Study shows
Men with this style of clothing are more likely to cheat than others
© giuseppelombardo
It’s finally out: according to a study, men are more likely to be associated with infidelity with a certain style of clothing than others. Gottfried Keller always said it: clothes make the man. Or?
What a service! Thanks to a US study, in the future we can save ourselves from asking someone the uncomfortable question when they get to know each other: “Uuuund … have you ever cheated on someone in the past?” No more snooping around, detective games and mistrust when he has to work overtime again (which cliché excuse do we actually use when the home office becomes established as a workplace in the long term …?). From now on we only need to pay attention to what our loved one has in the closet. Or … maybe not.
Logo shirt study: It’s all about size
A research team from the University of Michigan, led by evolutionary psychologist Daniel Kruger, showed almost 400 students: inside two different Ralph Lauren shirts: one with a small logo on the chest, one with a large one. The researchers then asked the participants to imagine the owners of the two T-shirts in their minds – most of them are very likely to have resorted to their life experience (or their reality TV consumption …). And then the respondents were asked to classify these two personae based on their world knowledge in relation to various criteria on a scale from 1 to 100, for example: “flirts a lot”, “digs on people even though they are taken”, “does well with children deal “,” invests a lot of time and energy in his family “.
The result: the imaginary owners of the shirt with the large logo were much more likely and more often ascribed the role of a cheating man who did not care for his family than those with the small logo.
“Displaying luxury, for example through excessive size, color or volume, seems to imply a greater effort to get others to bed,” the Daily Mail quoted study director Kruger as saying. “Large logos demonstrate competitiveness and a willingness to flirt, whereas small logos are more likely to be associated with trustworthiness and reliability.”
Cross-check: Which logo do men prefer for which occasion?
In a second part of the study, the researchers only asked men in which contexts they would wear which shirt. Lo and behold: Most chose the large logo for situations in which they want to demonstrate dominance, e.g. B. when they play a leadership role or want to impress a woman, and the small for contexts such as job interviews or meetings with the parents of the friend. The only question is whether such a meeting will even come about if they wore the big logo shirt on the date …
What can we do with the result?
Even if the students questioned in the first part of the study were certainly based on their experience in their classification, we cannot of course infer a person’s fatherly qualities or fidelity from the clothing style. Or we shouldn’t – we obviously can and mostly unconsciously do it, but it is not said that we are right. After all, some people wear the shirt with the big logo simply because it was on sale. And isn’t thrift again a good quality for a future father of a family …?
Sources used: Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, Dailymail.com, nypost.com