Attraction as a Function of Attitudes and Dress

An experiment was designed for the study of the effect of similarity in attitudes, similarity in dress, and attractiveness of dress on attraction. In an initial session with the experimenter, each of 72 female college students serving as subjects completed a shortened version of Byrne's (1971) Survey of Attitudes and was photographed. Between the initial session and a second session, another survey of attitudes alleged to belong to a stranger was created by the experimenters to be either similar or dissimilar to the survey completed by each subject. Also at this time, judges matched each subject's photograph with a photograph of the stranger. The photograph contained the stranger in dress judged to be either similar or dissimilar to that of the subject, and either as attractive, neutral, or unattractive. In the second session, subjects were presented with the survey alleged to have been completed by the stranger and the photograph of the stranger. The subjects were then asked to complete Byrne's Interper sonal Judgment Scale based on the information presented to them. Results of the experiment indicated that similarity in attitudes had the greatest effect on attraction; similarity in dress had the next greatest effect; and attractiveness of dress had the least effect on attraction.