Clothing motives

Abstract

The research is conducted to discover the roles clothing plays in our lives,what are the clothing motives,or what are the needs clothing satisfy and how. Many types of tests are used in the research.Demographic and socioeconomic characteristics,attitudes and opinions,awareness and knowledge, motivation and behavior are all measured with a 163 variables questionnaire.Pictured projective tests,design preference tests are specially developed and used in the research. In data analysis,frequencies,cross-tabulation and factor analysis are used. Frequently used clothing items,accessories,even mustache and beard are found to have images.People think a bearded man is intellectual and unconformistic without being aware of the fact that "beard" stimulates these personality attributions.The projective technique developed in this study showed that clothing items send some visual messaqes,and these messages can be identified and measured although they are unconscious. Style,design and color seem to be the alphahet of a silent language. We junge others getting several messages from appearance and clothing in the first few seconds of a meeting.Our tastes,how we make ourselve: look,or our nermanent style-design-color preferences seem to be close related to our personality,self-image,social attitudes.It is shown that design tastes are also identifyahle and measurable if the objective elements of design like "simplicity-complexity" ,"symmetry-asymmetry" ,"dynamism-statism" are considered seryarately. As an example, unconformistic and more individualistic people tend to prefer complex design consisting of asymmetrical balance,crossing lines,and contrasting shades of color. And this taste is not only clothing specific,but a general preference.Colors are closely related to designs.Besides their very well-known ability to send messages,it seems they also have some functional abilities in clothing.Grey color,for instance, is shown to be an economic color because of its multi-purpose characteristics. It seems that some life-styles are identified with clothing.Fashionable women, for instance, develop their individuality and their self and social image by caring and improving their look in the determined way of following fashion and innovations .Some other people use clothing as a means of social adaptation.Conservative, classical, conforming clothing seem to create respect anc as a consequence social acceptance in traditional sociaLenvironments. Some other people make shopping of unnecessary cloths to compensate personal disillusion. It seems that a relaxing physical harmony between body and cloth secures and make certain peonle more comfortable.They prefer cloths which are soft and just fitting the body like a natural fur. Brand loyalty and value perception are closely related to status prestige seeking motive. Frequently renewinq expensive branded cloths seems to reflect a show of economic poer. Clothing reflects,help to identify, and satisfy the needs of any personality:conformistic or unconformistic,perfectionist or down-to-earth, defensive or extrovert, leader or follower.