Appearance has effects on many of our social interactions. But, to what extent are people naturally encoding the appearance of others? Previous research has examined appearance accuracy in eyewitness settings and the numerous physical factors that could affect memory for the appearance of others. The present study, however, focused on 2 personality characteristics, social anxiety and public self-consciousness, that would seem to contribute to varying levels of appearance accuracy. Participants were given 4 min to work on a jigsaw puzzle with a confederate and were then taken into a separate room to complete a questionnaire testing their levels of social anxiety and public self-consciousness as well as their memory for the appearance of the confederate. Social anxiety correlated positively with appearance accuracy and was found to be a unique predictors of appearance accuracy based on a multiple regression. Public self-consciousness, on the other hand, showed no significant correlation and was not found to be a unique predictor of appearance accuracy. Gender differences were also identified, with women showing greater accuracy.








__________
Faculty supervisor: Thomas W. Britt, Clemson University