Role of personality traits in first impressions: An investigation of actual and perceived personality similarity effects on interpersonal attraction across communication modalities

We investigate the effects of perceivers’ impressions of others’ personality traits on their social attraction, after a brief encounter face-to-face or via Facebook. We first examine the main effects of perceived personality traits. Next, we compare and contrast the effects of perceived- and actual- personality similarity through polynomial regressions with response surface analysis (RSA) accounting for dyads’ respective levels of personality traits. Results suggest that RSA yield estronger effects of perceived similarity (vs. actual) on attraction. Perceivers are more attracted to targets who are “better versions” of themselves, yet too much discrepancy impede attraction, more so when face-to-face.