By Hans Eisenbeis
What’s Happening
• A researcher at Rice University has found there is a physiognomic association between facial features and creditworthiness. Dr. Jefferson Duarte used photos and information from Prosper.com, the well-known peer-to-peer lending site, to study the impact of borrower photographs on their loan performance.
• Using independent research subjects (contracted through Amazon’s Mechanical Turk—now that’s a Web 2.0 scientific study for you!), he found that the impression created by facial features directly correlated to actual loan performance. In other words, persons who looked uncreditworthy turned out to actually be uncreditworthy.
What This Means to Business
• Web 2.0 offers not just unique business opportunities, but opportunities for science to understand how consumers behave in new marketplaces.
• Any research that associates physical features with “moral character” is sure to be controversial.
• Though most peer-to-peer lending sites don’t require photographs, customers probably feel that providing them is an advantage.
• What are the specific facial features that imply creditworthiness? Duarte’s study didn’t go that far.
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