Attracted to power: challenge/threat and promotion/prevention focus differentially predict the attractiveness of group power

Annika Scholl,Kai Sassenberg,Claudia Sassenrath

doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2015.00397

Abstract

Depending on their motivation, individuals prefer different group contexts for social interactions. The present research sought to provide more insight into this relationship. More specifically, we tested how challenge/threat and a promotion/prevention focus predict attraction to groups with high- or low-power. As such, we examined differential outcomes of threat and prevention focus as well as challenge and promotion focus that have often been regarded as closely related. According to regulatory focus, individuals should prefer groups that they expect to “feel right” for them to join: Low-power groups should be more attractive in a prevention (than a promotion) focus, as these groups suggest security-oriented strategies, which fit a prevention focus. High-power groups should be more attractive in a promotion (rather than a prevention) focus, as these groups are associated with promotion strategies fitting a promotion focus (Sassenberg et al., 2007). In contrast, under threat (vs. challenge), groups that allow individuals to restore their (perceived) lack of control should be preferred: Low-power groups should be less attractive under threat (than challenge) because they provide low resources which threatened individuals already perceive as insufficient and high-power groups might be more attractive under threat (than under challenge), because their high resources allow individuals to restore control. Two experiments (N = 140) supported these predictions. The attractiveness of a group often depends on the motivation to engage in what fits (i.e., prefer a group that feels right in the light of one’s regulatory focus). However, under threat the striving to restore control (i.e., prefer a group allowing them to change the status quo under threat vs. challenge) overrides the fit effect, which may in turn guide individuals’ behavior in social interactions.

Highlights

Imagine you have the possibility to join a new team
There were no interactions of Group power with threat/challenge and/or with Order on perceived power, indicating that the manipulation of Group power was successful
Attraction to group power We expected that the low-power group should be evaluated as even less attractive under threat than challenge, whereas the high-power group might be more attractive under threat than challenge

Summary

Introduction

Imagine you have the possibility to join a new team. You could become a member of a high-power group (e.g., a team of sports referees or a group of supervisors) that is relatively independent and has access to many resources. Prevention-focused individuals, in contrast, evaluated low-power groups more favorably than did promotion-focused individuals In these studies, regulatory focus predicted the attraction to group power among non-group members (i.e., when individuals did not yet belong to the group; Sassenberg et al, 2007, 2013). In case of those palliative responses, threat in one context affects evaluations in another context We propose that this palliative regulation of threat applies to the evaluation of high- and low-power groups: under threat, individuals perceive a lack of resources to master the current discrepancy. Regulatory focus and threat/challenge were manipulated independently of the group context, in order to rule out potential demand effects

Material and Methods

Results

Discussion

General Discussion