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Why is hierarchy often surrounded by ambivalence? This article contributes to current debates about the goods and the ills of social hierarchy by drawing attention to the double-edged role of grace in hierarchical relations. Taking the Aari of southern Ethiopia as my example, I show how a conception of seniors as founts of grace entails a social life marked both by intense love and frequent conflict. Conversion to Christianity flattens social hierarchies by relocating the source of grace from seniors to God. As humility replaces seniors' demands to be honoured for dispensing grace, social life becomes less conflictual but also less engaging and affectionate. This shows that different conceptions of grace entail different forms of sociality and that grace can help explain the ambivalence of hierarchy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Dominance captures behavioural patterns found in social hierarchies that arise from agonistic interactions in which some individuals coercively exploit their control over costs and benefits to extract deference from others, often through aggression, threats and/or intimidation. Accumulating evidence points to its importance in humans and its separation from prestige—an alternate avenue to high status in which status arises from information (e.g. knowledge, skill, etc.) or other non-rival goods. In this review, we provide an overview of the theoretical underpinnings of dominance as a concept within evolutionary biology, discuss the challenges of applying it to humans and consider alternative theoretical accounts which assert that dominance is relevant to understanding status in humans. We then review empirical evidence for its continued importance in human groups, including the effects of dominance—independently of prestige— on measurable outcomes such as social influence and reproductive fitness, evidence for specialized dominance psychology, and evidence for genderspecific effects. Finally, because human-specific factors such as norms and coalitions may place bounds on purely coercive status-attainment strategies, we end by considering key situations and contexts that increase the likelihood for dominance status to coexist alongside prestige status within the same individual, including how: (i) institutional power and authority tend to elicit dominance; (ii) dominance-enhancing traits can at times generate benefits for others (prestige); and (iii) certain dominance cues and ethology may lead to mis-attributions of prestige. This article is part of the theme issue ‘The centennial of the pecking order: current state and future prospects for the study of dominance hierarchies’. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although previous research has demonstrated that generosity can lead to status gains, the converse effect of status on generosity has received less attention. This is a significant gap because groups and society at large rely on the beneficence of all members, especially those holding high-status positions. More broadly, research on the psychology of status remains largely unexplored, which is striking in light of the attention given to other forms of social hierarchy, such as power. The current work focuses on the psychology of status and explores the interactive effects of status and legitimacy on generosity. In particular, we hypothesize that status will decrease generosity when the status hierarchy is perceived as legitimate because status can inflate views of one’s value to the group and sense of deservingness. In contrast, we hypothesize that status increases generosity when the status hierarchy is perceived as illegitimate, due to efforts to restore equity through one’s generosity. Our results support these hypotheses across 6 studies (a field study and 5 experiments) and empirically demonstrate that the effects of status and legitimacy on generosity can be attributed to concerns about equity in status allocation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Social hierarchies among animal species are established on the dominance-aggressiveness level of the animal aligned with the subordination of their mates. This study aimed to evaluate the association among social rank hierarchy, scrotal circumference (SC), semen quality (SQ), and sexual drive (SD). Adult Dorper rams (n=24) with similar live weight (LW), body condition score (BCS), and age (AG) were subjected to a behavioral test to define the success index (SI) based on male-to-male interactions, determining three social ranks: low hierarchy rams (LHR; SI = 0-0.33; n=9), medium hierarchy rams (MHR; SI=0.34-0.66; n=10) and high hierarchy rams (HHR; SI= 0.67-1; n=5). Afterward, the SC, SQ, and SD were evaluated. The GLM procedure of SAS (SAS Institute, Cary, NC) was used to analyze LW, AG, BCS, SC and SQ variables such as ejaculate volume, and sperm concentration. Microscopic characteristics of sperm cells were subjected to an ANOVA using the MIXED procedure of SAS. The GENMOD procedure was used to assess the effect of social rank (three levels) on the SD variables. Differences were considered as significant at P < 0.05. SC was greatest (P< 0.05) for HHR rams (40.0±3.5) and least for rams with medium social rank (MHR; 29.3±1.20). SQ was greatest (P< 0.05) for HHR rams (3,848±187) and least for LHR (2,660±463). The rejection percentage to mount an estrous ewe or SD was 77.7 for LHR and 20% for HHR and MHR rams (P < 0.05). To conclude, the HHR rams presented the highest successful copulation, the greatest scrotal circumference, and the greatest sperm cell concentration compared with rams with lesser social rank scores. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article uses social dominance theory (SDT) to explore the dynamic and systemic nature of the initiation and maintenance of organizational corruption. Rooted in the definition of organizational corruption as misuse of power or position for personal or organizational gain, this work suggests that organizational corruption is driven by the individual and institutional tendency to structure societies as group-based social hierarchies. SDT describes a series of factors and processes across multiple levels of analysis that systemically contribute to the initiation and maintenance of social hierarchies and associated power inequalities, favoritism, and discrimination. I posit that the same factors and processes also contribute to individuals' lower awareness of the misuse of power and position within the social hierarchies, leading to the initiation and maintenance of organizational corruption. Specifically, individuals high in social dominance orientation, believing that they belong to superior groups, are likely to be less aware of corruption because of their feeling of entitlement to greater power and their desire to maintain dominance even if that requires exploiting others. Members of subordinate groups are also likely to have lower awareness of corruption if they show more favoritism toward dominant group members to enhance their sense of worth and preserve social order. Institutions contribute to lower awareness of corruption by developing and enforcing structures, norms, and practices that promote informational ambiguity and maximize focus on dominance and promotion. Dynamic coordination among individuals and institutions is ensured through the processes of person-environment fit and legitimizing beliefs, ideologies, or rationalizations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]