The Psychology of Social Status

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vi Preface and Acknowledgments

while many of the consequences may be similar, the psychological underpinnings

of status and related processes are unique from those that lead to power. Given this
distinction, we believed that the field was in need of a book dedicated to the large
bodies of research that have emerged on status and naturally occurring social rank.
With this volume, our goal was to showcase the major foundational insights that
have emerged to date on the psychology of social status. The scientific study of
status—which began over 40 years ago with classic studies in sociology by Berger,
Ridgeway, Driskell, and others—has grown tremendously in recent years. Many
of the most influential psychology papers on the topic—such as those by Tiedens,
Anderson, and Willer, to name a few—were published within the last 15 years.
Moreover, the study of status has become an interdisciplinary enterprise, crossing
the boundaries of sociology, psychology, organizational science, anthropology, and
other fields. Essential to this volume is the inclusion and synthesis of these inter-
disciplinary approaches. Among the 16 chapters included are the latest perspectives
and cutting-edge empirical findings from across these disciplines; contributors in-
clude social, personality and evolutionary psychologists, organizational scientists,
sociologists, and anthropologists. Furthermore, all of these contributors are leading
experts in the field, whose work has broken theoretical and empirical ground. It
is our hope that this collection will provide a one-stop shop for those who wish to
learn about the latest and most important developments in this flourishing area of
research.
This volume is divided into five sections. The first section provides an over-
view of prominent overarching theoretical perspectives that have shaped much of
the current research agenda on social status. These chapters lay out the theoretical
foundations for much of the rest of the work presented in the volume, and address
core questions about the nature of social status and hierarchy. In Chap. 1, Cheng
and Tracy explore the evolutionary origins of human status hierarchies, and review
a large body of evidence supporting the Dominance-Prestige theoretical account.
According to this model, there are two fundamental pathways to social rank attain-
ment in human societies: dominance (inducing fear in others) and prestige (gain-
ing others’ respect). In Chap. 2, Barkow explores the evolutionary emergence of
prestige, and discusses the pivotal role of culture and cultural transmission in the
rise of complex, socially stratified groups and societies, from an anthropological
perspective. Complementing these chapters on the distal forces that favor the emer-
gence of hierarchical relationships, in Chap. 3 Anderson and Willer offer a broad
account of the proximal drivers of status allocation. They argue that, although hu-
mans are motivated to develop hierarchies based on prestige—by allocating social
rank only to the most skilled and committed group members—their ability to do so
is constrained by a number of interesting psychological biases and traps. Finally,
in Chap. 4 Blader and Chen synthesize across these distinct theoretical perspec-
tives to explore the multidimensional nature of hierarchical relationships, with a
close review of the conceptual overlap and distinctions among these diverse forms
of hierarchy. This chapter helps to explain the different ways in which researchers
have conceptualized each of the key constructs relevant to the central topic of this
Preface and Acknowledgments vii

volume: status, power, influence, socioeconomic status, leadership, dominance, and

