A Comparative Study on Fashion-Conservativeness of Religious People and Non-Religious People in Korea

Religion is deeply connected with human culture and life, and affects all areas of religious people's lives. The aim of this study was to find out how fashion-conservativeness of religious people and non-religious people differ in Korea. Ten religious people and ten atheists all in their twenties were interviewed to find out the differences between religious people and non-religious people related to their viewpoints on clothes. The twenties age group was selected because people in their twenties are sensitive to fashions and styles, and a fair proportion of males and females were selected. The subjects were asked demographic questions, questions about their religion and faith, whether or not they thought they were conservative or affected by religion, and finally, what they thought of photographs of certain styles. 12 photographs from the 2006-7 F/W collections of London, Paris, New York and Milan were presented to the subjects. The photographs were from the Vogue U.K. website and divided into 6 major styles based on verbal evidence used to describe the collections in catwalk reports: "Sexy," "attitude/confidence," "luxury," "sophisticated/chic," "feminine," and "rock." In conclusion, religious people were found to be more conservative than non-religious people in their twenties because they prefer more conservative and covered up styles, have more negative views of bold and skin-showing trends, and regard some styles to be too sexy when non-religious people do not.