Why it really is cool to be fashionably late to a bash: From revellers copying what latecomers drink to even mimicking how they dress, new research shows
- Arriving late to a party could be an image booster, new research reveals
- Fellow partygoers may even copy what latecomers drink and dress, it shows
- The fashionably late can be seen as not being worried about social disapproval
Arriving late at a party is a proven image-booster, according to researchers.
Tardy guests – those making an entrance up to 90 minutes beyond the time on the invitation – are respected and admired by other party-goers.
Fellow revellers even copy what late-comers drink, while eight out of ten want to copy how they dress, according to a study published in the Journal Of Business Research.
The fashionably late are seen as superior because they aren’t worried about disapproval.
(Stock Photo) Being late signals that one has sufficient popularity and a social network to be able to afford to lose new socialising opportunities, researchers claim
‘We’ve shown through a series of studies that people infer higher status to late-arriving people,’ say the researchers from Cardiff University and other centres, who tested party guests in Europe and the US.
Being late signals that one has sufficient popularity and a social network to be able to afford to lose new socialising opportunities, they claim.
But the researchers also warned that there are disadvantages.
Latecomers may face disapproval from some guests, and risk missing out on the best food and drink.
After noting that some people regularly arrive late to social gatherings, the researchers created a series of experiments to discover why.
One, involving 136 students at a European university, showed that guests were more likely to copy the late arrival’s choice of drink.
Another found that 78 per cent preferred the later guest’s T-shirt, even when it was not significantly different to anyone else’s.