It seems we really do conflate attractiveness with positive traits like happiness. In a study, participants were asked to evaluate the mood of a crowd composed of only attractive and only unattractive people, and researchers found that attractive crowds were more often evaluated to be happier, while unattractive crowds were more quickly and more often evaluated as angry. This suggests that attractiveness plays a significant role in our perception of social cues, meaning future research on the topic should take attractiveness into account when choosing targets.
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