Power increases performance in a social evaluation situation as a result of decreased stress responses

Details

Serval ID
serval:BIB_B4AC611F51FC
Type
Article: article from journal or magazin.
Collection
Publications
Title
Power increases performance in a social evaluation situation as a result of decreased stress responses
Journal
European Journal of Social Psychology
Author(s)
Schmid P.C., Schmid Mast M.
ISSN
0046-2772
Publication state
Published
Issued date
04/2013
Peer-reviewed
Oui
Volume
43
Number
3
Pages
201-211
Language
english
Abstract
We tested whether power reduces responses related to social stress and thus increases performance evaluation in social evaluation situations. We hypothesized and found that thinking about having power reduced fear of negative evaluation and physiological arousal during a self-presentation task (Studies 1 and 2). In Study 2, we also showed that simply thinking about having power made individuals perform better in a social evaluation situation. Our results confirmed our hypotheses that the mechanism explaining this power-performance link was that high power participants felt less fear of negative evaluation. The reduced fear of negative evaluation generated fewer signs of behavioral nervousness, which caused their performance to be evaluated more positively (serial mediation). Simply thinking of having power can therefore have important positive consequences for a person in an evaluation situation in terms of how he or she feels and how he or she is evaluated.
Keywords
Virtual-reality version, Psychosocial stress, Public speaking, Heart-rate, Challenge appraisal, Source credibility, Cortisol, Anxiety, Reactivity, Tolerance
Web of science
Create date
19/11/2014 14:05
Last modification date
20/08/2019 15:23
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