Different cues of personality and health from the face and gait of women

Redundant cues for attractiveness in humans have been identified, but the idea of

multiple systems displaying different socially-relevant traits has yet to be extensively

examined. We compared the accuracy with which observers could identify socially-relevant

information of female targets, both from static images of their faces, and from point-light

displays of their gait. Perception of extraversion was at chance. However, agreeableness and

sociosexuality were more accurately perceived from the face than gait, while physical health

showed the opposite pattern. This double dissociation suggests different information can be

carried in different modalities. In addition, partial correlation analyses suggested that even

when both modalities allowed accurate trait identification, the information content was

different. Our results demonstrate that cues of different socially-relevant traits are

communicated more effectively through different modalities, and these modality-specific

cues contain distinctive information, supporting a “multiple messages” hypothesis.