Speaking of Psychology - Psychology of Fashion (SOP83)

Episode Date: June 19, 2019

The clothes we put on everyday tell a story about who we are to the world and can have a major impact on our emotions and mood. Cognitive psychologist Carolyn Mair, PhD, who created the psychology of fashion department at the London College of Fashion at the University of the Arts London, explains the psychology behind our fashion choices and why psychologists are needed to help solve some of the biggest challenges facing the fashion industry now and in the future. APA is currently seeking proposals for APA 2020 sessions, learn more at http://convention.apa.org/proposals Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Welcome to Speaking of Psychology, a biweekly podcast from the American Psychological Association. I'm your host, Caitlin Luna. The clothes we put on every day tell a story about who we are to the world and can have a major impact on our emotions and mood. So where does psychology fit into all of this and how does it help us solve some of the biggest challenges facing the fashion industry now and in the future? Our guest for this episode is Dr. Carolyn Mayer, a cognitive psychologist who created the Psychology of Fashion Department at the London College of Fashion at the University of Arts London, as well as an undergraduate program and two master's degree programs there. Dr. Mayor is currently a consultant for fashion brands and recently published a book called The Psychology of Fashion. Welcome, Dr. Mayor. Thank you very much, Caitlin. It's a pleasure to be here. Thank you. We're happy to have you. So how did you get into this field?

I've always been interested in fashion and my first job was a window dresser or visual merchandiser as is known now. I did that for four years, absolutely loved it. And then I did several other creative jobs, making clothes for people, making clothes for myself, and so on. And then when I got into my 30s and I had three children, I decided it was time to get a degree. So I did my undergraduate degree in applied psychology and computing. Then I did a master's in research methods. And then I was very fortunate to be able to have a funded PhD studentship. So after my PhD, I really wanted to work in the applied field of psychology

because my PhD was so theoretical. And I worked for seven years in an ordinary psychology department as a senior lecturer and then became a professor. And then I was at a conference and I met some. somebody from London College of Fashion. And when I asked him if there were any psychologists there, he said there weren't and that I should come and do a paper there. And so I gave a paper at London College of Fashion on the importance of psychology for fashion.

And I was invited back to discuss how I could bring psychology to the college. And that was back in 2011. I started working there in 2012 and developed a mind. master's courses and set up the department before I left in 2017. Wow. So you've had a lifelong interest in fashion and that became academic and now here you are having, have set up this program at the college. That's wonderful. Thank you. And you wrote in your book that there are very few psychologists in this field. So from your perspective, why is it important to have psychologists researching and working in the fashion industry?

Well, the fashion industry is about people. It employs millions of worldwide and everyone wears clothes. Clothes are the closest thing to our bodies. They're our second skin. And psychologists can help with lots of the issues that are known to be caused by the fashion industry. So for example, the fashion industry has a poor reputation in terms of social responsibility. And now, coming to a head, and it's been around for decades actually, are the issues about sustainability. So the fashion industry, is one of the worst industries for damaging the environment. And psychologists can help with this.

They can help the consumers change their habits through developing behaviour change programs. They can also work with employers to help them create workplaces that provide better conditions for their staff. And they can also help in predicting demand so that there's far less waste when the items are made. So currently, fashion forecasters tend to work on intuition, gut feeling.

Sometimes they look at historical cycles. But psychologists are well trained in data analysis, and they will be able to predict fashion trends much better using data. And of course, there's the obvious way that psychologists can work in the fashion industry, and that's in consumer behavior. Consumers are becoming more and more demanding. They are wanting more than just to be satisfied. Customers now have fantastic opportunities for competition for searching online and in store.

So the retail companies, fashion retail companies, have to give consumers a fantastic experience. And who better to help design a fantastic experience than psychologists? You just touched on some very interesting issues regarding overconsumption and regarding the environment. So you cited an alarming statistic in your book as well about that in the U.S., about an estimated 15 million people have a spending addiction. So we know that overconsumption is clearly an issue. How can people break the cycle and consume more responsibly? Well, it's a very difficult one because the way we shot becomes a habit and lots of

Lots of us go shopping as a social pleasure, as a leisure pursuit. And so shopping becomes part of what we do, part of our identity. And also, you know, we like novelty. We like fashion. We want to look nice and enhance ourselves. But people can also change their habits through structure, behavior change programs. So they can learn to identify what are the,

habits? What are the triggers that encourage them to go out and buy more, more, more, more? And quite often they don't wear these items. And how can their habits be changed so that it's a win-win situation for them. So they have more money in their pockets to enjoy experiences rather than material objects. And they can also do good for the environment by consuming less and contributing less to the landfill problem. Is this something you're working on in your consulting work? Yes, yes. So I'm currently working across so many issues within the fashion industry.

