Article summary with Sexual overperception: Power, mating motives, and biases in social judgment by Kunstman and Maner - 2011

The main question that this article is trying to answer is: why does power promote sexual cognition and behaviour towards subordinates? The main hypothesis is that power activates a motivational state associated with mating, and hereby, power elicits motivated biases in sexual perception (e.g. that others are sexually interested in them).

Power and goal pursuit

Power is defined as one’s control over group resources and the ability to influence others by manipulating access to those resources. Power leads to approach and goal pursuit, in part because the powerful have access to resources and because they suffer fewer obstacles like punishment. A first step in goal pursuit is attending to goal-relevant cues.

Power and mating motivation

Proposition: Those in power will be especially likely to pursue goals related to sex and mating. There are three reasons for this:

1. Mating goals are closely related to the approach system.

2. There is a cognitive link between power and sex.

3. Evolution: dominant individuals have more access to sexual mates.

Power, mating motivation and sexual perception

The functionalist approach states that the activation of a goal leads to biases in social perception: you see others in ways that satisfy your goals. Power activates mating motives and thus it promotes heightened perceptions of sexual interest (this is functionally related to the goal).

Moderators of sexual perceptions

In this article, the authors focus on three potential moderating variables in the power-sex relation. This can help to distinguish motivated cognitive processes from other cognitive phenomena.

1. Temporal delay: motivated processes tend to remain active even after some delay, so, the activation of sexual concepts should persist across time delay.

2. Attainability of the goal: Motivation = goal value + attainability. So, manipulate attainability and see what happens. The expectation is that power will only lead to expectations of sexual interest when the subordinate is attainable (romantically available, that is).

3. Individual differences in chronic mating goals: the power-sexual perception link will be stronger among individuals for whom sexual goals are chronically active (sexually unrestricted individuals).

The effect of gender remains unclear, because it could go either way: maybe the power-sex link is stronger among men because they are more motivated to strive for power and use it for sexual gratification. On the other hand, there might not be a difference between men and women once the mating motive is activated.

Study 1

Main question: does power activate a mating motive? Participants were assigned to either a power or a control group and they encountered either a delay or no delay. The dependent variable was a word stem completion task. Results: participants with power created more sexual words, regardless of time. So, power does indeed activate mating motives which results in a high degree of sexual cognition.

Study 2

Main question: does power increase expectations of sexual interest? Participants were again assigned to a power or a control condition (in which positive feedback was given). They were shown a short film clip of their partner. The dependent variable was the first impression they had of their partner, perceived sexual interest and general liking measures. Results: participants in the power condition expected greater sexual interest from their partner, not general liking.

Study 3

Main question: Does goal attainability moderate the relationship that is shown in study 2? Participants were again assigned to a power or a control condition. They received a video message from their partner, in which the partner either stated that they were “engaged to be married”, or “single and looking to meet someone”. The dependent variable was the first impression the participant had of their partner, their perceived sexual interest and general liking. Results: power only increased sexual interest when the partner was single, not when the partner was engaged to be married. So, attainability of the goal moderates the effects of power on perceived sexual interest.

Study 4

In the final study, participants were divided into opposite-sex dyads in which there was either a power situation (leader versus subordinate) or a control situation (positive feedback versus no feedback). The task was to build a figure from Lego blocks. Afterwards, general liking, perceived sexual interest, actual sexual interest, individual differences in sexual attitudes (restricted versus unrestricted) and likelihood to sexually harass were measured. Also, sexualized behaviour was rated by two independent coders who observed the interaction. Results: being in power increased sexual perceptions (not: general liking) among unrestricted individuals (who are looking for short-term sexual relationships). Fact of the matter is that being in power actually decreased sexual perceptions for restricted individuals (who are more conservative in their sexual attitudes). This study also proofed that it is indeed sexual overperception: among sexually unrestricted participants, power increased perceptions of sexual interest over and above any increases in partners’ actual sexual interest. This study also showed that power increases sexually tinged behaviour among dyads with unrestricted leaders, even after controlling for the partners’ actual sexual interest. So, power leads to sexual behaviour through sexual overperception among unrestricted leaders.

Conclusions

• Power increases sexual perception

• This effect is pronounced only in sexually unrestricted participants

• This effect is observed after controlling for actual sexual interest

• This effect mediates increases in sexual behaviour

• This effect is specific to sexual perception, not general liking

• Men and women responded similarly to a power position, so gender did not mediate the effects

An important implication of this research is that building insights in those with power can help to overcome the effects of power on sexual harassment (for example).