Status

Summary

Status is a social ranking of people, groups, or objects as relatively better or lesser according to a standard of value shared within a surrounding social world. Rather than possessed by the individual or group, status is reflected in the esteem, respect, deference, and influence granted by others. Status rankings create advantages or disadvantages in perceptions of competence/quality over and above what would exist without the ranking. Such status advantages are consequential for life outcomes and patterns of inequality in society among individuals and groups. Hierarchies of esteem, deference, and influence develop rapidly in groups oriented toward a cooperative goal. Group members’ status-valued social differences such as gender, race, or occupation shape their status within interpersonal groups in a status generalization process. Expectations States and Status Characteristics is the dominant explanatory theory for these hierarchies and status generalizations, but there are also evolutionary accounts based on dominance and prestige. The status of groups or differing categories of people in a society is reflected in widely shared cultural status beliefs that accord greater worthiness and competence/quality to some groups and categories over others. Rather than personal beliefs, status beliefs are beliefs about what most others think that act as a type of common knowledge people and groups use to coordinate their behavior in goal-oriented contexts. Status spreads by association among individuals and groups. Status rankings, reflected in shared status beliefs, develop and become consequential among organizations like business firms and organizations as well as individuals.