

tation for the phenomenon. We don’t know why judges are overly disappointed with the

less attractive channel (and perhaps also the less attractive traits or behaviors).

We should acknowledge at least two limitations of the study. First, the experimental

tasks—judging multiple people on attractiveness or personality from short segments—

lacks in experimental realism. Such judgments do occur in everyday life, but usually as

isolated cases with large time intervals in-between. Second, attractiveness ratings of theaudio clips could have reflected not only the quality of the voice but also the verbal

content. As such, the discrepancy at the focus of the present research could have been a


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attractive voice or face. In the present study, face and voice were presented concurrently

and yet perceivers zeroed in on the less attractive channel as disappointing. Indirectly, the

present results provide further support for the importance of vocal attractiveness as a

contributor for the overall impression that people form in any interpersonal contact. Not

only did the attractiveness of vocal cues elicit an effect on its own but it carried enoughweight to cause disappointment with targets’ physical appearance (when physical attrac-

tiveness was lower than vocal attractiveness) or disappointment with targets’ voices (when

vocal attractiveness was lower than physical attractiveness). Both scenarios lowered the

favorability of judges’ impressions.

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When Physical and Vocal Attractiveness Differ

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