Friday, July 3, 2015

Brain and 1st Impressions, Part 5

Studies have shown that a person's thinking becomes more abstract when the individual adopts formal, polite language. Turn out a similar thing happens when people put on formal clothing. Findings from a study led by Michael L. Slepian of Columbia University discovered that the nature of an everyday and ecologically valid experience, the type of clothing worn, influences cognition broadly, impacting the processing style that changes how objects, people, and events are construed. (Abstract thinking facilitates the pursuit of long-term goals over short-term gains; saving versus spending, for example.) Research participants wearing formal attire scored 5.04 on a 1-to-10 scale of a type of thought process that measures abstract thinking, versus 3.99 for those wearing casual clothing. My brain’s opinion is that this is just another example of the way in which ‘everything starts in the brain.’ It’s not only the brains of others that are impacted by your appearance, your own brain is, too! Thinking about how you are impressing your own brain may be a new concept. But you may want to pay attention, seeing as it can impact even the way your brain functions . . .


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