I Am Physically and Personality-Wise Warmer When Wearing Round Eyeglasses: Shape Priming Influences Personality Judgments and Estimated Temperature

Abstract

Shapes are considered to be related to different personality traits, and particularly, in terms of metaphorical associations, the round shape has been related to the warmth trait, and the square shape to the competence trait. The present study used a pre-post design to replicate these associations. Moreover, it was investigated whether round shapes enhanced the estimation of physical warmth as suggested by contemporary debates on cross-modal correspondences. The results indicated that the round shape increased the perception of warmth (p = .004) and the square shape enhanced the perception of competence (p = .025), which confirmed round-warm and square-competent associations. Furthermore, estimates of the room temperature were higher in the round condition, compared to the square condition (p = .023). The theoretical implications of these findings and directions for further research are discussed.