prestige.
The second section of the volume examines the personality, demographic, situ-
ational, psychological, emotional, and cultural underpinnings of status attainment.
This section, in essence, addresses questions about who attains status, and why.
In Chap. 5, Anderson and Cowan survey the extant empirical research on the per-
sonality determinants of status attainment. They find that high status individuals
consistently exhibit lower neuroticism but greater extraversion, dominance, and
self-monitoring, and, in some group contexts, greater conscientiousness, narcis-
sism, and openness to experience. Moving beyond personality, in Chap. 6 Blaker
and van Vugt examine the link between physical stature and social status. Their re-
view indicates that physical attributes such as height and muscularity promote rank,
but through different mechanisms. Whereas tall individuals acquire status via both
dominance and prestige, the high rank of muscular individuals results from domi-
nance. In Chap. 7, Kafashan, Sparks, Griskevicius, and Barclay explore the com-
plex bidirectional associations between prosocial behavior and status attainment.
Certain forms of prosocial behavior, they suggest, both influence and is affected by
status gains to a greater extent than others.
In Chap. 8, Leary, Jongman-Sereno, and Diebels offer insights into the psycho-
logical processes that underpin individuals’ pursuit of status, and focus specifically
on the role of impression management—the attempt to shape and influence one’s
reputation and public perception. Their theoretical analysis shows that acts of self-
presentation are not only pervasive in status pursuits, but also entail a delicate and
difficult balance between the often conflicting goals of getting ahead and getting
along. In Chap. 9 von Rueden addresses the universality of social hierarchy from a
cultural anthropological perspective. As his review of ethnographies and recent em-
pirical work in small-scale societies reveals, hierarchy is a human universal, found
even in highly egalitarian foraging and horticultural societies. Interestingly, status
in these populations is largely determined by a similar suite of factors observed in
industrial societies—such as skill and generosity, or prestige more broadly, as well
as physical stature. He shows that men’s status bears important consequences for his
reproductive success. Finally, in Chap. 10 Steckler and Tracy provide an in-depth
overview of the distinct emotional underpinnings of status hierarchy. They highlight
the critical functions that basic emotions—such as happiness, sadness, anger, dis-
gust, and fear—and more complex social emotions—pride, shame, envy, contempt,
and admiration—serve in facilitating hierarchy navigation.
The volume’s third section focuses on the intra- and inter-personal benefits and
costs of possessing and lacking status, examining the downstream consequences of
high and low status on cognition, self-perception, and interpersonal and inter-group
relations. In Chap. 11 Fast and Joshi explore two fundamental cognitive forces—
subjective sense of control and role expectations—that are triggered by high rank,
and examine the benefits and barriers that these forces present in organizational
settings. They argue that these rank-related cognitions are not always advantageous,
and in fact often create surprising barriers for those atop the social hierarchy in
domains such as decision-making, task performance, social relationships, and well-
viii Preface and Acknowledgments

being. Broadening the scope to status hierarchies that exist at a societal level, in
Chap. 12 North and Fiske discuss prevailing sociological and psychological in-
sights into social inequality. Their review highlights the socio-structural forces, cul-
tural stereotypes, and other psychological biases that jointly create and sustain so-
cial inequality and prejudice among groups who differ in race, gender, age, weight,
sexuality, and social class.
The volume’s fourth section reviews emerging research on the biological and
bodily manifestation of status attainment, identifying specific endocrinologies, neu-
ral systems, and nonverbal behaviors that create and reflect status differences. In
Chap. 13, Knight and Mehta review the mounting empirical findings on the neuroen-
docrinologies that underpin hierarchical differences. This body of research provides
compelling evidence for complex reciprocal relations between status attainment and
a number of hormones—namely testosterone, cortisol, estradiol, and oxytocin—in
both humans and nonhuman animals. In Chap. 14 Pornpattananangkul, Zink, and
Chiao provide an overview of research on the neural networks and patterns that
encode status-related information in the human brain. Their review indicates that
the serotonergic and dopaminergic neurotransmitter systems—which are regulated
by intricate gene-by-environment interactions—play pivotal roles in facilitating the
perception, recognition, and expression of dominance and submission patterns in
humans and other species. In Chap. 15, Hall, Latu, Carney, and Schmid Mast sum-
marize the large bodies of research on the nonverbal expression of status. As they
show, high and low relative rank are each associated with distinct nonverbal cues
emitted from the face, eyes, body, and voice. By signaling one’s rank position to
others and activating rank-related cognitions and behavioral patterns, these cues
both shape and reflect individuals’ rank in complex yet predictable ways.
Finally, the fifth section of the volume is comprised of a single stand-alone chap-
ter by Cheng, Weidman, and Tracy, which provides a broad review of available
research methods for measuring and experimentally manipulating social status. The
goal of this review is to provide researchers with an easy-to-access means of de-
termining how best to measure or manipulate the status-related constructs in which
they are interested. Together, these 16 chapters collectively form what we hope to
be a useful resource for researchers, students, policy-makers, and others interested
in learning about the remarkable proliferation of knowledge that has accumulated
across many decades of research, along with the latest and most exciting theoretical
and empirical insights into human social status dynamics.
A volume of this scope would not have been possible without the help of many
individuals. First and foremost, we are extremely grateful to each and every one of
the volume’s contributors, who generously devoted their time and energy to this
project. Our heartfelt appreciation also goes to the editors at Springer, in particular
Morgan Ryan and Anna Tobias, for their encouragement and support throughout
this project. Finally, we thank our publisher, Springer, without whom this effort
would not be possible.
February 2014 Joey T. Cheng
Jessica L. Tracy
Cameron Anderson
Contents

