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Beauty affects fairness: facial attractiveness alters neural responses to unfairness in the ultimatum game.
Brain Imaging Behav. 2022 Dec; 16(6):2497-2505.BI

Abstract

Human faces consist of rich information for social interactions and facial attractiveness is a key dimension affecting social decisions. Previous studies have indicated that human players are less likely to refuse an unfair offer from proposers with high facial attractiveness in the Ultimatum Game (UG). However, the neural mechanisms underlying such beauty premium effect remain unclear. In this study, we used functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) and examined the effects of facial attractiveness on brain responses to fair and unfair offers in the UG. Behavioral data showed that subjects were overall prone to refuse unfair offers across conditions but were more likely to accept unfair offers from higher facial attractive proposers than those from lower facial attractive proposers. Imaging data showed that unfair offers induced greater activity in the anterior insula and medial prefrontal cortex (MePFC) compared to those in fair offers condition for both high and low facial attractive proposers. Moreover, the acceptance rate of unfair offers positively correlated with the MePFC activity for high facial attractive proposers and negatively correlated with the anterior insula activity for low facial attractive proposers. These findings suggest that facial attractiveness modulates brain responses to unfairness through altering the roles of emotion and cognitive motivation in social interactions.

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Authors+Show Affiliations

Pan Y
Center for Magnetic Resonance Imaging Research & Key Laboratory of Applied Brain and Cognitive Sciences, School of Business and Management, Shanghai International Studies University, Shanghai, China.
Jin J
Center for Magnetic Resonance Imaging Research & Key Laboratory of Applied Brain and Cognitive Sciences, School of Business and Management, Shanghai International Studies University, Shanghai, China.
Wan Y
School of Economics and Management, Beijing University of Posts and Telecommunications, Beijing, China.
Wu Y
School of Economics and Management, Beijing University of Posts and Telecommunications, Beijing, China.
Wang F
Center for Magnetic Resonance Imaging Research & Key Laboratory of Applied Brain and Cognitive Sciences, School of Business and Management, Shanghai International Studies University, Shanghai, China.
Xu S
Center for Magnetic Resonance Imaging Research & Key Laboratory of Applied Brain and Cognitive Sciences, School of Business and Management, Shanghai International Studies University, Shanghai, China.
Zhu L
School of Journalism and Communication, Shanghai International Studies University, Shanghai, China.
Xu J
Center for Magnetic Resonance Imaging Research & Key Laboratory of Applied Brain and Cognitive Sciences, School of Business and Management, Shanghai International Studies University, Shanghai, China. xujing@shisu.edu.cn.
Rao H
Center for Magnetic Resonance Imaging Research & Key Laboratory of Applied Brain and Cognitive Sciences, School of Business and Management, Shanghai International Studies University, Shanghai, China. hengyi@pennmedicine.upenn.edu. Center for Functional Neuroimaging, Department of Neurology, University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine, Philadelphia, PA, USA. hengyi@pennmedicine.upenn.edu.

MeSH

HumansBeautyMagnetic Resonance ImagingDecision MakingBrainEmotions

Pub Type(s)

Journal Article

Language

eng

PubMed ID

35821158

Citation

Pan, Yu, et al. "Beauty Affects Fairness: Facial Attractiveness Alters Neural Responses to Unfairness in the Ultimatum Game." Brain Imaging and Behavior, vol. 16, no. 6, 2022, pp. 2497-2505.
Pan Y, Jin J, Wan Y, et al. Beauty affects fairness: facial attractiveness alters neural responses to unfairness in the ultimatum game. Brain Imaging Behav. 2022;16(6):2497-2505.
Pan, Y., Jin, J., Wan, Y., Wu, Y., Wang, F., Xu, S., Zhu, L., Xu, J., & Rao, H. (2022). Beauty affects fairness: facial attractiveness alters neural responses to unfairness in the ultimatum game. Brain Imaging and Behavior, 16(6), 2497-2505. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11682-022-00705-x
Pan Y, et al. Beauty Affects Fairness: Facial Attractiveness Alters Neural Responses to Unfairness in the Ultimatum Game. Brain Imaging Behav. 2022;16(6):2497-2505. PubMed PMID: 35821158.
* Article titles in AMA citation format should be in sentence-case
TY - JOUR T1 - Beauty affects fairness: facial attractiveness alters neural responses to unfairness in the ultimatum game. AU - Pan,Yu, AU - Jin,Jia, AU - Wan,Yan, AU - Wu,Yujia, AU - Wang,Fenghua, AU - Xu,Sihua, AU - Zhu,Lian, AU - Xu,Jing, AU - Rao,Hengyi, Y1 - 2022/07/12/ PY - 2022/03/28/received PY - 2022/07/05/accepted PY - 2022/06/28/revised PY - 2022/7/13/pubmed PY - 2022/12/3/medline PY - 2022/7/12/entrez KW - Facial attractiveness KW - Fairness KW - Insula KW - Medial prefrontal cortex KW - Ultimatum game SP - 2497 EP - 2505 JF - Brain imaging and behavior JO - Brain Imaging Behav VL - 16 IS - 6 N2 - Human faces consist of rich information for social interactions and facial attractiveness is a key dimension affecting social decisions. Previous studies have indicated that human players are less likely to refuse an unfair offer from proposers with high facial attractiveness in the Ultimatum Game (UG). However, the neural mechanisms underlying such beauty premium effect remain unclear. In this study, we used functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) and examined the effects of facial attractiveness on brain responses to fair and unfair offers in the UG. Behavioral data showed that subjects were overall prone to refuse unfair offers across conditions but were more likely to accept unfair offers from higher facial attractive proposers than those from lower facial attractive proposers. Imaging data showed that unfair offers induced greater activity in the anterior insula and medial prefrontal cortex (MePFC) compared to those in fair offers condition for both high and low facial attractive proposers. Moreover, the acceptance rate of unfair offers positively correlated with the MePFC activity for high facial attractive proposers and negatively correlated with the anterior insula activity for low facial attractive proposers. These findings suggest that facial attractiveness modulates brain responses to unfairness through altering the roles of emotion and cognitive motivation in social interactions. SN - 1931-7565 UR - https://www.unboundmedicine.com/medline/citation/35821158/Beauty_affects_fairness:_facial_attractiveness_alters_neural_responses_to_unfairness_in_the_ultimatum_game_ DB - PRIME DP - Unbound Medicine ER -