Physical and psychological correlates of appearance orientation

Objecti®cation theory posits that the sexualization of women in our culture socializes them to `selfobjectify' Ð that is, to place considerable emphasis on their appearance and to have diminished con®dence in competence-related activities. Recent studies have found that self-objecti®cation is associated with a number of negative consequences for women such as symptoms of disordered eating, body shame, and poor math performance. The present study is the ®rst to consider both physical and personality correlates of self-objecti®cation. In a sample of young women, we investigated, using multiple regression procedures, whether certain physical and personality traits would predict the variance in a measure of appearance orientation. We found that narcissistic and neurotic traits were positively related to the dependent variable, and that women who had higher facial-attractiveness ratings were also more appearance focused, but only if they had low perfectionism scores. Results are discussed in the context of expectancy e€ects on personality development. # 2000 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.