Shades of Influence: How Skin Tone Shapes Consumer Choices in Fashion Rentals
Dr. Liyuan Wei, an Associate Professor at the Digital & Data-Driven Marketing Department at the Southampton Business School, delivered an engaging and thought-provoking research seminar titled 'Skin Colour Congruence in Access-Based Consumption: Evidence from Fashion Rentals'. The seminar sparked lively discussion and offered fresh insights into the intersection of identity, social influence, and consumer behaviour in the digital fashion economy.
In this ongoing research, Dr. Wei and her co-authors investigate how skin colour subtly but powerfully shapes product selection in the context of online fashion rentals. By analysing user-generated content including selfies and product reviews on a fashion rental platform, the researchers observed a compelling pattern: consumers are more likely to follow the product choices of individuals with similar skin tones.
What makes the findings particularly noteworthy is the asymmetry in influence. While light-skinned renters tend to be followed by both light-skinned and some dark-skinned consumers, dark-skinned renters are predominantly followed by others who share their skin tone. This suggests that social identification and perceived similarity play a stronger role for consumers with darker skin, shedding light on how group-based social cues shape decision-making in digital environments.
These insights have meaningful implications for inclusive marketing, product representation, and platform design in the fashion-sharing economy. The team’s experiments are ongoing, so stay tuned for deeper explorations into how visual identity and social categorization continue to influence access-based consumption.