The shape of you: do people match a specific geometric figure with identity?
Abstract Since more than a century, psychologists have been interested in how visual information can arouse emotion. Several studies have shown that rounded figures evoke positive feelings due to their link with happy/baby-like expressions, compared with sharp angular figures, usually associated with anger and threatening objects having negative valence. However, to date, no-one has investigated the preference to associate a simple geometrical shape to one’s own identity, to a close and positive person like the best friend, or to a potentially dangerous one as a stranger. Through 2 online surveys we asked participants to associate a geometric shape, chosen among a circle, a square and a triangle, to each of three identities, namely “you” (the self), “a friend” or “a stranger”. We hypothesized that the circle would be more associated with the self, the square with the friend and the triangle with the stranger. Moreover, we investigated whether these associations are modulated by 3 personality traits: aggressivity, empathy and social fear. How predicted, we found that participants associate more often the circle with the self, the circle and the square with the best friend, whereas matched the angular shapes (both the triangle and the square) to the stranger. On the other hand, the possibility that personality traits can modulate such associations was not confirmed. The study of how people associate geometrical figures with the self or with other identities giving them an implicit socio-affective connotation, is interesting for all the disciplines interested in the automatic affective processes activated by visual stimuli.