Gender, status and the use of power strategies

Department of Psychology, Bar-Ilan University,Ramat Gan, IsraelAbstractThe present study examined the effects of gender and status on the use of power strategies. Theexperiment consisted of a computer-based problem-solving task performed in pairs, where partici-pants interacted with simulated long-distance partners. Participants were 36 female and 38 maleundergraduate students, who were assigned to be influencing agents and were required to convincetheir partners to accept their help in the problem-solving process. Status was manipulated bythe extent to which partners were dependent upon the participants’ resources. Partners were eithersame sexorothersex.Resultsindicated aninteractiveeffectof agentgender by status. Menused morefrequently ‘masculine’-typed and less frequently ‘feminine’-typed strategies than did women inlow status positions, whereas in high status positions no significant gender differences in powerstrategy choices were found. These findings suggest that gender differences and similarities varyaccording to social contexts. Implications of the findings for both theory and practice are discussed.Copyright # 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.Power strategies have been used in the social/industrial psychological literature to describe howinfluencing agents attempt to achieve influence and impress their views on the attitudes and behaviorsof target individuals (e.g. Podsakoff & Schriesheim, 1985; Raven, 1993; Raven, Schwartzwald, K Ely, 1995; Kanter, 1977;Ragins & Sundstrom, 1989).Several individual variables have been suggested as affecting choice of power strategies. Amongthese, gender and status, have been identified as key variables (e.g. Offermann & Schrier, 1985), yet,their relative salience and the way in which they interact have not been directly assessed. Such anevaluation has practical and theoretical value. In this study, we sought to explore men and women’schoice of power strategies when in different status levels, through the use of an experimental design.Received 8 July 2004Copyright # 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. Accepted 1 March 2005

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