Inferring corruptible politicians from faces applies only if they are White

First impressions from faces shape important real-world outcomes. We investigated to what extent and by which mechanism political corruption was associated with facial impressions across politicians’ gender, race, and perceivers’ culture. Across four preregistered studies (N = 1,352), we found that Caucasian male and female politicians who looked corruptible were more likely to have been convicted of corruption. We replicated this finding across perceivers from U.S. representative samples, Europe, and Asia (Studies 1-2). This association was absent for African American politicians, buffered by the Teddy Bear effect (Study 3). We surveyed participants working in industries that are vulnerable to corruption (e.g., finance) or combat corruption (e.g., legal). We found that corruptible-looking politicians made participants want to investigate them more but not bribe them more (Study 4). Together, these findings reveal a new mechanism underlying facial bias in justice and caution against the potential under-scrutiny of genuinely corrupt but trustworthy-looking politicians.