THE ORIGINAL
The doctor's coat
In 2012, people did better on an attention test wearing a lab coat described as a doctor's coat than one described as a painter's coat.
How it held upCLOTHES AND THE MIND
Dress the part,
think the part?
The idea has a name: enclothed cognition.
Weigh the evidence
SMALL TO MODERATEnot magic
It means clothes can shape the wearer's feelings, thoughts and behaviour through what they symbolise. The 2012 paper that coined the phrase has been cited more than 600 times. Then a careful replication failed, and researchers went back to check the whole field.
At a glance
- Meaning matters
- Newer studies hold up
- Effects are modest
- A claim that survived a hard check
40 studies
Experimental studies on enclothed cognition analysed
They came from 24 peer-reviewed articles, gave 105 effects and involved 3,789 participants in total.
SCOPE · REVIEW
103 people
Average number of participants per study
The authors said at least 150 would have been ideal, and named small samples as a limitation of many studies.
SAMPLE SIZE · REVIEW
TWO NUMBERS WORTH KNOWING
Checking a
whole field.
What the 2023 review found when it
re-examined every study it could find.
Sources: Horton, Adam and Galinsky, Evaluating the Evidence for Enclothed Cognition (University of Bath research portal); BPS Research Digest, 25 August 2023.
HOW STRONG IS IT?
Which findings
stand up?
Pick a part of the enclothed cognition evidence to see how well it held up when researchers checked it. The bar shows how much confidence the checks support.
Based on Burns and colleagues' 2019 preregistered replication and Horton, Adam and Galinsky's z-curve and meta-analyses of 40 studies (published in Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 2025).
THE SHORT ANSWER
Probably yes,
but less than claimed.
One famous result did not hold up.
The wider idea did, in newer studies.
THE REPLICATION
A careful re-run
A preregistered 2019 replication found no lab coat effect on the Stroop attention task, and argued any effect was too small for the original design to detect.
See the review
FORMAL CLOTHES
Suits and the big picture
A 2015 study found students in their interview clothes favoured big-picture over fine-detail processing more often than those in casual clothes.
Read the study
READING THE HEADLINES
Four questions
for any clothes claim.
Stories that a jumper, a uniform or a pair of shoes changes how you think are common. The enclothed cognition review suggests a few simple checks.
When was it published?
The review found effects published after 2015, when research practices improved, hold up far better than earlier ones.
How many people?
The average study had 103 participants; the authors said at least 150 would have been ideal.
Has it been re-run?
The best-known lab coat result failed a preregistered direct replication. One study is never the final word, either way.
How big is the effect?
The overall effect was estimated as small to moderate: a nudge, not a transformation.
THE FORMAL CLOTHES STUDY
Dressing up,
thinking broader.
Across five experiments reported in 2015, researchers tested whether formal clothing, which tends to signal social distance, encourages abstract thinking. In one, 54 students brought interview clothes and class clothes to the lab and were randomly assigned to change into one set.
Those in formal clothes more often picked out a large letter made of smaller letters rather than the small letters themselves, a sign of big-picture processing. The researchers noted that larger, more diverse samples were needed, and the study predates 2016, the period the later review treats with most caution.
Questions
Questions people ask
What is enclothed cognition?
The systematic influence clothes can have on the wearer's feelings, thoughts and behaviours through their symbolic meaning, as defined in the 2023 review of the field.
Did the lab coat study fail to replicate?
A preregistered direct replication in 2019 found no lab coat effect on Stroop performance, and argued any such effect was too small for the original design to detect.
So is the whole idea wrong?
Not according to the later review of 40 studies. It found evidential value for effects published after 2015 and supported the core idea that what we wear influences how we think, feel and act.
Does the coat itself matter, or what it means?
In the original study a lab coat was described either as a doctor's coat or as a painter's coat. That is why the theory stresses symbolic meaning, not the garment alone.
Will smart clothes make me perform better?
The evidence points to small to moderate effects on average. A 2015 study linked formal clothing to more abstract thinking, but its authors called for larger samples.
Sources
Where the facts come from
- University of Bath: Evaluating the Evidence for Enclothed Cognition, Z-Curve and Meta-Analyses (Horton, Adam and Galinsky)
- BPS Research Digest: Enclothed cognition brushes up well (2023)
- Burns et al.: An Old Task in New Clothes, a preregistered direct replication (2019)
- Association for Psychological Science: When Clothing Style Influences Cognitive Style
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