Yes, that actually happened in my life. My own mother, who enjoys watching ‘Strictly Come Dancing’ and talks to the cat, told me I wasn’t “cool enough” to wear Nike Blazers (the high-top trainer pictured below, for those of you who aren’t sure what I mean).
So this got me thinking: If I’m not cool enough for certain shoes, does this mean I’m generally not cool enough? Do people judge me on my flawed shoe selection?
To overcome this ‘shoe depression’ I turned to science and found this little gem from ABC News (based on some genuine research – which you can view here if you have $31.50 or an Athens login). I thought I’d check this out to soothe my growing complex and found some pretty interesting shoe stuff, such as the issue that there is very little research into the claim that “the clothes maketh the man”. As the paper itself states:
“Although shoes are usually the single most expensive item in people’s outfit, they have received relatively little attention in research.”
This bothers me. Mr C Louboutin needs to up his research funding and fix this, especially if people’s shoe-based judgements are as accurate as the paper suggests…
It turns out (according to the research) that people are fairly good at gauging others’ attachment anxiety and agreeableness just from photos of their shoes! And people are even better at judging the age, gender and income of people from their shoes too (a bit self-explanatory, but pah!). Even more, in this research it tended to be that, of all the people judging the shoes, there was consensus between the judgements – so basically LOTS of people think you’re not very agreeable, ouch! (For anyone wondering they asked for photos of the shoes the participants wear most, so less opportunity to cheat and mess up the results!)
But why are we such cruel, judgemental creatures who form long-lasting impressions of one another so soon? Because it’s an “adaptive social function” (the paper’s words, not mine). Basically, by gauging things about others by quickly checking them over you don’t have to expend a load of time and energy on them. Sort of like speed-dating, maybe? And we’re really good at it too! Generally the research shows that when you compare people’s judgements from when they’ve had a quick glance at someone to when they’ve had a long, soul-searching stare they’re only slightly less accurate in their judgement.
So, yes, from this I have discovered that people may judge me on my uncool choice in shoes. The worst bit? They may well be judging me correctly and in the masses!
Science&Shoes 