Women ratchet themselves up the social ladder, one high heel at a time

Heels terrify me...they are just lethal I tell you. Couple of my friends at work tried to explain how heels work but I gave up...apparently there is some deep significance to women's shoes which have a red underside but didnt quite comprehend why that is so important. 

Anyway, this research seems to say that women tend to keep up with the rich based on their heels...I quote

Fashion seems to embrace two opposite goals--fitting in with the crowd and standing out from it. Now new research reveals that the choice to fit in or stand out depends on who exactly the crowd is -- and the size of their high heels. That is, women adjust their fashion to look similar to the rich but different from the poor.Kurt Gray, a co-author at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and his colleagues investigated thousands of shoe purchases made by women who move to different cities, showing that women adopt the local trends when moving to wealthier cities but ignore them when moving to lower socioeconomic (SES) cities."In other words, women want to look like the rich girls, and different from the poor girls," said Gray, an assistant professor of psychology in UNC College of Arts and Sciences.To examine trends of conformity and individuality, Gray and his colleagues at Carnegie Mellon University and Yale University teamed up with a large-online fashion retailer. They examined five years of shoe purchases--16,236 in total--of 2007 women who moved between one of 180 U.S. cities. Because fashion choices are hard to quantify, they used a straightforward number: the size of high heels.Their analyses revealed that heel sizes changed when women moved, but not uniformly. When women moved to higher SES zip codes such as New York City or Los Angeles, the heel size closely matched the heel size that other women in that zip code had bought--showing a desire for conformity. But when women moved to lower SES zip codes, the heel size closely matched the heel size of their own past purchase--showing a desire to keep their individuality.The team of researchers, who included Jeff Galak, Nina Strohminger, Igor Elbert and Gray, label this phenomenon "trickle down conformity," because fashion preferences trickle down from the top but seldom up from the bottom. As Gray explained, "Walmart watches the styles on the runways in Milan, but Milan never watches the styles at Walmart."The explanation for this lopsided conformity is the deep human urge for status. "From the beginning of time, people have thirsted for respect and social standing, and have aligned themselves with the powerful and distanced themselves from the powerless," said Gray. "So it makes sense that they do the same with heel sizes."There is also reason to believe that this "aspirational fashion" is getting more prevalent. Inequality is increasing in America, and research reveals that the bigger the gap between rich and poor, the more people want to look rich. Such aspirations fuel the fortunes of fashion sites that provide high-status goods for low prices.This study examined only women, but there is no reason to believe it applies only to them. "Men do the same thing when they purchase clothes, electronics or cars," said Gray, "When you move from Wichita to LA, you look around and sell your Chevy for a BMW, but when you move from Los Angeles to Wichita, Kansas, you look around, and then just keep the BMW."This research builds off the past work of Gray and Strohminger, which examined what color combinations make outfits the most fashionable. "We often think of fashion as something frivolous, but it's an industry worth $1.7 trillion annually, and clothing often helps define ourselves," said Gray.With their current study, Gray and colleagues reveal that fashion industry isn't only about making money, but letting people look like they belong with money.

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Story Source:The above post is reprinted from materials provided by University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Note: Materials may be edited for content and length.

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Journal Reference:

1. Jeff Galak, Kurt Gray, Igor Elbert, Nina Strohminger. Trickle-Down Preferences: Preferential Conformity to High Status Peers in Fashion Choices. PLOS ONE, 2016; 11 (5): e0153448 DOI:10.1371/journal.pone.0153448

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2016/05/160504174852.htm

Trying To Be Sexy Instead Of Elegant Is Juvenile….

Choti 

I read this article and I thought of sharing this with you and some thoughts. I know I am your father and I am old and a fuddy duddy and what I know of fashion can fit into a tiny thimble. Still, there are some opinions I have after having visited many many countries and met literally thousands of people in a wide variety of situations, Choti. 