And it's just such an amazing opportunity to make a really important difference globally. So yes, changing people's habits. looking at the communication that we put out as a business, looking at how we communicate with our staff and with our customers. Yeah, so this is something that I've been doing as a consultant since 2017, understanding that, you know, the consumers are people and they have behavior and psychologists understand behavior. So as a cognitive psychologist, looking at all the cognitive processes,

the way we think, the way we perceive, the way we understand the world and make sense of it, all these things, processes that we do as human beings. This is what psychologists can help the fashion industry. And to be honest, all industry learn more about. And you wrote a lot about the fast fashion, which we've touched on as well, the environmental impacts of this and the human impacts of it, how it's created environmental and human rights problems. And there has been some movement in a positive direction, some more awareness of this,

but people are still suffering in sweatshops and landfills are still getting filled up with unused or unwanted clothing. What is needed to change this trend? Okay, first of all, I think it's quite important that this notion of fast fashion equals bad needs to be changed. So lots of items which are not considered fast fashion are made in exactly the same. factories under exactly the same conditions. The problem is not with fast fashion per se. The problem is with overproduction and over consumption. That ends up in the landfill sites.

There are problems with the working conditions, with abuse of the workers, with human rights, as you say. And these need to be addressed at the local level because the factories, are typically run by people in the local communities, and there is a lot of pressure on them to change, and hopefully they will. When the pressure turns into voting with our wallets, which is, I think we're beginning to see that.

People are buying less and being more mindful with what they buy, then the behavior of the factory owners and the retail companies will change accordingly. And the pressure is coming from consumers now. So you are seeing changes in the opposite direction where people are being more mindful about what they purchase and how much of it. Some pockets of the population, yes, for sure.

But there are still people who want to consume a lot simply because it's cheap. And in reality, they probably spend as much as they would on five or six very cheap items as they would if they bought one, more one expensive item or more expensive item that they would actually wear and it would potentially last longer and they would value it more. Do you think a solution is for people to purchase perhaps higher quality items?

Sometimes that can mean more expensive items as opposed to those, you know, buying five T-shirts for the price of one nice shirt. Is that one way to alleviate the problem? Yes. I think I think that makes perfect sense because, you know, buying four. five of very similar items and four of them are unlikely to be worn is purely wasteful. And because they're cheap, they're probably not going to be sold or swapped or nobody is really going to want them secondhand anyway. So, yeah, I would definitely say buy less,

buy mindfully, enjoy the experience, but don't buy multiple items that you're not going to wear. And think about it at the point of sale. When are you going to wear this item or these items? Do you really want to buy it? And is it just going to hang in your wardrobe with the tag still on it until you decide you don't want it anymore and find out that nobody else does either, which is just so wasteful? So there does come a point in a life cycle of a piece of clothing item where you might want to give it away or to donate it or something of that nature. Is that a good solution to give away your clothes, give them to charity, give them to friends? Yeah, definitely. Anything that stops them going into landfill is good. Recycling, if the product can be recycled,

then fantastic. Sometimes the recycling process does quite a lot of harm to the environment as well. Separating different fabrics, different textiles is difficult and not always possible. but anything is better than putting your unwanted items in the bin that would go to landfill. So swapping, renting clothes is becoming more and more popular, selling on a market, individuals selling their own clothes, it's also becoming popular. And lots of fashion brands, fast fashion I'm well aware of, I'm not sure that the higher end the fashion market does this, is accepting bags of recycle, well, clothes that you don't want, previously loved clothes, let's say, for recycling. And they might be used if they can be separated

out for recycling. Some are used for stuffing other fabrics, for rags. And then some are sent on to other countries. So there's some organizations that go around and buy. unwanted used clothing. But this can be problematic because the used clothes might end up actually frustrating the development of the fashion industry in developing markets. I want to turn now to mental health. And as you mentioned, clothing conveys a lot about a person. So what does, how does what we put on our bodies everyday influence our mental health?

