Attractive people are trusted more by others.
People are more trusting of good-looking individuals
Boffins at the University of Lyon in France have found that "beauty bias" is beneficial when it comes to job applications and applying for a loan as well as in relationships.
Scientists devised an experiment where 357 volunteers played a hidden action game against another volunteer, with the participants' photos being taken beforehand to test the volunteer's trustworthiness.
Following the game, the images were put in front of 178 new participants, and they predicted how the person photographed may have behaved during the hidden action game - which the researchers could match with their true behaviour.
Later, a third batch of volunteers rated how beautiful those pictured were - which went on to confirm that good-looking people were more trusting than those who were ugly or plain-looking.
Professor Astrid Hopfensitz, from the university, said: "With 'Beauty bias', or ‘pretty privilege,’ researchers label the unjustified beneficial treatments that more attractive individuals can receive.
"Our research shows that the beauty industry is certainly thriving for a reason, but also that this creates an additional layer of inequalities and unjustified benefits to those judged as attractive."