First of all, yes, I agree that focussing on how you look is not good, but then people are humans, they make their judgement on you based upon the first impressions. So there is nothing wrong in looking good. Secondly, it is very very easy to look sexy. Show some leg, show some chest, heavy makeup and yes, you will be noticed. I loved the quote in the article which says, be astonishing without creating astonishment. Do not base your fashion sense on film stars, sweetheart, nor on music stars. See some people like Jacqueline de Ribes or some of my favourite people like Christine Lagarde. They are classy, Choti. And class comes out, it emerges effortlessly, its in everything, how you speak to people, how polite you are, how you shake hands, how you dress, how you thank people, so on and so forth. That's where you need to go for Choti. Not the people who go for sexy. Not fun. Never follow the crowd, darling, everybody will be wearing leggings so stand out. Some of those leggings look weird. You need to have few good clothes, with scarves. With good shoes, create your own style. You know what it comes across? Boring. When the world is full of boring women who are all the same, legs chest breast make up out, how do you stand out? You stand out by being a lady. By being ridiculously well read (which you are, I am so proud of you), having a wicked sense of humour, very polite, and know that you are unique. Which you are. I think you have great friends as well. 

So that's the main thing which I wanted to say, Choti, go for elegant, smart, not sexy - that is too easy and common. Anybody can be sexy, but a lady stands out :) 

Love you 

Baba 

http://thefederalist.com/2016/02/01/trying-to-be-sexy-instead-of-elegant-is-juvenile/ 

Does anybody want to be elegant rather than sexy?” asked Frenchwoman Jacqueline de Ribes. Born into an aristocratic family and blessed with unique beauty and a nose like Cleopatra, Jacqueline reveled in adorning her swanlike figure in gowns as elaborate as those of Marie Antoinette. De Ribes had an insatiable appetite for creativity—she would tear apart her couture gowns to create new and elaborate styles. Her silhouette transfixed the eyes, and her presence captured the hearts of the men who surrounded her, from notable designers to noblemen. She made waves with her eccentric yet classic style, renowned in both her native Paris and abroad in America for her unsurpassed beauty, captivating charm, and swanlike grace. While this may sound like a fairy tale from centuries past, it is the true story of a woman who was one of twentieth century fashion’s greatest muses. Yet most millennials have never heard of her. “Glamour,” says de Ribes, “is a worldly style, lots of allure, a touch of flamboyance, a deep know-how, all wrapped up in natural seduction.” 

Book Review: The Panama Hat Trail

In my experience, travel books have a built in advantage, the reader is already pre-disposed towards the destination so even crap books get a bit of a bye. But even adjusting for that factor and the fact that I am an idiot, sometimes a book comes along which is a sheer pleasure to read.

this book by Tom Miller, first published in 1986, takes you through a journey behind the Panama Hat which is made in Ecuador. He has a fascinating way of describing the country, the Indians, the regular moans about coffee, the issues with the traffic and bus travel, he describes the hat, Gosh, he describes the hat process. The man ends up in the depths of the forest to pluck the particular straw and then moves through entire supply chain from those depths of the forest down the history, geography, religion, culture, anthropology, economics of Ecuador to the showrooms in New York where these Panama Hats, now revalued hugely from the original price of literally cents to the farmers of the straw to the hundreds of dollars that a purchaser of a Montecristo Fini hat will pay. Some of these straw hats are so finely woven that they can hold water.

Amazing book. I learnt so much about the country. Like India, it also lost huge swathes of territory and does stupid nationalistic things like map controls (you cant show the land that Ecuador lost in the war with Peru). And I now have to go check out the bookstores in Quito, found out there are two there which stock English language books besides the usual fiction pap. And the man has a sense of deprecating humour which is lovely and refreshing. Loved it.

And it doesn't talk about Galapagos at all. So as a very respected member of the travel book species, it comes very highly recommended. One of the best books that I have read. So much that I recommended it to my son, whose response was a gratifying “ummm, ok”

Your feet in heels

How your feet do in heels.

Look at the stresses, bloody hell, and women go through this every day? !!!!!