Well, it's stressful for us if we don't feel comfortable in what we're wearing. If we're really worrying that it's appropriate or it's suitable or we don't feel confident in what we're wearing, it stresses us. And this means that we don't have the cognitive capacity to deal with a problem at hand. This is why lots of very successful people tend to wear a work uniform in inverted commerce, not necessarily a suit, but it may be a T-shirt and jeans. as we've seen with Mark Zuckerberg, who wears the same items every day to allow this freeing up of cognitive capacity for more important issues. And then, you know, for you or me, this might mean going to a meeting wearing something that we've worn before and knowing that it's suitable or it's appropriate and we don't have to worry about that at that time. I know there have been positive

steps in the right direction, but it still seems like everywhere we go, bombarded with images that encourage us to consume fashion and that there's no way to escape it. How does that impact people's mental health? Well, people generally buy far more than they need. And probably, to be honest, none of us probably needs to buy any more clothes ever. Research suggests that 80% of clothes in our wardrobe is unworn. And that's quite worrying, actually. And some people can become addicted to shopping and this can result in debt, in shame,

and guilt. And there's a move now to buy mindfully, which we've discussed. And I would definitely agree with that. Buying too much is something that we really should avoid. When you buy less, it seems like a win-win situation. You've got more money in your pocket to enjoy the experiences that bring more and lasting satisfaction. And you're also doing less harm to the environment.

So throughout this interview, you've mentioned several times about the importance of people being mindful of their purchases. And this move toward mindfulness is certainly wonderful in many ways. But how does that work within the fashion industry? Because they certainly need to generate profits. I mean, they want to respond to their customers in terms of wanting to be understanding and receptive to being more mindful about fashion. But at the same time, they also need to make money.

So what are you seeing in terms of that tension that exists? Well, I think once the fashion industry is more in tune with what their customers want, actually want rather than what they think they want, when they're more able to predict more accurately, so production on demand rather than full supply, then, you know, this affects profits more so than the selling. So so much money is wasted on overproduction. So if that comes out of the equation, the company can still be profitable. You mentioned in your book, pressure to produce for consumers is so high that people in the fashion industry often suffer from mental health issues like substance abuse, anxiety, depression and eating disorders.

So what needs to change in the industry? And are you seeing any movement in that direction, in a better direction? Well, I think we're still waiting for some change in that. And the cycles of fashion have become shorter and shorter. So where they used to be two seasons and perhaps a cruise collection, there are now six, seven, ten. Some high street brands have new stock every week, some every two weeks. And the designers are just on a treadmill. And the ones who we've seen are the very famous high-end designers where it makes news when they have mental health problems or worse. But there's a whole industry behind them of designers. assistants and interns who don't make that publicity when they have mental health problems.

And it's not, there isn't time to speak out about how you feel. There isn't that possibility really. And it's not just the designers, it's models as well who, when there's a fashion week or on shoots, they have to be available from the designers. the early morning to late at night, looking fantastic the whole time, often no time to eat or very little time to eat, no food available for them. And there are reports of models saying that they've not been treated very well at all, that they're just treated like a clothes hanger, I suppose. You know, and they're not called by their names. Not all. And we see

the very famous ones, the ones who have fantastic lifestyles. But again, there are thousands of models who don't enjoy that kind of celebrity status whose mental health may well suffer. And it may be that the fashion industry attracts people who are susceptible to mental health problems because it's so creative, so dynamic, so exciting. And the pressures are on, not just to work, but to be on form 24-7. And on the flip side, for consumers who see images of these impossibly thin and beautiful models, what does that do to a person's self-image and their positive feelings about themselves? Well, there's quite a lot of research now, which shows that even a very brief look at fashion imagery of thin models or airbrush models can damage a person's body satisfaction.

So they feel worse about their body than they did before after a very brief exposure. And given that we're exposed to images of fashion thousands of times in a week, you know, this is affecting most of us. And social media has a lot to answer for, to be honest, with the images that are on Instagram, for example, so anyone who likes fashion is going to be following the people, the designers they like, the models they like, the influences they like on Instagram.

