Are men fashionably backward?

The saying, ‘Behind every successful man is a woman’, may soon be amended to, ‘Behind every well-dressed man is a woman.’

A recent survey in Britain revealed that more than half of the population of men depend on their women to buy their clothes and pick their outfits for them. In fact, the results reveal that one in four men ask their girlfriends or wives to shop for them and on the rare occasion that they go solo, they seek their mother or female partner’s approval. These results come as a surprise, since men’s fashion has been given more importance in the past few years. But does this apply to the male population in India as well?

Clinical psychologist Dr Kanan Khatau Chikhal isn’t in total agreement with this survey. She says, “This could be the case, since men seldom care about their attire and women are generally more fashion savvy and know where the good sales take place. However, there are a lot of men who do shop on their own.” She feels, while the archetype of the man is to fend and provide for his family, the woman is the one who stocks for the house. “A man who’s insecure or unsure about his image may need approval from his woman. Further, in societies where the mother is overprotective, she may end up shopping for her son till he’s grown-up, and the pattern continues when he marries a woman who does the same for him.”

Commenting on this survey, psychiatrist Dr Paresh Trivedi says it can observed here too, but he adds that it differs from person-to-person. “Men sometimes feel that their girlfriend or wife will nag them, and hence may seek their opinion while shopping. This could also be due to the fact that women are generally more looks-conscious themselves, and want their partners to be dressed in a specific way. However, I have seen couples where the case is the other way around,” he adds.