Dowd: All That Glisters Is Gold

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Wed, 04 May 2005 06:07:08 -0700

Dowd: All That Glisters Is Gold

 

 

 

 

<http://www.nytimes.com/2005/05/04/opinion/04dowd.html?hp>

 

All That Glisters Is Gold

By MAUREEN DOWD

 

Published: May 4, 2005

 

 

 

I went out once with a guy who didn't care for his mother, partly

because he felt she was not attractive enough. My brother Martin, on the

other hand, tells our mom how proud he was when she picked him up from

grade school because he thought she was the prettiest mother.

 

And we've seen those studies showing that aesthetics is hard-wired in

the brain - that even babies have an innate sense of beauty, choosing to

gaze longer at lovelier faces.

 

So it shouldn't be surprising to learn parents have the same bias.

Still, the headline yesterday in Science Times was jolting: " Ugly

Children May Get Parental Short Shrift. " As Nicholas Bakalar wrote:

" Canadian researchers have made a startling assertion: parents take

better care of pretty children than they do ugly ones. "

 

Researchers at the University of Alberta observed that at the

supermarket, less adorable tykes were more often allowed to engage in

potentially dangerous activities - like standing up in the shopping cart

or wandering off. Good-looking children, especially boys, got more

attention from their parents and were kept closer at hand.

 

" When it came to buckling up, pretty and ugly children were treated in

starkly different ways, with seat belt use increasing in direct

proportion to attractiveness, " the article said. " When a woman was in

charge, 4 percent of the homeliest children were strapped in, compared

with 13.3 percent of the most attractive children. " With fathers, it was

even worse, " with none of the least attractive children secured with

seat belts, while 12.5 percent of the prettiest children were. "

 

Haven't these parents heard of the ugly duckling? Do they read to pretty

kids only about pretty ducklings?

 

Even if you're skeptical about supermarket science, the story conjures

up poignant images of Pugsley-looking rugrats toddling off, or flying

through the air and crashing into the rotisserie chicken oven because

they're not belted in.

 

Dr. Andrew Harrel, the research team's leader, put the findings in

evolutionary terms: pretty children represent a premium genetic legacy,

so get top care. " Like lots of animals, " he said, " we tend to parcel out

our resources on the basis of value. "

 

As Marilyn Monroe explained in " Gentlemen Prefer Blondes " : " Don't you

know that a man being rich is like a girl being pretty? You wouldn't

marry a girl just because she's pretty, but my goodness, doesn't it help? "

 

A beauty bias against children seems so startling because you grow up

thinking parents are the only ones who will give you unconditional love,

not measure it out in coffee spoons based on your genetic luck - which,

after all, they're responsible for.

 

But the world can be harsh. Surface matters more and more, and the world

ignores Shakespeare's lesson from " The Merchant of Venice " : " Gilded

tombs do worms infold. "

 

An analysis published last month by the Federal Reserve Bank of St.

Louis suggests that the good-looking get more money and promotions than

average-looking schmoes.

 

Quoting the economists Daniel Hamermesh and Jeff Biddle, the study notes

that being tall, slender and attractive could be worth a " beauty

premium " - an extra 5 percent an hour - while there is a " plainness

penalty " of 9 percent in wages (after factoring out other issues).

 

Researchers report that taller men are more likely to win in business

and - except for the hapless Al Gore and John Kerry - get elected

president. Correlating 16-year-olds' height with their later salaries

shows beanstalks grow up to earn about $789 more a year for each extra

inch of height.

 

In his best seller " Blink, " Malcolm Gladwell did a survey of half the

Fortune 500 C.E.O.'s, and found that (Jack Welch notwithstanding - or

notwithsitting) the average C.E.O., at 6 feet, is about 3 inches taller

than the average American man.

 

As Randy Newman sang, " Short people got no reason to live. "

 

Research also shows that obese women get 17 percent lower wages than

women of average weight and that dishy professors get better evaluations

from their students.

 

There can be too much of a good thing. As Dan Ondrack, a professor at

the University of Toronto, told The Toronto Star, there's a " Boopsey "

effect - if women are too gorgeous, people assume they are airheads.

 

No one seems sure whether bosses discriminate against people because

they're less attractive, or whether more attractive people develop more

self-esteem and social finesse.

 

But one thing's for sure: it's hard to develop self-esteem when you're

hurtling out of the supermarket cart toward the rotisserie oven.

 

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