And most of them have a particular image, which the individuals want to aspire to. They aspire to it, but quite often are unattainable. And what do you think needs to change in this area? Well, same as it across the whole industry. More diversity, more representation. So not just on the other side of the camera, but in front of the camera.

so more diversity in the workforce of the fashion industry and in the peripheral workforce, so model agents and so on. So far more representation of the populations that the fashion industry serves. And this isn't just about skin tone. It's about body type, body shape, ages, ability. I just the whole range, you know, as I said, right at the start, everyone wears clothes. And everyone should be represented by the fashion industry. Where do you see psychologists fitting into all this in terms of helping promote more inclusivity and diversity?

Psychologists can run studies that test hypothesis that say that improving representation is good for the industry, good for the consumer and show the evidence, bring the evidence to the fashion industries. Psychologists can also help with the communities who are marginalized. And when psychologists work in the industry, they can actually really show the industry and how beneficial it is to have a diverse workforce. I mean, there's plenty of evidence for that already. Yeah, absolutely. And turning to a more casual topic, what are your thoughts today?

about people dressing more casually. I mean, a lot of people wear active wear as everyday clothing and offices are becoming more casual in a lot of instances. Yeah, I'm fine with that. I, you know, in London, you can wear absolutely anything you want and nobody looks at all. I think it's great that people can wear whatever they want,

whether that's active wear, casual wear to work. I think it's a really positive move. For lots of people working in a formal suit doesn't represent their true cells or their self-identity. And so they might struggle to do the kind of job that they want to if they were free to choose what clothes they can wear. Me, for example, I really don't like wearing suits and I would typically wear jeans. I'm wearing jeans now. jeans and a jumper or jeans and a shirt. So, yeah, I just think people should be allowed to dress in the way they want because the way we dress is part of our identity, part of who we are.

Yeah, so what you're saying is a more casual environment overall does help people's mental health, I imagine, because if they're becoming more of an show expressing their authentic self as opposed to wearing a suit or uniform every day, probably feeling better, yeah. Exactly. They have the freedom to choose and autonomy, again, plenty of evidence to support this, giving people autonomy at work or in their lives in whichever aspects is possible is a really positive element of people's life. So people say often dress for success, does that hold water these days? It depends on the industry. Progressive industries, success might be a pair of jeans and a course. T-shirt with a slogan or something. Still in finance, it might be that you still have to wear a suit. When people ask me this question, I would always say, do some homework, find out what the next

level in the hierarchy is wearing. What is the unwritten rule for that job? Because, you know, if something is inappropriate or just considered not suitable by the person who might be hiring you, then however much you love it, it shows your identity. The person, the hireer, might believe that you're not really the right person for that job. In my opinion, it shouldn't matter, but it still does. As a fashion psychologist, how do you approach your wardrobe? I like very plain, casual clothes. I try to dress appropriately for a situation that I'm going to yeah I would say that I don't want clothes that shout

so I prefer clothes that don't say very much about them so I'm not a logo wearer yeah typically quite plain clothes often black or navy in the summer maybe white I'm quite plain dresser. You know, I've actually noticed that some of the biggest fashion designers, you know, they'll come out on the catwalk and they're wearing very simple, maybe black clothing. So is there any psychological reason why they might do that? Are they trying to have the emphasis beyond the clothes of their other clothes they're designing? Yeah, it's almost an unwritten rule, I think, of the fashion industry is black.

almost like a modest dressing, quite loose, fluid, gender fluid clothes. Yeah, and that's been around for quite a while in the industry. Yeah, I suppose it varies. I mean, there are some fashion designers who dress quite, well, outrageously, let's say. but yeah the majority I would say just plainly perhaps yes as you say to not distract from the creations they've made that are on the catwalk it's always kind of struck me as is interesting someone who creates this like nearly dynamic outfit maybe it's colorful or something and then comes out and they're wearing maybe a black pants and a black shirt sneakers or something like that's always

yeah oh it's a little jarring yeah right I wanted to go back with which you mentioned about the workplace uniform and kind of the trend you might see like in the Silicon Valley or something where entrepreneurs wear casual clothes, maybe they wear the same thing every day, that kind of thing. Is there any thing behind that? You mentioned people wanting to reserve cognitive resources, but is there any other, are there any psychological reasons why someone might want to wear a self-imposed uniform? It says something to the people who they are interacting with, for example, there's not going to be any commentary around their clothes if they wear the same thing every day. So, you know, this issue with, oh, wow, drawing attention to what they're

wearing just won't happen if you wear the same thing every day. And perhaps that's why fashion designers and people who work in fashion wear a lot of black loose clothing because it doesn't say anything much about what they're wearing. But I think there's an important part about the cognitive resources because if you're stressed about what you're wearing or if you're thinking about what you're wearing, you don't have the capacity to think fully on the job at hand. You know, worrying is it appropriate or have I dressed correctly for this meeting and then I'm going to another meeting. So I think a work uniform frees up time in the morning.

