New Study Shows Clothes Don't Make The Professor

It's not uncommon for UC Berkeley professor Randy Katz to come to class carrying a sword or fake grenades.

Katz, a professor of electrical engineering and computer science, usually comes to his freshman seminar "Information Technology Goes to War!" in full military uniform to engage his students.

"Students feel more comfortable and open to discussion," Katz said. "It doesn't seem like I am a remote personality, it's kind of immediate."

While his method works to break the ice, teachers' clothing does little to affect students' perceptions of them, according to a recent study.

The study, which surveyed four psychology classes at North Hennepin Community College in Minnesota, concluded that the clothing instructors wear has little effect on how students perceive them over longer periods of time.

The study, conducted by Yasmine L. Konheim-Kalkstein, a faculty instructor at the community college, Mark Stellmack, an instructor of the University of Minnesota and Amanda Miles, a graduate student at the University of Minnesota, was presented at the Association for Psychological Science and is in the process of being written.

As Konheim-Kalkstein was preparing to start teaching her first class, she said it became important for the relatively young 28-year-old to look and dress older than she was.

"Eventually I started wondering, how much does it really matter what I'm wearing?" Konheim-Kalkstein said.

For the first four weeks of class, Konheim-Kalkstein taught two of the classes dressed in jeans and a T-shirt, while she dressed in more formal slacks and dress shoes for her other two classes.

Stellmack handed out a survey to Konheim-Kalkstein's classes after 30 minutes of lecture the first day and a similar survey at the end of the first four weeks. The survey asked students questions about the professor's approachability, age and level of knowledge.

The data suggested that the type of clothing made a small difference in the instructor's perceived approachability on the first day, but the clothing made no difference in the perception of the instructor after the four weeks.

The study was limited in that it only used one instructor, Konheim-Kalkstein said.

"I think there needs to be more research, but my inclination is that (clothing) doesn't matter a whole lot," she said. "To students it matters more how engaging you will be or what expectations you will have of them."

UC Berkeley fifth year Katie Knoche said clothing does not define a professor.

"I've had ones who dressed down and there was a certain kind of freedom in how the lecture was structured ... but I've also had ones who wore jeans and shirts who were also very structured," she said.

Katz said style is only a way of engaging students. In the end the professor is what really matters.

"It may not matter whether you are wearing jeans or a suit-you are still the professor in front of the student," he said.

Tags: