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Status Relations

Status generally refers to an individual's position or rank, along a standard of honor or respect, within a group or social hierarchy. As such, status relations are defined as observable rank-ordered pairings of individuals in some social situation. For instance, when male presidential advisors are more influential than females, when senior partners in a legal firm are given access to the beach home but junior partners are excluded, or when attractive children dominate the best playground equipment, relations are affected by status. In each case, a characteristic (i.e., gender, seniority, or beauty) produces advantages wherein some individuals are ranked more highly than others. What follows is a brief examination of historical accounts of status relations, their causes and consequences in group interaction, and prevailing theories of this phenomenon. We conclude by surveying contemporary directions in status research.

Background

Interest in status relations is as varied and diverse as sociology itself. The first systematic writings can be traced to Aristotle, who claimed that status, merit, or excellence is one basis for the allocation of social rewards. Max Weber applied the concept of status more broadly, noting that status groups (i.e., white-collar workers vs. blue-collar workers) share common lifestyles as indicated by housing, dress, and leisure time activities. For Weber, status is an important dimension of social stratification. Thorstein Veblen linked status and economic behaviors, noting that people express status through the conspicuous consumption of material wealth. Modern theorists tend to use the term status more uniformly, in reference to the honor or prestige one is granted in a social situation.

That status relations have captured the attention of social theorists probably stems from the numerous interesting properties such relations exhibit. Status relations are seemingly universal, quite robust, and often paradoxical. First, status relations are universal in that they emerge among turkeys eating bugs, macaques living in captivity, and humans deliberating on a jury. That humans and animals order themselves along a standard of respect or deference is a phenomenon that spans the phylogenetic scale. Second, status relations are fairly robust in that they emerge quickly and are mostly stable. In human groups, status ordering typically emerges within the first few minutes of interaction and tends to change very little over time. Finally, perhaps the most compelling and bothersome property is that status relations frequently pose a paradox. That is, status ordering frequently exists even when the most competent or capable individuals are not those with the most input or influence in the group. The combination of these three factors may account for the widespread interest in status and status relations. Some of the ways that status affects social relationships are considered next.

Effects of Status

Over five decades of research has been aimed at understanding how status affects behavior, cognition, and emotion. In terms of behavior, early studies found that high status tends to produce social influence. For instance, in a classic military study of three-person decision-making teams, it was found that pilots were more influential than navigators, and navigators were more influential than gunners. In essence, the participants act as if those with more prestigious occupations (i.e., pilots) have better ideas than those with lower occupational prestige (i.e., gunners) even when the task is not related to occupation. Such early studies set the stage for more detailed inquiry and the discovery that status relations tend to produce a complex web of interrelated behaviors, perceptions, and emotions. The most significant program in this regard was initiated by Robert Freed Bales.

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