The Dominance,Prestige, and Leadership Account of Social Power Motives |
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Authors: | Felix Suessenbach Steve Loughnan Felix D. Schönbrodt Adam B. Moore |
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Affiliation: | 1. Department of Psychology, University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, UK;2. Department of Psychology, Ludwig‐Maximilians‐Universit?t München, Munich, Germany;3. Correspondence to: Dr. Felix Suessenbach, Leopoldstr. 13, Munich 80802, Germany.;4. E‐mail: |
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Abstract: | The power motive predicts influential social behaviour; however, its heterogeneous conceptualisations have produced inconsistent results. To overcome this problem, we developed and validated a unitary taxonomy of social power motives based on established delineations of social hierarchies: the dominance, prestige, and leadership account. While we could measure these motives both reliably and distinctively (study 1), we also showed they strongly related to a common power desire (study 2). Assessing their nomological networks (studies 3 and 4), we demonstrated distinct associations between the dominance motive (D: wanting to coerce others into adhering to one's will) and anger and verbal aggression; the prestige motive (P: wanting to obtain admiration and respect) and the fear of losing reputation and claiming to have higher moral concerns; the leadership motive (L: wanting to take responsibility in and for one's group) and emotional stability and helping behaviour. Furthermore, while D uniquely predicted agonistic/retaliatory behaviour in dictator games (study 5), L uniquely predicted the attainment of higher employment ranks in various professions (study 7). Finally, at least to some degree, P and L related positively, and D negatively to prosocial donating behaviour (study 6). This taxonomy represents a novel and powerful approach to predicting influential social behaviour. © 2018 European Association of Personality Psychology |
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Keywords: | dominance prestige leadership social hierarchies power motive |
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