... of someone's appearance. It has been considered that we develop beliefs and stereotypes of what the appearance of a "criminal" would be, which can then determine how we react towards them. Thornton (1939) conducted a study which assessed this idea of stereotyping by showing participants 20 photographs of criminals and asking them which, of four given crimes, would they expect each to have committed. He found that people were able to correctly match the criminal's faces to their crimes far more reliably than chance would have predicted. Thornton's study looked at whether people stereotype, this current study investigates whether age has an effect on the tendency to place stereotypes, due to appearance. Age has always been a commonly studied variable in sociology and has also been related to areas such as stereotyping. The research hypothesis is that older people will score more highly on the questionnaire. This has ...

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