Site tells what people think of your looks
If you look at yourself in the mirror and see Brad Pitt or Heidi Klum staring back at you, Facestat is not for you.
If not, well ... Facestat.com is a Web site that bills itself as "market research for the individual" and it's based strictly on looks.
Upload a photo and Facestat will ask a series of questions based on age, gender, ethnicity, intelligence, political affiliation, attractiveness, trustworthiness, wealth, weight, intoxication and relationship status.
It's not for thin-skinned, supersensitive types; the results will offer up a general - and sometimes brutal - assessment of what the average person thinks of your looks. Think of it as your snapshot based on snap judgment.
Perhaps the most intriguing aspect of the Facestat survey are the questions that ask respondents to judge behavior based on looks.
How do you judge levels of intelligence and trustworthiness based on a photo? What makes a person look trustworthy or smart? Do people make these judgments based on stereotypes or are these values based on something more intuitive?
As an experiment, the Daily News uploaded candid photos of elected officials to the site.
We chose people like City Council President Christine Quinn and former Gov. Eliot Spitzer; people that are known to New Yorkers but not necessarily to others around the country. We wanted to find out if people thought Quinn looked smart or if Spitzer looked trustworthy.
Most respondents thought Quinn was a trustworthy, married, Hispanic, liberal who, unfortunately, looks a bit older than she is - she's 42.
Most people thought Spitzer was a likable fellow who seemed trustworthy and fun.
Of course, perception and reality can be completely different. Facestat reinforces the belief that people are basically superficial when it comes to judgments based solely on appearance.
Want to know what people think of you? Go to Facestat.com, upload your photo and grow some thick skin before the results arrive.
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