Big Pants, Big Anxiety: Fashion Search Behavior as a Signal of Societal Uncertainty

This dataset and analysis investigate the "Big Pants Gauge" hypothesis proposed by Ralph Lauren, as described by Vanessa Friedman (The New York Times, April 18, 2025). In response to growing societal uncertainty, Lauren suggested that a surge in public interest in baggy pants could function similarly to the traditional "Hemline Index" as a cultural-economic signal. This project empirically explores Lauren's idea by combining Google search trend data for various loose pant styles with key indicators of market volatility (VIX) and economic policy uncertainty (USEPU). The Python code (BigPants.py) processes the data, performs Newey-West robust regressions, AR(1) modeling, structural break (CUSUM) tests, and Granger causality tests. Key findings include: Significant structural breaks in fashion search trends coinciding with major crises (2008 Global Financial Crisis, COVID-19 pandemic). A modest but statistically significant short-term predictive relationship between lagged baggy pants interest and VIX movements. No strong evidence of Granger-causal predictive power across multi-month horizons. The results suggest that fashion search behaviors may serve as informal, early behavioral sensors of collective anxiety, complementing traditional economic indicators. However, they also highlight the complexity of fashion trend dynamics, which can evolve into self-sustaining cultural phenomena independent of macroeconomic conditions. This upload includes: BigPants.py — Python script for data loading, cleaning, modeling, and figure generation (designed for Google Colab or local execution). Data files (data-*) — Search trends and macroeconomic indices. Output figures (Results_Figure_1.png, Results_Figure_2.png) — Visualization of key results. README_BigPantsBigAnxiety.txt — Documentation file explaining structure, usage, and licensing. License: Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0) Citation: Brown, S. (2025). Big Pants, Big Anxiety: Fashion Search Behavior as a Signal of Societal Uncertainty. Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.15292232