The Cultural Transmission of Prestige and Dominance Social Rank Cues: an Experimental Simulation

Abstract

Informal social hierarchies within small human groups are argued to be based on prestige, dominance, or a combination of the two (Henrich & Gil-White, 2001). Prestige-based hierarchies entail the ordering of individuals by the admiration and respect they receive from others due to their competence within valued domains. This type of hierarchy provides benefits for subordinates such as social learning opportunities and both private and public goods. In contrast, dominance-based hierarchies entail the ordering of individuals by their capacity to win fights, and coerce or intimidate others. This type of hierarchy produces costs in subordinates due to its aggressive and intimidating nature. Given the benefits and costs associated with these types of social hierarchies for subordinates, we hypothesised that prestige and dominance cues are better recalled and transmitted than social rank cues that do not elicit high prestige or dominance associations (i.e. medium social rank cues). Assuming that for the majority of the population who are not already at the top of the social hierarchy it is more important to avoid the costs of dominance-based hierarchies than to obtain the benefits of prestige-based hierarchies, we further hypothesised that dominance cues are better transmitted than prestige cues. We conducted a recall-based transmission chain experiment with 30 chains of four generations each (N = 120). Participants read and recalled descriptions of prestigious, dominant, and medium social rank footballers, and their recall was passed to the next participant within their chain. As predicted, we found that both prestige cues and dominance cues were better transmitted than medium social rank cues. However, we did not find support for our prediction of the better transmission of dominance cues than prestige cues. We discuss whether the results might be explained by a specific social-rank content transmission bias or by a more general emotional content transmission bias.

Experimental studies of cultural evolution

“…The cumulative changes in the material can be assessed as it passes through multiple individuals, revealing systematic biases in cultural transmission. This method has often been used to study content biases in the repeated transmission of written texts (Bebbington, MacLeod, Ellison, & Fay, 2017;Eriksson & Coultas, 2014;Jiménez & Mesoudi, 2020;Mesoudi, Whiten, & Dunbar, 2006;Miton, Claidière, & Mercier, 2015;Stubbersfield, Tehrani, & Flynn, 2015), the cumulative cultural evolution of artifacts or skills (Caldwell & Millen, 2008Derex, Bonnefon, Boyd, & Mesoudi, 2019;Kempe, Lycett, & Mesoudi, 2012;Lucas et al, 2020;Miton, Wolf, Vesper, Knoblich, & Sperber, 2020;Thompson & Griffiths, 2021;Zwirner & Thornton, 2015), or the iterated learning of artificial languages or categorisation schemes (Griffiths, Christian, & Kalish, 2008;Kalish, Griffiths, & Lewandowsky, 2007;Kirby, Cornish, & Smith, 2008;Raviv & Arnon, 2018).…”

Sharing or hiding? The influence of supervisor bottom-line mentality on employee knowledge behaviors

“…Dominance involves using force or coercion to gain control, while prestige involves demonstrating competence and generosity so that others follow of their own volition (McClanahan, 2020). Because prestigious and dominant individuals are associated with benefits and costs, respectively, for subordinates, it is important for subordinates to identify who is prestigious and who is dominant within a social group (Jim enez and Mesoudi, 2021). Therefore, this research tested whether perceived leader prestige or dominance by employees serve as two explanatory mechanisms accounting for the effect of supervisor BLM on employee knowledge-related behaviors.…”

A Transmissão Cultural Do Prestígio a Luz Das Inovações Tecnológicas De Rápida Informação

“…Sob as condições certas, a seleção natural irá favorecer a sobrevivência dos indivíduos que mais se adaptarem ao meio, a fim de fornecer-lhes oportunidades de explorar e transmitir as informações que coletaram ao longo de uma vida. Desta forma, pesquisas encontraram algumas evidências de que o prestígio afeta tanto o próprio indivíduo quanto a transmissão cultural de um indivíduo para outro (JIMÉNEZ et al, 2020).…”

“…Assim, com a entrada das novas tecnologias e de informação em massa, percebe-se uma mudança de paradigma e a forma de imitar o modelo potencial (o prestigiado). Por exemplo, quando a atriz de Hollywood Angelina Jolie escreveu um artigo de jornal sobre sua decisão de se submeter a uma mastectomia dupla preventiva devido ao teste positivo para um gene associado ao câncer de mama, houve um aumento nas pesquisas online por informações sobre o câncer de mama, aumento da demanda por rastreio genético desta doença e aumento do número de encaminhamentos para realização de operações preventivas semelhantes (JIMÉNEZ et al, 2020). Desta forma, o conteúdo do artigo de Jolie certamente desempenhou esse papel de disseminação da informação, mesmo que, a atriz não seja uma referência na área médica.…”

“…Por exemplo, aprender com modelos bemsucedidos (conhecedores ou habilidosos) em um domínio valioso geralmente leva à aquisição de conhecimentos ou habilidades que aumentam a aptidão. Portanto, copiar preferencialmente modelos de sucesso é tipicamente uma estratégia adaptativa quando o conhecimento ou habilidade não pode ser facilmente adquirido por conta própria (JIMÉNEZ et al, 2020).…”