(Press-News.org) People who are deemed social misfits or "losers" aren't effective leaders, even if they are crusading for a cause that would benefit a larger group, according to new research from Rice University, the University of Texas and Universitat de Valencia.
The study's authors observed the contributions of 80 participants in a repeated public-goods game and found that players were more likely to mimic the actions of a leader they perceived as a high-status individual; they ignored leaders perceived as low-status and, when they had a chance, punished them for trying to lead.
"In a team, naming someone a leader is not sufficient to create effective leadership," said Rick Wilson, co-author of the study and professor of political science and statistics and psychology at Rice. "The status of the leader -- the way in which the leader is chosen -- determines the extent to which the rest of the subjects will follow."
In each round of the research experiment, players were given 50 experimental currency units (ECUs) and had to decide what portion to keep for themselves and how much to contribute to a group account. Whatever was put into the group account was doubled and then split equally by the group of four. For any individual, this meant that it was better to retain everything for their private account, since each ECU put into the group account would yield only a .5 ECU return. However, if everyone in the group put in everything, they would each double their ECUs -- hence the public-goods problem.
Each group had a leader whose contributions everyone could see. The leader was determined by scores on an arbitrary trivia quiz. In half the experiments, the leader was the player who had the highest score (high status); in the other half, the player who had the lowest score (low status) was designated as the leader. The group members were told how their leader was chosen.
At the end of each of the 20 rounds, each follower observed his or her own earnings and the leader's contributions. The leader observed the contributions of each of the followers. On average, players allocated between 40 and 50 percent of their ECUs to the public pot, whether they had a high- or low-status leader. However, contributions from followers with low-status leaders dropped off in later rounds even though their leaders began giving more and more, crusading for followers to make greater contributions to the public pot that could benefit everyone in the group.
Groups with high-status leaders showed greater stability, and the followers were more likely to imitate their leaders -- even though those leaders maintained the amount of their initial contributions.
"In teams with high-status leaders, followers are more likely to go along with them, even though the leader does not necessarily set a good example," Wilson said. "A high-status leader should be willing to risk making unilaterally high contributions to the public good, because the followers will do the same."
Wilson and his co-authors, Catherine Eckel of the University of Texas and Enrique Fatas of the Universitat de Valencia, also studied the effect of punishment. In the 21st round of the game, followers were given the option to punish the leader by issuing points that decreased a player's profits in the experiment, and vice versa. Punishment was costly both for the person initiating the punishment and for the person punished.
Once punishment was introduced, contributions increased significantly for the groups with a low-status leader and only slightly for those with a high-status leader. However, low-status leaders punished others and, in turn, were punished more. They made significantly less money in the experiment than any other player.
"Punishment, while important to enforcing cooperative norms in many social dilemmas, does not boost contributions in all instances," Wilson said. "The bottom line is that high-status leaders don't need to punish because they are followed. Low-status leaders need to rely on punishment to motivate followers, but it is costly for everyone. It's like they are the Rodney Dangerfields of the world -- they get no respect. When they use punishment to boost contributions to the public good, their followers retaliate."
INFORMATION:
The study, "Cooperation and Status in Organization," was published in the August issue of the Journal of Public Economic Theory, available at http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1467-9779.2010.01472.x/abstract.
Wilson is the Herbert S. Autrey Professor of Political Science at Rice University. His bio is available at http://rkw.rice.edu/index.html.
To interview Wilson or request a PDF of the study, contact David Ruth, director of national media relations, at 713-348-6327 or druth@rice.edu.
Low-status leaders are ignored
How a leader is picked impacts whether others will follow
2010-12-04
ELSE PRESS RELEASES FROM THIS DATE:
Do our bodies' bacteria play matchmaker?
2010-12-04
Tel Aviv ― Could the bacteria that we carry in our bodies decide who we marry? According to a new study from Tel Aviv University, the answer lies in the gut of a small fruit fly.
Prof. Eugene Rosenberg, Prof. Daniel Segel and doctoral student Gil Sharon of Tel Aviv University's Department of Molecular Microbiology and Biotechnology recently demonstrated that the symbiotic bacteria inside a fruit fly greatly influence its choice of mates.
The research was done in cooperation with Prof. John Ringo of the University of Maine, and was recently published in the Proceedings ...
Widely used arthritis pill protects against skin cancer
2010-12-04
A widely-used arthritis drug reduces the incidence of non-melanoma skin cancers – the most common cancers in humans – according to a study published this week in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute. The COX-2 inhibitor celecoxib (brand name Celebrex), which is currently approved for the treatment of osteoarthritis, rheumatoid arthritis and acute pain in adults led to a 62 percent reduction in non-melanoma skin cancers, which includes basal cell carcinomas and squamous cell carcinomas.
Celecoxib, a prescription-strength nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drug (NSAID), ...
Kicking the habit: Study suggests that quitting smoking improves mood
2010-12-04
PROVIDENCE, R.I. [Brown University] — Quitting smoking is certainly healthy for the body, but doctors and scientists haven't been sure whether quitting makes people happier, especially since conventional wisdom says many smokers use cigarettes to ease anxiety and depression. In a new study, researchers tracked the symptoms of depression in people who were trying to quit and found that they were never happier than when they were being successful, for however long that was.
Based on their results, the authors of the article published online Nov. 24 in the journal Nicotine ...
Set of specific interventions rapidly improves hospital safety 'culture'
2010-12-04
A prescribed set of hospital-wide patient-safety programs can lead to rapid improvements in the "culture of safety" even in a large, complex, academic medical center, according to a new study by safety experts at Johns Hopkins.