Part I Theoretical Perspectives: The Nature of Social Status

and Hierarchy

1 Toward a Unified Science of Hierarchy: Dominance and

Prestige are Two Fundamental Pathways to Human Social Rank �����   3
Joey T. Cheng and Jessica L. Tracy

2 Prestige and the Ongoing Process of Culture Revision �����������������������    29

Jerome H. Barkow

3 Do Status Hierarchies Benefit Groups? A Bounded

Functionalist Account of Status �������������������������������������������������������������    47
Cameron Anderson and Robb Willer

4 What’s in a Name? Status, Power, and Other Forms

of Social Hierarchy ����������������������������������������������������������������������������������    71
Steven L. Blader and Ya-Ru Chen

Part II Who Leads? Psychological Underpinnings of Status

Attainment   

5 Personality and Status Attainment: A Micropolitics Perspective �������    99

Cameron Anderson and Jon Cowan

6 The Status-Size Hypothesis: How Cues of Physical Size

and Social Status Influence Each Other ����������������������������������������������� 119
Nancy M. Blaker and Mark van Vugt

7 Prosocial Behavior and Social Status ���������������������������������������������������� 139

Sara Kafashan, Adam Sparks, Vladas Griskevicius and Pat Barclay

ix
x Contents

8 The Pursuit of Status: A Self-presentational Perspective

on the Quest for Social Value ����������������������������������������������������������������� 159
Mark R. Leary, Katrina P. Jongman-Sereno and Kate J. Diebels

9 The Roots and Fruits of Social Status in Small-Scale Human

Societies ���������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 179
Christopher von Rueden

10 The Emotional Underpinnings of Social Status ����������������������������������� 201

Conor M. Steckler and Jessica L. Tracy

Part III Intrapsychic and Interpersonal Consequences of Status

11 Decision Making at the Top: Benefits and Barriers ����������������������������� 227

Nathanael J. Fast and Priyanka D. Joshi

12 Social Categories Create and Reflect Inequality:

Psychological and Sociological Insights ������������������������������������������������ 243
Michael S. North and Susan T. Fiske

Part IV How Is Status Manifested in the Body?

13 Hormones and Hierarchies �������������������������������������������������������������������� 269

Erik L. Knight and Pranjal H. Mehta

14 Neural Basis of Social Status Hierarchy ����������������������������������������������� 303

Narun Pornpattananangkul, Caroline F. Zink and Joan Y. Chiao

15 Nonverbal Communication and the Vertical Dimension

of Social Relations ����������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 325
Judith A. Hall, Ioana Maria Latu, Dana R. Carney
and Marianne Schmid Mast

Part V Methodology

16 The Assessment of Social Status: A Review of Measures

and Experimental Manipulations ���������������������������������������������������������� 347
Joey T. Cheng, Aaron C. Weidman and Jessica L. Tracy

Index ................................................................................................................ 363

Contributors

Cameron Anderson Haas School of Business, University of California, Berkeley,

Berkeley, USA

Pat Barclay Department of Psychology, University of Guelph, Guelph, Canada

Jerome H. Barkow Department of Sociology and Social Anthropology, Dalhousie
University, Halifax, Canada
Steven L. Blader Stern School of Business, New York University, New York,
USA
Nancy M. Blaker Department of Social and Organizational Psychology, VU
University, Amsterdam, Netherlands
Dana R. Carney Haas School of Business, University of California, Berkeley
Berkeley, USA
Ya-Ru Chen Johnson School of Management, Cornell University, Ithaca, USA
Joey T. Cheng Haas School of Business, University of California, Berkeley,
Berkeley, USA
Joan Y. Chiao Department of Psychology and Interdepartmental Neuroscience
Program, Northwestern University, Evanston, USA
Jon Cowan Haas School of Business, University of California, Berkeley,
Berkeley, USA
Kate J. Diebels Department of Psychology and Neuroscience, Duke University,
Durham, USA
Nathanael J. Fast Marshall School of Business, University of Southern
California, Los Angeles, USA
Susan T. Fiske Department of Psychology, Princeton University, Princeton, USA
Vladas Griskevicius Carlson School of Management, University of Minnesota,
Minneapolis, USA

