ARE YOU WHAT YOU WEAR?

How does clothing affect behaviour? Are we what we wear?

If we’re wearing something that we feel confident in, it makes us more able to achieve whatever we’re aiming for, and this positive behaviour is reciprocated by the people we’re interacting with, so it’s an upward spiral. There has been a lot of research into this - for example, we know when we wear a suit that we’re likely to behave more professionally, whatever that means. The enclothed cognition study by Hajo Adam and Adam Galinsky tested two groups of people; one who had been told that a white lab coat belonged to a painter, and another who were told the same coat belonged to a doctor. Both groups were given an attention span test while wearing the coat, and those who wore it believing it belonged to a doctor outperformed those who wore it believing it belonged to a painter. They also discovered that people who merely looked at the coat lying on a chair, while believing it to be a doctor’s coat, performed better than people looking at it thinking it belonged to a painter. So, belief is really powerful, and when we have a strong