A Modern Twist on Lombroso’s Ideas

While in class we talked extensively about how Lombroso tried to catalog similar physical features in order to find out which features would make one more apt to be a criminal. He believed that features that were more reminiscent of apes or uncivilized cultures such as facial asymmetry were hints that someone could be distinguished from a non-criminal. While this theory is generally discredited today, new research seen here has given rise to find out the facial features that makes a black man more apt to be a CEO. A stunning 95% of CEO’s in America are white males. Researchers tried to figure out what physical characteristics alone (leaving out obvious other necessary traits such as dedication, hard work and education) black males usually attain in order to become CEO’s. In a sense this research is the exact opposite of Lombroso, instead of looking for physical characteristics that make one more apt to be a criminal, they are looking for characteristics that make one apt to be a successful business man. The study found that many of the black CEO’s possessed what they call “babyfaceness” or having attributes such as “a round face with a larger forehead, a small chin, full cheeks and other characteristics that are exaggerated in infants”. These traits made the black men appear less threatening to white people by bringing out emotions like warmth and tolerance. This finding is interesting in comparison to white CEO’s with similar babyfaceness who are perceived as being weak and incompetent. This study is relevant because it shows that tactics used by Lombroso are still being used and applied, but for different reasons. People indeed still make assumptions based on looks alone.