Psychological science
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Psychological science · Dec 2013
The double-edged sword of grandiose narcissism: implications for successful and unsuccessful leadership among U.S. Presidents.
Recent research and theorizing suggest that narcissism may predict both positive and negative leadership behaviors. We tested this hypothesis with data on the 42 U. S. presidents up to and including George W. ⋯ Nevertheless, grandiose narcissism was also associated with several negative outcomes, including congressional impeachment resolutions and unethical behaviors. We found that presidents exhibit elevated levels of grandiose narcissism compared with the general population, and that presidents' grandiose narcissism has been rising over time. Our findings suggest that grandiose narcissism may be a double-edged sword in the leadership domain.
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Psychological science · Nov 2013
Other people as means to a safe end: vicarious extinction blocks the return of learned fear.
Information about what is dangerous and safe in the environment is often transferred from other individuals through social forms of learning, such as observation. Past research has focused on the observational, or vicarious, acquisition of fears, but little is known about how social information can promote safety learning. To address this issue, we studied the effects of vicarious-extinction learning on the recovery of conditioned fear. ⋯ We confirmed that these effects could not be attributed to the presence of a learning model per se but were specifically driven by the model's experience of safety. Our results confirm that vicarious and direct emotional learning share important characteristics but that social-safety information promotes superior down-regulation of learned fear. These findings have implications for emotional learning, social-affective processes, and clinical practice.
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Psychological science · Nov 2013
Nonverbal expressions of status and system legitimacy: an interactive influence on race bias.
A voluminous literature has examined how primates respond to nonverbal expressions of status, such as taking the high ground, expanding one's posture, and tilting one's head. We extend this research to human intergroup processes in general and interracial processes in particular. Perceivers may be sensitive to whether racial group status is reflected in group members' nonverbal expressions of status. ⋯ These hypotheses were supported in three studies using self-report (Study 1) and reaction time (Studies 2 and 3) measures of racial bias and two different status cues (vertical position and head tilt). For perceivers who supported the status quo, high-status cues (in comparison with low-status cues) increased preferences for White people over Black people. For perceivers who rejected the status quo, the opposite pattern was observed.
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Psychological science · Sep 2013
Unstable identity compatibility: how gender rejection sensitivity undermines the success of women in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics fields.
Although the perceived compatibility between one's gender and science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) identities (gender-STEM compatibility) has been linked to women's success in STEM fields, no work to date has examined how the stability of identity over time contributes to subjective and objective STEM success. In the present study, 146 undergraduate female STEM majors rated their gender-STEM compatibility weekly during their freshman spring semester. ⋯ Fluctuations in compatibility predicted impaired outcomes the following school year, including lower STEM engagement and lower academic performance in STEM (but not non-STEM) classes, and significantly mediated the relationship between gender RS and STEM engagement and achievement in the 2nd year of college. The week-to-week changes in gender-STEM compatibility occurred in response to negative academic (but not social) experiences.
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Psychological science · Aug 2013
Perceiving social inequity: when subordinate-group positioning on one dimension of social hierarchy enhances privilege recognition on another.
Researchers have suggested that viewing social inequity as dominant-group privilege (rather than subordinate-group disadvantage) enhances dominant-group members' support for social policies aimed at lessening such inequity. However, because viewing inequity as dominant-group privilege can be damaging to dominant-group members' self-images, this perspective is frequently resisted. ⋯ We predicted that occupying a subordinate position on one dimension of social hierarchy could enhance perceptions of one's own privilege on a different dimension of hierarchy, but that this tendency would be diminished among individuals who felt they had achieved a particularly high level of success. Results from three studies that considered gender-based and race-based hierarchies in organizational settings supported our hypothesis.