9 things people can figure out about your personality just by looking at you

Business Insider

Looks can be deceiving.

Except sometimes, they're not.

A growing body of research suggests that people are pretty good at guessing what you're like — how smart you are, your sexual orientation — just by glancing at you.

We dug up some of that disconcerting data and presented it below. Read on to find out what you're unconsciously communicating, whether you like it or not.

How open to new experiences you are

In 2015, scientists asked students at a Chinese university to look at selfies and try to evaluate the personalities of the people pictured. Meanwhile, the people pictured completed personality assessments.

For the most part, the students were wrong in their assumptions. But the one accurate observation they did make was that positive emotion in a selfie generally predicted the person's openness to experience.

Your sexual orientation

In a small 2008 study, 90 male and female undergrads looked at photos of men's faces. Half the men were straight; half were gay.

Results showed that, on average, participants accurately judged the men's sexual orientation in one twentieth of a second about 57% of the time, which is 7% better than chance.

How smart you are

Science suggests that observers can accurately judge your intelligence from a brief interaction — but only if you're actively trying to seem smarter.

In a 2007 study, 182 college students were asked to discuss an assigned topic in pairs for five minutes. Half the participants had been told privately to act intelligent and competent; others weren't given these instructions. All the interactions were filmed.

Partners then rated each other on how smart they seemed. So did 20 men and women who watched video recordings of the conversations.

As it turns out, participants generally weren't able to accurately judge their partners' intelligence. On average, the people who watched the recordings were — but only when they were evaluating participants who had been told to act intelligent.

By way of explanation, the researchers write: "[B]ehaviors that signal high or low intelligence in a social interaction may be magnified in an impression management setting. Perhaps motivation to convey a particular impression amplifies naturally occurring behavior."