I was thinking about what we talked about in class on Tuesday
- T.V and its effects on presidential elections. A couple of years ago my PSYC
1010 teacher talked about a crazy fact regarding the height of the presidential
candidates. That is, since the involvement of T.V in presidential elections,
the taller candidate has won most the time. The trend is something near 75% of
the time the winner is the taller of the candidates. (In case you’re wondering Mitt Romney is
taller than Obama.) This fun fact scares me a little. Are we really that bias
toward physical appearances when it comes to T.V viewing? The answer, sadly, is
yes. I recently watched a show (I think it was “Brain Games”) where they asked
people to pick the candidates who won based solely on “looks.” The study used real
election photos from small regional elections. The people on the show had no
idea of the original outcome. Sadly, the people were able to guess who had won based
on physical appearance the majority of the time (I have tried to find the video
and when I do I will link it to my blog). This fact can be seen with a simple google
search, “Do looks matter in elections?” Here is a quote from an article: http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/the-look-of-a-winner/
“A recent study in the journal Science has
found the study conducted by psychologists John
Antonakis and Olaf Dalgas, at the University of
Lausanne in Switzerland, showing Swiss children as young
as five years old can predict which candidates are more likely to win the French
Parliamentary elections.”
If how a
person looks factors into who will wins elections - to the point that a five
year old can figure it out - I must say
I am scared for my generation’s future leaders (HD T.V will not help this trend
at all). The first step to fixing any problem is knowledge. Knowing voters seem
to be easily swayed by physical appearances should hopefully make us want to research
the issues and the candidates a little more closely as we enter election seasons.
I guess the old saying, “It’s what’s on the inside that counts,” does not apply
to elections as well as what we might have hoped.
I actually find this topic super interesting and frightening as well. I actually did a research paper on the topic of women and media bias in political elections. The election that got a ton of attention was when Sarah Palin was McCain's VP Candidate. The media was so focused on her looks. They called her a VPILF (vice president I'd like to f***) and then the comparisons to Hilary Clinton came in to play. Palin was referred to as the ditz and Clinton the bitch, based primarily upon their looks. I could seriously go on and on about female political candidates but we would be here all night. I found it incredibly interesting though about what you mentioned regarding height. I had no idea that was even a thing. It is also interesting that it was mentioned in class about JFK winning because of his looks and how he was the first presidential candidate shown on TV. The amount of weight society puts on looks in frightening.
ReplyDeleteIt won't let me post it here, but Google pics of Bush vs. Dukakis. Dukakis was so short, for the first time in history they had to shorten the podium to accommodate him. He lost the first debate because he could barely be seen over the podium. Other candidates have since had shorter podiums also. This same nonverbal concept carries over to other things. Notice how Tom Cruise always has short leading ladies.
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