Female body dressing: Perceptions and investments in beauty

Abstract

Clothing style and the extent of body revealing in public are cultural and social factors that can influence one’s beauty investments and assessments of attractiveness. To explore this further, we recruited 99 Polish women from Poland (perceived to represent a western approach to dress and body) and 100 Iranian women from Iran (perceived to represent a Muslim culture with a more modest approach to dress). We asked these women to respond to questionnaires to test whether cultural norms regarding one’s clothing are linked to investments in one’s beauty and self-perceived attractiveness. In line with our hypotheses, Polish women (who have more freedom to reveal their bodies publicly) spent more time caring for their bodies than Iranian women. Polish women also spent more time caring for their bodies than their faces. However, contrary to our predictions, Iranian women did not spend more time caring for their faces than their bodies. In fact, Iranian women did not spend more time caring for their faces than Polish women. Furthermore, we observed that older participants spent less time thinking about their attractiveness and owned fewer care products than younger participants. We further discuss our findings in the context of cultural norms regarding female body dressing and how it might relate to beauty investments.