xi
xii Contributors

Judith A. Hall Department of Psychology, Northeastern University, Boston,

USA
Katrina P. Jongman-Sereno Department of Psychology and Neuroscience,
Duke University, Durham, USA
Priyanka D. Joshi Marshall School of Business, University of Southern
California, Los Angeles, USA
Sara Kafashan Department of Psychology, University of Guelph, Guelph,
Canada
Erik L. Knight Department of Psychology, University of Oregon, Eugene, USA
Ioana Maria Latu Department of Psychology, Rutgers University, Camden, USA
Mark R. Leary Department of Psychology and Neuroscience, Duke University,
Durham, USA
Marianne Schmid Mast Department of Organizational Behavior, University of
Lausanne, Lausanne, Switzerland
Pranjal H. Mehta Department of Psychology, University of Oregon, Eugene,
USA
Michael S. North Department of Psychology, Columbia University, New York,
USA
Narun Pornpattananangkul Department of Psychology and Interdepartmental
Neuroscience Program, Northwestern University, Evanston, USA
Christopher von Rueden Jepson School of Leadership Studies, University of
Richmond, Richmond, USA
Adam Sparks Department of Psychology, University of Guelph, Guelph, Canada
Conor M. Steckler Department of Psychology, University of British Columbia,
Vancouver, Canada
Jessica L. Tracy Department of Psychology, University of British Columbia,
Vancouver, Canada
Mark van Vugt Department of Social and Organizational Psychology, VU
University, Amsterdam, Netherlands
Aaron C. Weidman Department of Psychology, University of British Columbia,
Vancouver, Canada
Robb Willer Department of Sociology, Stanford University, Stanford, USA
Caroline F. Zink Division of Cognitive Neuroscience, Lieber Institute for Brain
Development, Baltimore, USA
 Part I
Theoretical Perspectives: The Nature of
Social Status and Hierarchy
Chapter 1
Toward a Unified Science of Hierarchy:
Dominance and Prestige are Two Fundamental
Pathways to Human Social Rank

Joey T. Cheng and Jessica L. Tracy

Although affiliative and cooperative interactions form the primary fabric of human
social relationships, group living necessarily entails conflict over divergent goals and
competition over scarce resources. The formation of social hierarchies, an organiza-
tional structure observed across many species in the animal kingdom and ubiquitous
to human groups, presents a solution to these conflicts. Although the bases on which
humans form hierarchies and allocate rank are diverse, hierarchies are fundamentally
social structures in which high-ranking individuals reliably receive greater influence,
deference, attention, and valued resources than low-ranking others (Homans 1950,
1961; Magee and Galinsky 2008; Mazur 1973, 1985; Strodtbeck 1951; Zitek and
Tiedens 2012). By affording high-ranking individuals privileged influence and access
to valued resources such as mates and food, mutually accepted hierarchical relation-
ships minimize costly agonistic conflicts, establish order, and facilitate coordination
and cooperation among individuals in groups (Báles 1950; Berger et al. 1980). In-
deed, a substantial body of evidence indicates that stable social hierarchies, in which
subordinates defer to rather than dispute or contest their high-ranking counterparts,
generally result in better group coordination and performance and more satisfying
relationships (e.g., Halevy et al. 2011; Kwaadsteniet and van Dijk 2010; Ronay et al.
2012; Tiedens and Fragale 2003; Tiedens et al. 2007; see also Anderson and Willer,
Chap. 3, this volume).
Despite the fundamental importance of social hierarchies to human relation-
ships, however, questions remain about the processes that allow individuals to attain
rank and the factors that determine rank allocation. Although an extensive literature
has documented a wide range of micro-level attributes and behaviors that influence
rank attainment, these findings lack a coherent, unifying framework integrating the
various data points into a comprehensive and theoretically supported understanding
of rank differentiation. To address this disparity, we have adopted a parsimonious

