Must Read: A New Study Counters The Argument That Ugly People Are Paid Less

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A recent study by Satoshi Kanazawa of the London School of Economics and Political Science in the United Kingdom and Mary Still of the University of Massachusetts in Boston counter the argument that beautiful people earn more and ugly people or those who are not so gorgeous are paid less.

However, the salaries of every individual are influenced by more than just physical appearances and individual differences are significant too. In the study, the researchers found that persons who are healthier, more intelligent, more conscientious, more extroverted, and has less neurotic personality traits are the ones earning fatter paychecks home.

Economists have widely documented the "beauty premium" or, rather, the "ugliness penalty" on wages. A previously conducted population-based survey in the United States and Canada suggests that people who are more physically attractive tend to earn more. This was compared to those who are aesthetically compromised who were found by the study to earn less. The study also found that attractive professionals like lawyers and MBA graduates also earn more, according to Eurekalert.

The researchers of the current study also analyzed a nationally representative sample from a United States data set that had very precise and repeated measures of physical attractiveness - the National Longitudinal Survey of Adolescent Health. The study measured the physical attractiveness of all respondents on a five-point scale at four different points in life over a period 13 years.

The researchers found that individuals are not necessarily discriminated because of their looks. They dispelled the beauty premium theory and upheld factors such as health, intelligence, and major personality factors together with other correlates of physical attractiveness. They emphasized that those individuals are healthier, more intelligent, with more Conscientious, more Extraverted, and less Neurotic personality traits significantly earned more than others.

Moreover, evidence was tendered for a so-called ugliness premium which claims that it pays to not be aesthetically pleasing. The findings suggest that respondents who came under the "very unattractive" group always earned more compared to respondents rated as merely unattractive. The study stressed that this was even the case when the income of the very unattractive was compared to attractive co-workers.

The researchers noted that the procedure utilized in several other studies might explain why the results of the instant research are contrary to many arguments on the economics of beauty, according to Science Daily. Although few other studies have taken into account aspects of health, intelligence and personality factors, most studies have grouped the so-called "very unattractive" and "unattractive" categories to form a "below-average" category.

Thereby, failing to document the ugliness premium enjoyed by the "very unattractive" workers. The researchers published their findings in Springer's Journal of Business and Psychology.