Why we wear what we wear.
http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20110416211021AAvWuKZ
In the link above, a user of answers.yahoo.com wonders why so many people follow fashion trends no matter how weird they are. As an example, the user references guys walking with one hand up their pants, which always hang low enough to reveal most of their underwear. All of the answers given by our fellow internetters were related to the psychology of fitting in with peers. For example, the user that supplied the answer that was voted the best reasoned that people are usually unaware of the fact that not every style suits everyone; if they go out and buy what is considered in style it may not necessarily look good on them if it doesn’t suit them. Although this is a valid explanation for people looking terrible in outfits that don’t suit them while others can look great in them, it doesn’t seem to explain why people decide to follow the fashion trends in the first place. When I contemplated this question for a while, I realized that a possible explanation can be found in network dynamics.
The example of someone buying clothes that don’t suit them simply because they are in style seems irrational; after all, everyone should have at least enough sense of fashion to realize it when something doesn’t look that good on them, especially considering the high cost of fashionable items these days. Even if most shoppers are blinded by the trends, it is reasonable to think that there are people who irrationally buy expensive brand-name outfits instead of cheaper clothes even if they don’t necessarily think it’s an upgrade.
A possible way to explain this behavior is by considering information cascades. In fact, the fashion example fits perfectly into the model of information cascading behavior; in the market for clothes, people buy their clothes in sequence (i.e. there is a first, second, third and so forth buyer of any particular item) and although they can see the decision made by other shoppers by looking at their clothes they don’t know what moved them to buy designer brand or cheaper clothes. Notice how well this fits the information cascade model, where decision makers decide between accepting or rejecting based on a positive or negative signal. In this case, the buyers decide to buy expensive designer clothes (accept) or cheaper clothes (reject) based on whether they personally think the designer clothes are worth it (a positive signal) or they are not worth the money (a negative signal). When considering this situation, it is wholly possible that an information cascade of buying expensive clothes can form; a buyer will see other people wear the more expensive clothes and believe that these people must have believed it was worth the money (i.e. received a positive signal). Then, when faced with their own decision to go cheap or buy designer, they will buy designer even if they personally believe the cheap brands are the better option, as long as they’ve seen the majority of people do the same.
The model seems to fit very well, but it probably doesn’t fully explain the phenomenon. However, although the psychology of fitting in with the people we surround us with is a good explanation for why we sometimes deck ourselves in outfits we don’t necessarily always like, the idea of an information cascade in this situation seems to reinforce our decision to go against our private signals.