J. T. Cheng ()
Haas School of Business, University of California, Berkeley, Berkeley, USA
e-mail: [email protected]
J. L. Tracy
Department of Psychology, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada
J. T. Cheng et al. (eds.), The Psychology of Social Status, 3
DOI 10.1007/978-1-4939-0867-7_1, © Springer Science+Business Media New York 2014
4 J. T. Cheng and J. L. Tracy

and empirically supported evolutionary model, the Dominance-Prestige Account

(Cheng et al. 2010, 2013a; Henrich and Gil-White 2001), which we believe can
unify the diverse extant findings. This account proposes that differences in hierar-
chical rank within human social groups are the result of both: (a) coerced deference
to dominant others who induce fear by virtue of their ability to inflict physical or
psychological harm (i.e., Dominance) and (b) freely conferred deference to presti-
gious others who possess valued skills and abilities (i.e., Prestige).
This chapter provides a broad review of the extant research regarding rank allo-
cation processes, by surveying findings from the major disciplines that have studied
human rank dynamics empirically, including psychology, sociology, management
science, and anthropology. We argue that the Dominance-Prestige Account can be
fruitfully applied to organize these diverse empirical findings—including those that
appear, at first glance, to be conflicting. The Dominance-Prestige Account not only
allows for and predicts the diversity of results that have emerged in the prior lit-
erature, but also goes beyond many prior descriptive accounts to provide a deep
theoretical explanation for the extant body of work.
It is important to note that, in contrast to many other chapters in this volume that
focus more specifically on one particular dimension of social rank involving respect
and admiration (often referred to as status; e.g., Anderson and Kilduff 2009a), our
focus is on the determinants of social rank broadly construed, a concept that reflects
the degree of influence one possesses over resource allocation, conflict resolution,
and group decisions (Berger et al. 1980; for further discussion of hierarchy-related
conceptual terms, see Blader and Chen, Chap. 4, this volume; Cheng et al. 2013e).
The present review is organized into three sections. First, we discuss the key te-
nets of the Dominance-Prestige Account, outlining the selection pressures theorized
to favor the evolution of these two distinct forms of social rank inequalities in hu-
mans, and the psychological processes that underpin them. Second, we discuss find-
ings from our own recent work that directly support this account, by demonstrating
(a) the co-existing effectiveness of Dominance and Prestige in promoting social
rank and (b) the distinction between Dominance and Prestige as separate rank-at-
tainment processes, wherein each is underpinned by a distinct suite of personality
profiles, emotional mechanisms, behavioral patterns, cognitions, neuroendocrine
profiles, and fitness outcomes. Third, we summarize a number of predictions that
the Dominance-Prestige Account entails regarding the relevance of a wide range of
narrow, lower-order traits, and attributes to rank attainment, and examine the fit of
these predictions to the prior empirical literature. Taken together, this substantial
body of research converges to suggest that intimidation and respect co-exist as two
fundamental yet distinct bases of rank differentiation in human societies.

The Dominance-Prestige Account of Social Rank

Differentiation

The Dominance-Prestige Account (Henrich and Gil-White 2001) holds that social
hierarchies are multidimensional, arising from two systems of rank allocation. In
contrast to prior accounts of hierarchy differentiation (e.g., Anderson and Kilduff
1 Toward a Unified Science of Hierarchy 5

