Comments on: Ugly People Commit More Crimes?

By: Ales Rarus - A Rare Bird, A Strange Duck, One Funky Blog » Ugly People Are Unattentive Parents?

Mon, 10 Apr 2006 20:46:05 +0000

[...] Ugly People Are Unattentive Parents? By Funky Dung First we heard that ugly people commit more crime. Now we’re being told that they’re less attentive to tehir children than attractive people.“‘Unattractive parents are less likely than attractive parents to supervise their children closely,’ said Andrew Harrell. He’s the same social scientist who took a fair bit of heat last year when he presented evidence suggesting parents pay more attention to attractive children. Now he’s onto new findings bound to stir up further familial feelings. ‘The unattractive parents may be ugly because they have had economic difficulties, health problems, diabetes, poor eyesight, psychological and physical hardships that distract them,’ Harrell offers as an explanation. ‘They have their own personal concerns and they have less time to be attentive to their children. They are in such physical and psychological misery they are not there.’ He admits his limited data can’t prove the theory, since his team never interviewed the parents or children who were observed.”Can you say “junk science”? [...]

By: Sean

Sean — Tue, 30 Nov 1999 00:00:00 +0000

Ugly kids either grow up to commit crimes… or work with computers. That's what saved me from a life on the lam.

By: Advogado de Diabos

Advogado de Diabos — Tue, 30 Nov 1999 00:00:00 +0000

I have a small problem with the study. The subjects were asked to rate their own attractiveness. I think this tests self esteem more than attractiveness. There are a lot of average people who can be either attractive or not based on their self esteem, how they dress, etc. Basically the study tells me people with low self esteem are more likely to commit crimes, which is an interesting but not too surprising find.

By: dymphna

dymphna — Tue, 30 Nov 1999 00:00:00 +0000

Well of course ugly people commit more crime. Ugly children get treated worse than attractive children and their personalities either get bent or are allowed to go along uncorrected. Look at a bunch of mugshots. Almost all of the guys look "wrong" in some way.

By: Lightwave

Lightwave — Tue, 30 Nov 1999 00:00:00 +0000

I agree to an extent with the ugly/self-esteem that Diabos mentioned. But the study itself was not run that way. The interviewer rated the student's attractiveness.

But I would ask what other factors were assessed in terms of demographics. Were those who ranked themselves ugly largely lower-income? This is particularly troublesome since the interviewer was rating the attractiveness. Would someone who was dressed poorly and without much makeup (for females) be rated lower because they lack the disposable income to do better?

Did they generally have a lower IQ? Or any other demographics which are often correlated to crime?
Perhaps a better study would be one of popularity. It may be that those who are less popular are more desperate for friends an acceptance, hence they fall into the wrong crowd.

It's also important to note that correlation is not causation! A watermelon is 95% water. A cloud is 99.9% water. But a watermelon is nothing like a cloud!

In any case, without additional data like what I mentioned above, the study seems to work hard to find its only preconceived notion of truth.