Experimental Design Workshop | March 10 [Virtual] - Incite at Columbia University

Join us for a workshop presentation. This event is free and open to the public.

Status Conflict: When and How People Contest the Ordering versus Bases of Unequal Social Hierarchies

YeJin Park (Management and Organizations, NYU Stern) & L. Taylor Phillips (Management and Organizations, NYU Stern)

Despite the growing attention placed on redressing social inequality in the US, the divide between haves and have-nots has only widened. One of the drivers of the durability of inequality is that status characteristics (i.e., the association between objective group differences and status) privilege dominant group members and are sticky.

In this project, we examine how people may contest unfair social hierarchies by building on cultural schema theory that posits that status characteristics persist because people uphold a set of shared status beliefs about a certain trait that serves as the basis of worth in a hierarchy and about social differences which indicate greater or lesser worthiness within that hierarchy. Specifically, we theorize that people can contest unjust hierarchies by adopting these two distinct pathways: challenge either the hierarchy order (claiming the relative position of the groups is incorrect) or challenge the hierarchy bases (the entire basis of worth is illegitimate) itself. We have run two studies thus far showing that people are more willing to challenge the hierarchy order and think close to others and general society is also more likely to support challenging the hierarchy order.

We plan to field an experiment to reverse this effect – i.e. get people to challenge the hierarchy bases. We test two barriers: (i) cognitive accessibility, and (ii) motivated reasoning. First, we examine if there is a psychological barrier to conceptualizing challenging hierarchy bases as a viable option. That is, would showing them an alternative trait that is the basis of worth in another hierarchy increase their willingness to support challenging hierarchy bases?

To reach this end, we hope to conduct a 2-cell (imagination vs. control) between-subjects design. Participants in both conditions will be asked to name an inequality they care about. In the imagination treatment condition, participants will then read about another trait that is viewed as a legitimate basis of worth in another domain of society or time. Participants in the control condition will read a filler paragraph. Afterward, both participants will be asked to write about (i) all the strategies they can come up with (without considering how viable or realistic they are), (ii) and choose the ideal strategy to contest inequality, and we will assess whether the participants in the treatment condition are more likely to list strategies that challenge hierarchy bases and prefer strategies that challenge hierarchy bases.

The second experiment tests an alternative barrier: people believe that most others associate the incumbent trait as the basis of worth, and thus consider it futile to challenge hierarchy bases because they cannot garner sufficient societal support. To test this idea, we will create a scenario of a novel context with novel groups, using a 2-cell (social support rich vs. social support scarce) between-subjects design. Participants in both conditions will read a scenario where they are a member of a novel society, where there is an inequality that they care about. In the support-rich condition, they read that they have enough allies who are willing to support any inequality they choose to contest. In the support poor condition, they read that they do not have a lot of social support. Participants then are asked if they are more willing to challenge the ordering or bases of the hierarchy in that story. We will assess whether the participants in the support-rich condition are more likely to prefer strategies that challenge hierarchy bases.

About the Experimental Design Workshop

The workshop gives social scientists the opportunity to workshop the design of an experiment they have not yet fielded. Graduate student and faculty presenters will present their designs and receive specific, actionable feedback from other workshop participants. A list of our previous sessions can be found here.

For inquiries or if you are interested in joining the workshop's email list, please contact Daniel Tadmon (daniel.tadmon@columbia.edu) or James Chu (jyc2163@columbia.edu).

Funding support for the Experimental Design Workshop is provided by the Paul F. Lazarsfeld Lecture Series, administered by INCITE, which features events and programming that embody and honor Lazarsfeld’s commitment to the improvement of methodological approaches that address concerns of vital cultural and social significance.