"It doesn't take decades or tons of money to get from a culture that says 'mistakes are inevitable' to a belief that harm is entirely preventable," says Peter Pronovost, M.D., Ph.D., a professor of anesthesiology and critical care medicine at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine and leader of the study published online in the journal ...
Relationship-strengthening class improves life for new families
2010-12-04
Expectant parents who completed a brief relationship-strengthening class around the time their child was born showed lasting effects on each family member's well being and on the family's overall relationships, according to a recent Penn State study.
The team, led by Mark Feinberg, senior research associate in Penn State's Prevention Research Center for the Promotion of Human Development, analyzed the effects of the Family Foundations program for three years after a child was born.
The Family Foundations program, offered in several Pennsylvania locations as part of ...
Lower occurrence of atopic dermatitis in children thanks to farm animals and cats
2010-12-04
Atopic dermatitis (also known as atopic eczema) is a chronic and extremely painful inflammation of the skin that frequently occurs in early childhood, generally already in infancy. Up to 20 percent of all children in industrialized countries are affected, making it one of the most common childhood skin diseases.
The need to better understand this disease is all the greater considering the intense suffering it causes in small children. Atopic dermatitis is, however, an allergic condition and all allergic reactions result from complex interactions of genetic and environmental ...
Checklist continues to stop bloodstream infections in their tracks, this time in Rhode Island
2010-12-04
Using a widely heralded Johns Hopkins checklist and other patient-safety tools, intensive care units across the state of Michigan reduced the rate of potentially lethal bloodstream infections to near zero.
Now, led by the same Johns Hopkins patient-safety expert who spearheaded the Michigan program, researchers in Rhode Island have shown the Michigan results weren't just a fluke.
The new study, published in the December issue of the journal Quality and Safety in Health Care, found that the rate of central-line associated bloodstream infections (CLABSIs) fell by 74 ...
Beyond nature vs. nurture: Parental guidance boosts child's strengths, shapes development
2010-12-04
Why does a child grow up to become a lawyer, a politician, a professional athlete, an environmentalist or a churchgoer?
It's determined by our inherited genes, say some researchers. Still others say the driving force is our upbringing and the nurturing we get from our parents.
But a new child-development theory bridges those two models, says psychologist George W. Holden at Southern Methodist University in Dallas. Holden's theory holds that the way a child turns out can be determined in large part by the day-to-day decisions made by the parents who guide that child's ...
People with a university degree fear death less than those at a lower literacy level
2010-12-04
People with a university degree fear death less than those at a lower literacy level. In addition, fear of death is most common among women than men, which affects their children's perception of death. In fact, 76% of children that report fear of death is due to their mothers avoiding the topic. Additionally, more of these children fear early death and adopt unsuitable approaches when it comes to deal with death.
These are some of the conclusions drawn from a research entitled Educación para la muerte: Estudio sobre la construcción del concepto de muerte en niños de entre ...
Polluted air increases obesity risk in young animals
2010-12-04
COLUMBUS, Ohio -- Exposure to polluted air early in life led to an accumulation of abdominal fat and insulin resistance in mice even if they ate a normal diet, according to new research.
Animals exposed to the fine-particulate air pollution had larger and more fat cells in their abdominal area and higher blood sugar levels than did animals eating the same diet but breathing clean air.
Researchers exposed the mice to the polluted air for six hours a day, five days a week for 10 weeks beginning when the animals were 3 weeks old. This time frame roughly matches the toddler ...
LAST 30 PRESS RELEASES:
Calorie labelling linked to 2% average reduction in energy content of menu items
Widely prescribed opioid painkiller tramadol not that effective for easing chronic pain
Exercise snacks may boost cardiorespiratory fitness of physically inactive adults
15,000 women a year with breast cancer could benefit from whole genome sequencing, say researchers
Study highlights risks of Caesarean births to future pregnancies
GLP-1 agonists pose emerging challenge for PET-CT imaging, study finds
Scripps Research scientists unlock new patterns of protein behavior in cell membranes
Panama Canal may face frequent extreme water lows in coming decades
Flash Joule heating lights up lithium extraction from ores
COMBINEDBrain and MUSC announce partnership to establish biorepository for pediatric cerebrospinal fluid and CNS tissue bank
Questionable lead reporting for drinking water virtually vanished after Flint water crisis, study reveals
Assessing overconfidence among national security officials
Bridging two frontiers: Mitochondria & microbiota, Targeting Extracellular Vesicles 2025 to explore game-changing pathways in medicine
New imaging tech promises to help doctors better diagnose and treat skin cancers
Once dominant, US agricultural exports falter amid trade disputes and rising competition
Biochar from invasive weed shields rice from toxic nanoplastics and heavy metals
Rice University announces second cohort of Chevron Energy Graduate Fellows
Soil bacteria and minerals form a natural “battery” that breaks down antibiotics in the dark
Jamestown colonists brought donkeys, not just horses, to North America, old bones reveal
FIU cybersecurity researchers develop midflight defense against drone hijacking
Kennesaw State researcher aims to discover how ideas spread in the digital age
Next-generation perovskite solar cells are closer to commercial use
Sleep patterns linked to variation in health, cognition, lifestyle, and brain organization
University of Oklahoma researcher awarded funding to bridge gap between molecular data and tissue architecture
Nationally-recognized pathologist Paul N. Staats, MD, named Chair of Pathology at University of Maryland School of Medicine
The world’s snow leopards are very similar genetically. That doesn’t bode well for their future
Researchers find key to stopping deadly infection
Leafcutter ants have blind spots, just like truck drivers
Tayac receives funding for community engagement project
Parker receives funding for Elementary Education Program Professional Development School (PDS)
[Press-News.org] Low-status leaders are ignoredHow a leader is picked impacts whether others will follow