Personality may fit appearance

Press, 22 May 1978, Page 12

Personality may fit appearance

Chicago If your girl friend has I slender legs, it’s likely she | is socially active, eager to I please, and usually friendly — and so are you.

On the other hand, if she has big hips, there is a good chance that both , of you are guilt-ridden, self-abrasing and introverted.

So says a psychologist, Nancy Hirschberg, who

reckons we may be choosing our mates on the basis of physical appearance — and getting a personality match into the bargain. Research on this subject has been under way at the University of Illinois for the past decade, and studies of several hundred men and women there have turned up some curious results, said Professor Hirschberg.

For instance, a woman’s breast, hip and leg sizes appear linked to how she

sees her own personality. Further, a man’s preferences in the anatomy of the opposite sex appear to reflect his own personality, she says. Finally, there is often a neat match of personalities, even when a man is choosing among women strictly on the basis of physical characteristics.

“What we don’t know is why,” admits the professor.

“When the studies began, we predicted that different shapes in women were preferred by different types of men, and that this could help identify men’s personalities,” she said.

Silhouettes of nude women — with hips, breasts and legs ranging in size from small to large were shown to men who were asked to express a preference. Then the men were given standard personality tests. Among the findings: Mer who liked big-breast-ed women were largeI yexhibitionistic,

adventuresome, needed lots of heterosexual contact, and read “Playboy” magazine. Male fans of slender legs were socially active, very friendly, had a need to care for others, tended not to drink, and read sports magazines. Those preferring women with big hips were guilt-ridden, self-abas-ing, introverted, and more interested in ideas than people. “That was back in 1970. More recently, we decided to find out what the women were like who had these various body-part characteristics,” said Professor Hirschberg. A sample of women were photographed — front, rear and silhouette — and given personality tests. The test results were compared with body measurements. It turned out that bigbreasted women had per* sonalities similar to those of men who liked big

breasts in their women, and the same correlation applied to slim-legged and big-hipped women. “It wasn’t a perfect match in all cases, but enough to show clearly in our data,” said Professor Hirschberg. To the question why, she replied: “It may be very simple, that similar personality types attract, but we don’t yet know.’’ As professor Hirschberg’s research continues, the next step is to photograph men with physical characteristics of different sizes, show the pictures to women and ask them to determine preferences.

The psychologist has a theory about what will happen when body types as well as personalities are compared. “I have a suspicion we will find similar body types attract, as well as similar personalities,” she said.

And what’s the point of all this?

“We all share in stereotypes based on a person’s

physical characteristics,” she' said. “We see someone fat, we assume he’s jolly, friendly, warm. We see someone with glasses, we think he’s intelligent.”

She continued: “Physical clues are triggering stereotypes in our minds about our own and others’ personalities, and people may be choosing one another on the basis of stereotype similarity.” The 40-year-old researcher noted that her studies were done only on university-age men and women, adding with a laugh: “After the age of 30 one body part is pretty much like any other — fat.”