Strategy. Innovation. Brand.

social psychology

Enclothed Cognition

Dress like a philosopher, think like a philosopher.

Dress like a philosopher, think like a philosopher.

I’ve written at various times about embodied cognition – the idea that the body influences the mind. (See here, here, and here.) In other words, our mind is not limited to our brain. We think with our bodies as well. You can improve your confidence by making yourself big. You can brighten your mood by putting a smile on your face. Want to feel morally pure? Take a bath.

How far does this extend? The clothes you wear, for instance, touch your body and mediate between your body and the world around you. It’s fair to ask: do the clothes you wear influence your thinking?

The answer is yes. Hajo Adam and Adam Galinsky introduced the term “enclothed cognition” in an article in the Journal of Experimental Social Psychology in July 2012. (Click here). They write that enclothed cognition describes, “…the systematic influence that clothes have on the wearer’s psychological processes.” They also suggest that two factors come into play: “the symbolic meaning of the clothes and the physical experience of wearing them.”

Many clothes have symbolic value. Take the humble white coat. In a hospital setting, we might assume that someone wearing a white coat is an expert or an authority. We behave differently towards her because of the coat’s symbolism. In other words, the coat affects the perceiver’s cognition and behavior. But does it affect the wearer’s cognition?

Adam and Galinsky conducted three experiments to find out. In the first, they divided randomly selected participants into two groups, one of which wore white lab coats, the other of which did not. The two groups then performed the Stroop test in which the word “blue” is printed in red or the word “green” is printed in yellow. The groups were asked to identify incongruities between the words and colors. The group wearing white lab coats performed about twice as well as the other group.

The second test used three groups. One group wore a white lab coat and believed that it was a doctor’s coat. The second group wore an identical white lab coat but believed that it was painter’s coat. The third group wore normal street clothes. The experimenters asked the three groups to spot discrepancies in a series of illustrations. Those who wore the doctor’s coat found more discrepancies than either of the other two groups. The symbolic value of a doctor’s coat had greater impact on attention than did the painter’s coat.

The third experiment was similar to the second except that some groups didn’t wear the doctor’s or painter’s coat; they merely observed them. Those who donned the doctor’s coat performed best.

The study suggests that the symbolic nature of clothing does indeed affect our cognition. Merely observing the clothes does not trigger the effect (or does so only mildly). Actually wearing the clothes has a meaningful impact on our thinking and behavior.

These studies suggest that our clothes not only affect how others perceive us. They also affect how we perceive ourselves. Even if no one sees us, our clothes influence our cognition. Perhaps, then, we can dress for success, even if we work alone. Similarly, wearing athletic clothes may well improve our chances of getting a good workout. Dressing like a member of the clergy may make us behave more ethically. Dressing like a slob may make us behave like a slob.

There’s one other wrinkle that was brought to my attention – oddly enough – by my spellchecker. When I wrote “enclothed cognition”, the spellchecker consistently converted it to “unclothed cognition”. This raises an interesting question. If clothes affect our cognition in certain ways, does the absence of clothes affect our cognition in other ways? Time for another study.

My Social Media

YouTube Twitter Facebook LinkedIn

Newsletter Signup
Archives