Fitting in and feeling important is a large portion of an average teenager’s conscience. When it comes to modern fashion, teens can be influenced into certain clothing brands through means of social conformity, social media, and their own self conscience.
In today’s society, teenage fashion and clothing styles are changing every week. Clothing is shaped by a world of technology, in which social media plays an enormous role when influencing teen fashion. Certain social media apps such as Youtube, Instagram, and Tik Tok target teenagers and young millennials to influence the youth about the latest trends, including fashion. Nowadays, almost every teenager owns a social media account of some sort, allowing fashion opinions and trends to spread like wildfire.
Jannah Said, Leesville High School Student, says her fashion styles are often influenced through social media outlets: “A lot of times I get fashion or clothing style ideas from apps like Instagram or famous social media icons I see. From what I’ve noticed, the teenage fashion industry has become very popular over social media.”
While social media and the internet play a large role when influencing teen fashion, social conformity and self consciousness also greatly affect how people dress.
As a teenager, one is thrown into countless masses of pressure to fit in among others in their community. Today, social conformity plays a great role in determining one’s fashion, behaviour, and style. Trends usually start by someone who introduces a specific fashion trend, nowadays teens fall in line with other peers and groups that catch on to that. From this, social conformity pressures teens to purchase and wear certain styles in order to look and feel like others to ‘fit in’. However, each student is unique in their own way, avoiding conformity.
Natalie Gore, Leesville Road High School student, talks about how social conformity impacts her own fashion trends saying, “The expectation to wear something others are wearing in kind of a conforming way has a large influence on my styles. The need to match and look like my peers is almost necessary for me.”
When it comes to personal self conscience, students think and judge in their own way. Some may find certain clothing brands different from others, some may judge another for wearing a specific shoe brand. Overall, each student is unique in their own way, and clothing is the opportunity to express that. When asked about the importance of a clothing brand over another, Gore said, “It doesn’t matter if someone doesn’t skateboard while wearing a Thrasher shirt, clothes are clothes. If you like how something looks, and you want to spend your money on it, by all means wear it. I like to think about it somewhat resembling the First Amendment, say what you want and wear what you want.”
“I think clothing is a way to express yourself to others. If you wake up one day and feel like dressing like a skater girl, then by all means dress like a skater girl. In the long run, it doesn’t matter to me what you wear,” said Said.
Whether regarding the importance of clothing brands or the social conforming pressure, teenage fashion trends and styles are influenced by many contributing aspects.
Hi! My name is Chase and I am a staff writer for The Mycenaean. Two fun facts about me are that I enjoy playing guitar with my dad and friends, and I also am a two-time spikeball tournament champion.