What happens when ordinary looking people suddenly become superstars? We are about to find out according to leading psychologists.

The Journal of Applied Psychology recently wrote an article about the “Beauty Premium,” which means that better looking people usually win the prize whatever it is.

Now we have an equal and opposite reaction they have dubbed "The Boyle Effect."

Experts have named the effect after plain looking Susan who shocked the world with her singing talent on “Britain’s Got Talent" and has gone onto become one of the most extraordinary figures in show business with millions of fans worldwide.

No one could quite believe it at first, but the reaction was so incredible that the Boyle Effect has now become a term used in modern psychology.

It has already made an impact down in Australia where a woman named Julie Goodwin recently won “MasterChef Australia.”

Like Boyle, she was no oil painting, and was up against incredible competition from far better looking would-be master chefs.

She even had the same sense of being on the edge as Boyle had with her well publicized troubles in her past.

She overcame all that and won.

It seems that the “matronly, on the edge of a nervous breakdown" look, as one publication dubbed it, may be the new cute.

Goodwin shocked the Aussies when she won and left many upset contestants in her wake, but she has gained an incredible new fan club.

Susan Boyle may have done the world a great service by almost winning “Britain's Got Talent” if it helps us all understand that beauty truly is skin deep and that talent and genius come in many different forms.

Susan's loyal fan base has realized that right away.

I spent a period of my life as a schoolteacher and learned one powerful lesson: no kid, no matter how challenged, had a particular skill that he or she shone at. It was a matter of finding that skill.

Susan and now Julie Goodwin's victories show us all that when we forget about the "beauty premium,” our initial assumptions about people like Boyle and Goodwin are proven to be very wrong, and we can play on a much more level and fair playing field. We need to look further than the person we see onscreen.

We especially need to teach this lesson to our kids and grandkids. In a world obsessed with looks and celebrity the real person fails to shine through.

Susan Boyle and Julie Goodwin have done us all a huge favor by proving otherwise.