You don't have to make decisions about what to wear for the day. but it's also very efficient at work because you won't get comments on what you're wearing. I think it's rare that people would say, well, you're wearing the same thing every day. And do you think there's a lot of openings in the fashion industry for psychologists? You mentioned wanting to get more people in the field, but do you think this is an area of study that you see growing in the future and opportunities for psychologists or people, background in psychology or interest in psychology to find a way to use their knowledge, in perhaps a different field that they expected? Absolutely.

I think this year is a very interesting year for fashion retail. I think a lot of retailers will struggle this year with the rising consumer demands and the rising competition and the rise of omnichannel shopping. And so psychologists are suddenly being the the people as well as tech people who are necessary in the fashion industry to understand all the processes that happen in the brain as well as all the social processes that happen between people. So consumers, fashion employees and the peripheral people who work with fashion brands but are not actually part of the brands. And I think a huge opening will happen.

This takes time. So the course of only started recruiting in 2014, but I would say in a couple of years' time, there's going to be great demand for psychologists working in the fashion industry. And I really feel it's important that people who work in the fashion industry as psychologists have psychology training and don't just feel that because they're human, that they are psychologists. I think this is really, really important because psychologists are also trained in. in ethics and understanding that, you know, people are vulnerable and sort of making claims about what happens because this or that can backfire with people who are not able to

handle the outcomes of something, for example. So I'm really conscious of some people wanting to work in the fashion industry as psychologists who have little or no understanding or training of psychology. And going off what you just mentioned about ethics, there's been some scandals from recent brands like Gucci and Prada who've had issues with race and cultural sensitivity issues. So how can psychologists contribute to helping brands in this manner? Well, psychologists can help because they need to help brands become more diverse. in the areas of design, in their thinking, in their communications, because this is an issue

of lack of diversity as much as it's an ethical issue and a racist issue. So the lack of awareness by these brands is clearly shocking. And running diversity programs, implicit bias training to overcome the biases that that people have and also getting people on the ground actually working with the communities who these brands serve. It's beyond offensive and I think the brands have to hold their hands up when they've done something that is offensive. It all comes down to diversity, but the ethics is across the board and it needs to be implicit in everything that a brand does. So, you know, we're seeing with more data use, the ethics of that

has to be really seriously considered. From your perspective, what is the future of the fashion industry? Well, I think the fashion industry is going to diversify, not in terms of it, only in terms of its workforce or its imagery, but in terms of its products, in terms of its services. Because if we really are going to to be buying less and it still needs to make a profit. It needs to do that somehow. I think the fashion industry is also going to need to work with other disciplines. It's already working with AI and tech. It'll be working far more with material scientists creating biodegradable textiles that can be woven easily and laundered and cared for, but also going to be woven, can be recycled in a way that doesn't harm the environment.

The fashion industry will, of course, be working with more psychologists, anthropologists. I think it's going to be an industry that in the past has been very much design-based and business-based that will see the necessity, like neuroscience, for working with lots of different disciplines and actually appreciating the value of. of the diversity of disciplines within that, within the industry that's going to make it far richer. Thank you so much for joining us, Dr. Mayor. I really appreciate your time. Thank you very much for having me. To learn more about Dr. Mayor's work, visit www.psychology.

We want to know what you think about our show. You can email me your comments and ideas at K-Luna at APA.org. That's K-L-U-N-A-A-A-P-A-Rg. Speaking of Psychology is part of the APA Podcast Network, which includes other great podcasts such as APA journals dialogue about new psychological research and progress notes about the practice of psychology. You can find all our podcasts on iTunes, Stitcher, or wherever you get your podcasts. You can also go to our website speakingofpsychology.org to listen to more episodes. I'm Caitlin Luna with the American Psychological Association.