Traditionally people thought that the flashier you look, the more attention you get. This, however, is no longer the case as researchers from Harvard Business School claim that people who do not follow “normal fashion” get more respect.

When you dress down , people would rate you as someone who is “confident” and does not need clothes to reflect their achievements. To prove this, Ms. Bellezza and her colleagues conducted a study. In one, people in different types of clothes shopped at expensive boutiques in Milan.

 

Experiment# 1

One group wore casual sports clothes, while the other wore expensive-looking outfits. The sales assistants assumed the ones in the sports clothes were the bigger spenders.

 

Experiment# 2

In another test, students rated an unshaven professor wearing a T shirt above an academic wearing a suit and tie.

 

Conclusion

Bellezza says that this change maybe a result of the change we see in how rich people of today dress. In particular,     Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg's wearing of hoodies and the late Steve Jobs' trademark jeans, sneakers and polo neck tops.

 

 


Last modified: Thursday, 6 August 2020, 6:35 PM