2009a; Berger et al. 1972; Lee and Ofshe 1981; Magee and Galinsky 2008; Mazur
1973), the Dominance-Prestige Account argues explicitly, on the basis of evolution-
ary logic, that both avenues persist in contemporary human groups, and produce
patterns of behaviors and tactics that effectively promote influence over others,
even when wielded within the same social group.
First, Dominance entails the induction of fear, through intimidation and coer-
cion, to attain or maintain rank and influence, and is thought to be homologous
with dominance hierarchical systems in nonhuman primates that result from ago-
nistic contests (Chase et al. 2002; Rowell 1974). In humans, Dominance can be
observed in dyadic social relationships based on coercion, such as those between
police and citizen, bully and victim, or boss and employee, as well as in larger
social structures. Dominant individuals effectively instill fear in subordinates, typi-
cally through threats that are more psychological than physical. For example, those
with formal institutional power, such as employers, can evoke fear in subordinates
by threatening to provide or withhold resources. Subordinates respond by comply-
ing with the demands of Dominant individuals to safeguard their well-being and
resources. Consequently, Dominance begets substantial social influence, rooted in
coercive compliance. It is theorized that Dominance arose in evolutionary history
in response to agonistic conflicts over material resources (e.g., food, mates), which
were common among nonhuman species, but also persist in contemporary human
societies in the form of psychological conflicts. By regulating patterns of domi-
nation-deference, Dominance hierarchies facilitate coordination and minimize the
frequency of agonistic encounters and associated costs, and, as a result, enhance the
fitness of all parties involved. It is noteworthy that numerous others have previously
argued for the importance of Dominance-related processes in hierarchy formation,
typically pointing to the prevalence of agonistic contests in human social life, as
well as the tendency for competitive outcomes to govern patterns of domination
and subordination in virtually all animals species (e.g., Chagnon 1983; Mazur 1973,
1985; Lee and Ofshe 1981; Mazur and Booth 1998). In contrast to prior models,
however, the present account proposes that coercion and intimidation are not the
only means to human social-rank attainment; rather, a secondary pathway, termed
Prestige, is thought to co-exist and operate concurrently.
Prestige refers to influence that is willingly granted to individuals who are recog-
nized and respected for their skills, success, or knowledge. Subordinates seek out the
opinions and company of Prestigious individuals in efforts to imitate and learn their
superior skills or knowledge. As a result, the Prestigious are conferred with influence
and rank, which in their cases rests on freely conferred deference and genuine persua-
sion, rather than forced compliance. Prestige-based rank is thought to be unique to hu-
mans, because it relies on cultural learning, which is considered to be less developed
in other animals (Boyd and Richerson 1985; Laland and Galef 2009). Learning from
the most skilled group members is a low-cost way of acquiring fitness-maximizing
knowledge, so the emergence of cultural learning in early human evolutionary his-
tory likely generated selection pressures to preferentially identify, attend to, and copy
knowledge from highly skilled or successful others. These selection pressures would
favor a psychological machinery capable of differentiating and ranking individuals
along the dimension of skill (and, thus, Prestige), such that the highest quality cultural
models with the greatest expertise are elevated to the top of the hierarchy.
6 J. T. Cheng and J. L. Tracy

The assumption that earned respect represents a fundamental path to rank attain-
ment in humans is consistent with the predominant view of rank attainment within
social psychology, which assumes that hierarchical differences result from groups
members’ rational and freely chosen decisions to confer rank upon those individu-
als who possess and offer the greatest skills and ability to contribute to the group
(e.g., Anderson and Kilduff 2009a; Berger et al. 1972; Blau 1964; Thibaut and Kel-
ley 1959; Ridgeway and Diekema 1989). In contrast to the Dominance-Prestige
Account, however, this perspective holds that social influence is acquired only via
this merit-based route, and cannot be acquired via force or coercion (e.g., Anderson
and Kilduff 2009a; Barkow 1975; Ridgeway 1987; Ridgeway and Diekema 1989).
The distinction between Dominance and Prestige parallels Krackle’s (1978)
delineation of two kinds of leadership in simpler societies: “forceful” leaders, or
domineering headmen who maintain their position and power through the induc-
tion of fear, threat, and compulsion, versus “persuasive” leaders, who lack formal
authority but nevertheless exercise substantial influence that is dependent on the
consent of their followers. Similar contrasts have also been observed by scholars
distinguishing between “agonic” vs. “hedonic” behavior (Chance and Jolly 1970)
and “resource-holding potential” vs. “social attention holding power” (e.g., Gilbert
et al. 1995).
However, unlike these prior descriptive taxonomies, the Dominance-Prestige
Account was theoretically derived and provides an evolutionarily based explana-
tion of why these widely observed patterns occur. The strong theoretical basis of this
account allows for the formulation of precise yet broad predictions regarding the
suites of traits, emotions, cognitions, and behaviors expected to propel and underpin
these two avenues to rank. Furthermore, this account is unique, in that it incorpo-
rates both our species’ shared heritage with other primates who resolve conflicts
through domination-subordination coordination, and our unique human nature as
cultural beings who depend heavily on cultural learning (Henrich and Gil-White
2001). The account’s breadth also gives it the potential to unify prior theoretical ef-
forts and to integrate the somewhat scattered extant literature on power, status, and
leadership into a coherent account, by parsing these prior results into Dominance-
or Prestige-based processes.

