Article summary with Holding onto power: Effects of power holders’ positional instability and expectancies on interactions with subordinates by Georgeson and Harris - 2006

The main question of this article is: why do the powerful derogate subordinates? Specifically, the role of positional insecurity and negative expectancies about the subordinate are investigated.

Effects of power on social perception

Power is defined as the amount of unshared control possessed by one person over another person (e.g. rewards and punishments). Legitimate power is power in a relationship that is structured such that one member of the relationship has the right to control the behaviours of a subordinate other (definition by French & Raven). The effects of holding power are self-enhancement and other-derogation. In this article, the authors try to identify factors that cause these adverse effects of power.

Theoretical perspectives

• The metaphoric effects of power: because power holders have the opportunity to influence others, they come to believe that they are personally responsible for any positive actions executed by their subordinates.

• System justification theory: social hierarchies are maintained because there is a strong motive to defend and justify the status quo and bolster the legitimacy of the existing social order. Especially for power holders because they benefit from it.

• Social dominance theory: social hierarchies can be explained through both individual differences in social dominance orientation and institutional discrimination. Hierarchy legitimizing myths (e.g. “the less powerful deserve their low position”) maintain certain privileged positions.

The role of threat in power hierarchies

People in power positions are more likely to hold negative impressions of subordinates than vice versa because in order to justify their position, power holders need to feel that subordinates are less deserving of resources. The authors propose that this tendency would be stronger when their position is threatened (thus, when there is an unstable power position).

The self-fulfilling nature of legitimizing myths

Negative expectancies often operate as self-fulfilling prophecies, especially when the perceiver has more power than the target. This could be because power holders stereotype the subordinates, hereby failing to engage in individual processing, making them unable to detect expectancy-incongruent behaviour.

Study and hypotheses

Power role, positional threat, and expectancies were manipulated. It is hypothesized that positional threat and negative expectancies will both have negative effects on the interaction with a subordinate. The combination of both would hypothetically be the most dangerous.

Method & Procedure

Participants were assigned to the role of boss or employee (the boss gets to allocate a 55 dollar prize). Half of the bosses were told that the interaction (which was a problem-solving task) would be observed and if the boss did a poor job, the roles would be reversed (hereby, positional threat was manipulated). Only the bosses were informed about the problem-solving skills of their employees, which were either good or poor (hereby, expectancies were manipulated). The dependent variables were the goals of the interaction, measured with a questionnaire (was their main goal to control the interaction, to focus on their partner, to achieve the best outcome, to maintain their role… etc.). Next, the boss and the employee were brought together to solve a problem. After five minutes, they were separated and given a questionnaire containing a thought-listing measure. Finally, they were brought together again for 15 minutes after which they were again separated and asked to fill out a questionnaire about their opinions about their partner and the interaction, and the boss was asked to allocate the 55 dollar prize.

Results

Pre-interaction

When power was unstable, and the boss had negative expectations, they had more negative goals for the interaction. When power is secure, then high expectations about the employees are welcomed (the boss exerted less control over the situation). But, when power is unstable, bosses are threatened by high expectancy employees and thus they want to control the situation more in order to maintain their position.

During interaction

Through the thought-listing procedure, it was found that bosses with negative expectancies about their subordinates reported more negative thoughts. When power is unstable, then negative expectancies result in more negative thoughts than positive expectancies. Bosses with negative expectancies also devoted fewer thoughts to the task than bosses with positive expectations.

Post-interaction

First of all, there was evidence of subordinate derogation: bosses held more negative views of the interaction than employees did. There was also evidence of the self-fulfilling prophecy: dyads in the positive expectation condition rated the interaction more positively than dyads in the negative expectation condition. Under the circumstances of unstable power, negative expectancies led to a less positive view of the interaction than positive expectancies. Furthermore, when the bosses were allowed to allocate the money, depressive entitlement was shown: bosses gave employees less money than employees gave to bosses. Under the circumstances of unstable power and negative expectations, less money was allocated to the employee compared to unstable power and positive expectations. Striking: employees also gave the most money to a boss who had unstable power and negative expectations. In line with system justification theory, unstable power bosses asserted more strongly that they deserved to be in power. Bosses with negative expectations also felt they deserved to be boss more than bosses with positive expectations. Under the circumstances of unstable power, bosses experienced more evaluation anxiety, especially when expectations were positive. Finally, employees whose boss had positive expectations of them felt that the boss was more effective than when they had negative expectations of them (self-fulfilling prophecy).

Discussion

Holding negative expectations about their subordinates resulted in a wide range of negative thoughts and attitudes from the bosses: they thought they deserved to be boss more, reported more negative thoughts about their partner, evaluated the partner and the interaction more negatively, and allocated less money to the subordinate. The self-fulfilling prophecy was apparent: employees picked up the negative expectations and evaluated the interaction and their own performance more negatively, so strong that they also allocated more money to the boss.                                        

Unstable power bosses felt that they deserved to be boss more, intended to control the interaction more, rated the interaction more negatively and were more anxious than stable power bosses. When unstable power is paired with positive expectations, the bosses had even more desire to control the situation and maintain the boss-position, but they also evaluated the subordinate’s contribution to the interaction more positively. When unstable power is paired with negative expectations, the greatest amount of negative behaviour is enacted by the boss, so this is the most damaging condition. The bosses position depends on how well the team performs, thus, negative expectations are bad news. So, the bosses have less positive goals for the interaction, evaluate the interaction more negatively, express more negative thoughts, and gave the least amount of money to the subordinates. Employees also felt that they deserved less money in this case (which is called depressive entitlement): the employees attributed the outcome to themselves; they don’t see the situational constraints and blame themselves for it (which is the fundamental attribution error).                                  

The implications of this research is that so-called “up or out” management may have harmful effects: employees in unstable power positions may work harder, but they experience more negative affect and can sabotage the work of their subordinates and thereby also their own performance.