Your Mom Is Totally Copying Your Outfit

A new study found that mothers and daughters influence each other’s style choices, and shockingly enough, teen girls aren’t wearing head-to-toe Talbots to look more like mom. More often mothers are taking fashion cues from their daughters, which is just one of the many ways moms are ruining teenage girls’ lives.

The Temple University study found that in addition to having input in which products are purchased for the entire family — the “mommy buy me that” factor — daughters influence what products mothers buy for themselves alone, like makeup and clothing. Lead author Dr. Ayalla A. Ruvio says the findings, “suggest that the impact adolescents have on their parents is much more profound than has been credited to them.”

For the study, 343 mother daughter pairs, with an average age of 44 for the mothers and 16 for the daughters, responded to a questionnaire about their buying habits. Mothers who considered themselves young at heart and fashion conscious, and who see their daughters as stylish, are most likely to emulate their children. Across the board, daughters were less likely to take fashion cues from their mothers.

Even though teenage girls want to look older, they usually hope to accomplish this by looking like a celebrity, not their mothers. As for the moms, Ruvio tells LiveScience that they see copying their daughters as a “shortcut to what is hip and cool.” While the girls like when their mothers look fashionable, they don’t want that to involve stealing items from their closets or mixing up virgin cocktails and declaring, “You girls keep me young.” Ruvio explains, “They’re trying very, very hard to establish a separate, distinct image of who they are, and then the mother goes out and mimics them.”

But perhaps it goes beyond teens wanting to assert their individuality and hating their parents for no apparent reason. Our society tells women that their value is tied to how much they can make themselves look like a sexy 19-year-old. Maybe part of the reason that moms want to look like their daughters, but girls hate looking like their mothers, is that we’re all taught looking like an older woman is something to be avoided at all costs.

Study: Some Moms ‘Doppelgang’ Their Daughters’ Style [EurekAlert]
Moms Mimic Teen Daughters Style [LiveScience]