Consistency of likeability of objects across views and time

Subjective impressions of face images (eg personality trait judgments) are consistent across exposure durations and viewpoints. In this study, we investigated whether subjective likeability of common non-face objects would also be consistent. Participants rated the likeability of 32 common objects (eg chair, car, and kettle). Although the rated likeability scores were generally higher for objects shown in three-quarter views than for the same objects shown in full-frontal views, object-wise correlations across the views were significant (experiment 1). The likeability ratings based on brief exposure duration (eg 100 ms) also significantly correlated with those based on unlimited exposure duration (experiment 2). Even when the duration was brief, the consistency across the views was replicated. The findings confirmed that the subjective likeability of common objects is consistent and the process underlying it is efficient, similar to those of faces. However, the mean rated likeability was higher for longer exposure durations, suggesting a negative bias for briefly observed objects. Since this bias is contrary to previously reported findings for faces, the mechanisms for determining subjective likeability of common objects may be partially different from those of faces.