You may or may not have seen some things floating around on the interwebs about ‘enclothed cognition’ of late and we’d like to reiterate that it’s the most exciting scientific discovery since sliced bread.
Enclothed cognition is the idea “that wearing a piece of clothing and embodying its symbolic meaning will trigger associated psychological processes.” So, as an example, dressing in a suit and tie will make you look professional/baller as fuck, as well as actually making you express the attributes that makes one professional/baller as fuck.
Scientists Hajo Adam and Adam Galinsky coined the term back in 2012. They conducted a groundbreaking yet strikingly simple experiment that tested performance against the clothes several test groups were wearing.
Across three studies, Adam and Galinsky used lab coats (an item of clothing inherently connected with being a kick-ass intellectual) and tested to see if the symbolic meaning of the lab coat, as well as the physical experience of wearing the lab coat, would increase performance over a series of academic tasks.
The results of the study showed that people performed substantially higher when they completed activities whilst wearing a lab coat rather than just their regular clothes. In addition to this, participants who wore a lab coat that was described as a ‘doctor’s coat‘ performed significantly better than those wearing its ill-defined, drab counterpart.
These findings validate the idea that when we wear something, and have a concrete perception of what those clothes portray, we’ll have no choice but to demonstrate the characteristics associated with them.
HOW COOL IS THAT?!
So how can you use this ~science~ to improve your day-to-day?
Let’s take a look at athletes like the ladies and gents over at Nike.
Their job is literally working out. How twisted is that? Like, they get paid to exercise 24/7.
When you break it down though, they’re still just like the rest of us – only with god-like physical abilities.
Imagine training for the majority of your day and then still having to do odds and ends like the rest of us, like picking up toilet paper from the shops, getting to the bank before it closes, engaging in heated exchanges with your internet provider…
How.
HOW?!
HOW COULD YOU BE FUCKED?! HOW COULD YOU NOT CRAWL UP INTO A BALL SPIT THE ABSOLUTE DUMMY?!
HOW ELSE DO YOU THINK NIKE MASTER TRAINER, KRISTY GODSO, WORKS OUT ALL DAY AND STILL HAS ENERGY TO BUY GROCERIES?!
HOW ELSE WOULD NIC NAITANUI BE ABLE TO DESTROY HIS OPPONENTS ON THE FIELD AND STILL HAVE THE ENERGY TO COOK DINNER?!
We’ve uncovered the answer.
Not only do athletes wear clothes to increase their performance when they’re smashing it on the field or in the gym, they wear lifestyle products in their down time to keep their heads in the game.
Enclothed cognition, baby, enclothed cognition.
Unless you’ve been sleeping under a rock the size of Uluru, you’ll know that Nike are in the business of making shoes and threads that’ll make you dominate any given sporting field whilst still looking damn fine.
They’ve culminated their supreme knowledge of performance clothing and plucked the hawtest fashurn trends of 2015 to create their newest line of lifestyle products under the mantle of Tech Pack. These aren’t digs to wear to the gym, these are clothes to wear so you can get shit done, son.
Embrace the theory of enclothed cognition, deck yourself out in new dregs and change your life for the better.
And, if worsts comes to worst and you end up still being a pleb on the couch and not an ultra-productive savant, at least you’ll look magnificent.
Don’t believe us. Believe the science, people.
Nike Australia’s YouTube is chockablock with insights from national sporting stars like Nic Naitanui, Kristy Godso, Anna Flanagan and Michael Jennings. Check out how they get along in their downtime as well as insider-info on Nike’s range.
Images via Nike.