Evidence Supporting the Dominance-Prestige Account

The account outlined above generates two key predictions about social-rank dy-
namics. First, Dominance and Prestige should concurrently promote social rank in
groups. Second, because these two strategies are the products of distinct selection
pressures, they should be associated with distinct underlying psychological pro-
cesses and patterns of behavior. Here, we review findings from recent studies that
directly tested these two predictions.
1 Toward a Unified Science of Hierarchy 7

Dominance and Prestige Both Promote Social Rank

We recently tested the central theoretical prediction of the Dominance-Prestige Ac-

count—that both these pathways effectively promote social rank—by examining
the impact of these broad-level status-attainment strategies on rank attainment in
small groups (Cheng et al. 2013e). In the first of two studies, we assigned par-
ticipants to small same-sex groups. These individuals independently completed
a survival exercise (Bottger 1984), which involved rank-ordering 15 items (e.g.,
oxygen tanks, heating unit) in order of their utility for surviving a disaster. They
next worked collectively as a group for 20 min on the same task. Upon completing
the group task, participants privately rated each other (in a round-robin design) on
perceived social influence, Dominance, and Prestige; peer-rated Dominance and
Prestige were assessed via previously validated scales, which capture the extent to
which group members experience fear and admiration, respectively, toward each
other group member (see Cheng et al. 2010). We also obtained a behavioral measure
of influence by computing the degree of similarity between each participant’s pri-
vate response on the survival task and the group’s final response, under the assump-
tion that influential members would more effectively sway the group toward adopt-
ing their opinions. Finally, upon the completion of all sessions, outside observers
watched video-recordings of the group interactions and rated all participants on the
same dimensions as the in-lab peers. In a second study, naïve observers watched
these same video recordings while their gaze was monitored with an eye-tracking
device, and subsequently rated each group member on Dominance and Prestige.
Together, this approach generated four separate indices of social rank: (a) group
member-ratings of social influence, (b) outside observer-ratings of social influence,
(c) decision-making impact, and (d) visual attention received—which has been de-
scribed as “the best framework for analyzing social rank as it takes into account all
leadership styles” (Hold 1976, p. 179).
Results provided convergent support for the two proposed pathways to social
rank: Individuals who adopted either a Dominance or Prestige strategy attained
higher social rank. Specifically, not only were these individuals seen as more influ-
ential by both group members and outside observers, but they in fact exerted greater
behavioral influence, as indexed by the measures of decision-making impact and
attention. Furthermore, two other sets of findings provided evidence for the inde-
pendence of these two rank-attainment pathways and their divergent psychological
underpinnings. First, Dominance and Prestige were statistically independent, and
the rank-promoting effect of each emerged even when controlling for shared vari-
ance with the other—suggesting that dominant individuals’ ability to gain influence
cannot be attributed to a tendency among group members to (incorrectly) perceive
them as more competent or admirable (and by implication, Prestigious; cf., Ander-
son and Kilduff 2009b).
Second, findings from our more recent study provide direct evidence that—in
contrast to Prestigious individuals, whose influence is predicated upon perceived
competence and value—Dominant individuals’ elevated rank results from others’
8 J. T. Cheng and J. L. Tracy

fear and not from a perception that they are contributing value to the group (Cheng
et al. 2013a). Although Dominants tended to forcefully dominate group discussions
by speaking longer and occupying the floor to a greater extent than Prestigious indi-
viduals in small task groups (Cheng et al. 2013e), in a recent study examining simi-
lar group interactions, we found that group members’ perceptions of each other’s
contribution was much more strongly associated with Prestige ( r = .70; p < .001)
than with Dominance ( r = .29; p < .001; Z = − 6.102, p < .001). Moreover, replicat-
ing our previous finding, both Dominance and Prestige predicted greater group-
member-rated influence ( rs = .48 and .52; ps < .001). However, when perceived con-
tribution was statistically controlled (using partial correlations), only the relation
between Dominance and influence remained strong and significant ( r = .41), and did
not show a significant reduction in its magnitude ( Z = .97, p = .33); the association
between Prestige and influence after controlling for contribution ( r = .10, p = .13),
on the other hand, was substantially reduced ( Z = 5.27, p < .0001). Furthermore,
consistent with our account, when fear experienced toward each individual (“I am
afraid of him/her”) was controlled for, the relation between Dominance and influ-
ence was not only significantly reduced in magnitude, but also no longer different
from zero ( r = .09, p = .16; Z = 3.73, p < .001). In contrast, accounting for fear did
not significantly alter the relation between Prestige and influence ( r = .56, p < .001;
Z = − .66, p = .51). These results indicate that while the apparent value and contribu-
tion provided by Prestigious individuals are vital to, and account almost entirely
for, their rank attainment, these attributes do not explain the social influence of
Dominant individuals, who gain and maintain rank not by contributing value to the
group, but by inducing fear.
More broadly, these findings offer first evidence supporting the claim that Domi-
nance leads to increased social rank, a contentious notion that has been the topic of
considerable theoretical debate (see Anderson and Kilduff 2009a; Carli et al. 1995;
Lee and Ofshe 1981; Ridgeway and Diekema 1989). Over two decades ago, in a
series of methodologically similar studies (e.g., Carli et al. 1995; Copeland et al.
1995; Driskell et al. 1993; Ridgeway 1987; Ridgeway and Diekema 1989), the
opinions advocated by confederates who displayed domineering behaviors—such
as dismissive and contemptuous speech, or a looming posture and angry tone—were
consistently found to be no more readily adopted than those of confederates who
appeared more neutral or submissive. Although these results have been interpreted
to demonstrate the futility of Dominance for ascending social hierarchies, two im-
portant aspects of the study design raise concerns about this inference.
First, these studies (inadvertently) examined the consequences of failed attempts
at invoking fear. Despite their display of aggressive and threatening behaviors, con-
federates either posed no real threat to participants because they were present only
via video-recording (e.g., Carli et al. 1995; Copeland et al. 1995; Driskell et al.
1993; Ridgeway 1987), or were actively resisted and challenged with reciprocal
aggressive acts (e.g., Copeland et al. 1995; Ridgeway and Diekema 1989), indicat-
ing the absence of fear and thus an ineffective adoption of the Dominance strategy
(Chase et al. 2002).
1 Toward a Unified Science of Hierarchy 9

