Once you set up Google Authorship your headshot thumbnail and a link to your Google+ page will appear beside posts you've written in the Google search results.

This is supposed to be a good thing because:

• The listing(s) with photos stand out more than those than only comprise of text.
• It means that people can click on the Google+ to find out more about the author.

Well if all the listings have a thumbnail of the author, it'll just be the norm. In some ways the author photo and link is just a distraction from the infornation you are trying to glean from a search.

Call me cynical, but I think it's mainly a ploy to get people to use Google+.

I've set up Google Authorship for my travel blog a few month ago. I can't say I've noticed any increase in traffic to the blog but I do seem to have more people adding me to the Google+ circles.