“Welcome to (insert business here)” “Can I help you find anything?” “How are you today?” were just a few of the greetings I heard while Black Friday shopping this weekend. These are often the different sales tactics that associates use to gain your attention and influence you towards buying- and hopefully buying more than you intended in the first place. I choose to ignore the greetings of sales associates for fear that they will weasel me out of my money, that I will look stupid, or just because they are plain weird. Unfortunately, within my span of shopping there was a time that I had no idea where the item was I needed and I had to ask for help.
I scanned up and down the aisles of the store for a sales associate that did not look too busy. Due to the fact that I was in Wal-Mart at the time, some stereotypical Wal-Mart employees passed by. For those who are unaware of the stereotype, those who work at Wal-Mart are perceived as foul looking and smelling. They are unkind and very strange. Above all, Wal-Mart employees are not people to be interacted with unless necessary.
Being the shy, small girl that I am, I was weary of receiving assistance from an associate that was unattractive and fit the stereotype. Unconsciously I knew that I wanted help from an associate that was attractive because I thought that they would be kind and helpful. What I did not know what that along with the Wal-Mart employee stereotype, I was also using the physical attractiveness stereotype by assuming that “a physically attractive person has positive qualities while unattractive people have negative qualities” (Schnieder, Gruman & Coutts, 2012, p. 357).
To go further, the associate that I found to help me was in her late thirties and had a “mother” appearance to her. That is to say that she appeared kind and polite, while also looking like she took care of herself and was a respectable woman. It turns out that she had been awake since 5pm the night before and was very upset to be there. She was very short and rude to me. My stereotype did not come true. In fact, I formed a new stereotype that all associates working Black Friday are grouchy and rude.
References
Schneider, F., Gruman, J., & Coutts, L. (2012). Applying Social Psychology to Personal Relationships. In Applied Social Psychology (Second ed., pp. 357). New Delhi: SAGE Publications.
I think at first blush, people might think that someone who avoids an “ugly” looking Walmart employee might be slightly shallow. The reality is the avoidance feeling might not be something they learned, but instead something that is innate in all humans.
While looking at a Psychology Today article, I found that studies, “strongly suggest that the broad standards of beauty might be innate, not learned or acquired through socialization. The balance of evidence indicates that beauty is decidedly not in the eye of the beholder, but might instead be part of universal human nature” (Kanazawa, 2008). In the article, Kanazawa cites more than one study that shows how young babies are happier, more attentive, and attracted to people who adults judged as “attractive.” He posits that “[e]ven the most ardent proponents of the traditional view that “beauty is in the eye of the beholder” must admit that one week (or even a few months) is not nearly enough time for infants to have learned and internalized the (supposedly arbitrary) cultural standards of beauty through socialization and media exposure.”
I suppose there might be certain physical features we innately discern as “attractive” or desirable as children, and that those physical features might continue to be a baseline for our future comparisons as adults. But, what I’ve found as an adult is that my concept of beauty has changed slightly from when I was younger. For example, I have rejected some of the norms I was fed through the media, such as the idea that skinnier women are more beautiful, etc. I’ve never really believed that body shape has really made that much difference in my assessment of “beauty,” but certainly many girls buy into it (much to their detriment ala bulimia, anorexia, etc.). Bottom line, in order for us to get beyond these faulty attributions, we must take the time to know other people, and try to be more empathetic [I’m channeling Rogers as I write this 😉 ].
Reference:
Kanazawa , S. (2008). All stereotypes are true, except… II: Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. Psychology Today online. Retrieved from http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/the-scientific-fundamentalist/200804/all-stereotypes-are-true-except-ii-beauty-is-in-the-eye-th