Competition for limited resources is ubiquitous in social and economic life and has sparked a
large body of research on the determinants of competitive behavior. While we know a lot about
the role of contextual factors and personality traits, the potential link between competitive
behavior and physical appearance remains unexplored. ...
Competition for limited resources is ubiquitous in social and economic life and has sparked a
large body of research on the determinants of competitive behavior. While we know a lot about
the role of contextual factors and personality traits, the potential link between competitive
behavior and physical appearance remains unexplored. In this study we test whether objective
facial characteristics and subjective attractiveness ratings are related to the competitive
behavior in the form of opting for a tournament payment scheme in a real-effort task. We find
no association for any of the examined characteristics. Nevertheless, we show that individuals
are significantly better than chance at predicting the competitiveness of experimental
participants, just by looking at their headshots. These findings advance our understanding of
the role of observable physical characteristics as telltale signs of behavior.