Second, all of these studies (e.g., Carli et al. 1995; Driskell et al. 1993; Ridgeway
1987; Ridgeway and Diekema 1989) assessed persuasion—a unique component of
influence that entails private, internalized shifts in behaviors, ideas, values, or opin-
ions (Wood 2000)—but not other forms of deference or influence. Importantly, our
theory predicts a priori that, unlike Prestigious individuals whose influence is based
on genuine persuasion and imitation, the influence of Dominant individuals is mo-
tivated by subordinate appeasement, and is thus a matter of compliance rather than
actual persuasion (i.e., subordinates submit to the wishes of Dominants because
they fear the consequences of nonsubmission, not because they come to genuinely
adopt the Dominants’ opinions; see Henrich and Gil-White 2001, p. 186). In our
studies, which were designed to circumvent these limitations, we examined general-
ized influence more broadly (incorporating both compliance and persuasion), and
found that it is heavily determined by the effective pursuit of Dominance (opera-
tionalized as group members’ subjective reports of experienced fear, intimidation,
and related perceptions).
As a final point on this matter, although research on organizational effectiveness
has found that “pressure” tactics—which involve the use of demands, threat, and
intimidation to influence others (and thus are akin to Dominance)—generally result
in less successful and productive leadership, these findings address the effects of
Dominance-based leadership on performance and other work outcomes, and should
not be taken as direct evidence against or for the question of whether Dominance
promotes social rank. The Dominance account holds that force and intimidation
leads to submission and the conferral of influence and rank, but inherently makes
no strong predictions about the quality of the behavior enacted out of coercion. It
can be speculated, however, that because subordinates of Dominant leaders comply
with their requests out of fear and harm avoidance, rather than genuine commit-
ment, their influence will be met with resistance and the task behavior enacted by
subordinates will generally be of poorer quality and performance. Consistent with
this, a growing body of evidence appears to suggest that not only is Dominance-
based leadership seen as an ineffective approach and frequently resisted by sub-
ordinates (e.g., Falbe and Yukl 1992; Kipnis and Schmidt 1988; Yukl and Tracey
1992), but it can also bear counterproductive effects on workplace performance and
subordinate commitment (e.g., Falbe and Yukl 1992; Higgins et al. 2003; Yukl et al.
1996). Nevertheless, these findings address a distinct question, and do not directly
indicate the basic efficacy of Dominance for acquiring rank and influence.

Dominance and Prestige are Distinct

If Dominance and Prestige indeed form the dual core foundations of human so-
cial hierarchies, they should not only concurrently promote social rank, but should
also represent distinct pathways to high rank. The theoretical distinction between
the two pathways—Dominance predicated upon fear and intimidation, and Prestige
upon obtaining respect and admiration—leads to the prediction that the two avenues