The DOI matches its Crossref record; 43 of the 43 references it cites were found in a registry or an index.
When the appeal of a dominant leader is greater than a prestige leader
Open accessAbstract
Across the globe we witness the rise of populist authoritarian leaders who are overbearing in their narrative, aggressive in behavior, and often exhibit questionable moral character. Drawing on evolutionary theory of leadership emergence, in which dominance and prestige are seen as dual routes to leadership, we provide a situational and psychological account for when and why dominant leaders are preferred over other respected and admired candidates. We test our hypothesis using three studies, encompassing more than 140,000 participants, across 69 countries and spanning the past two decades. We find robust support for our hypothesis that under a situational threat of economic uncertainty (as exemplified by the poverty rate, the housing vacancy rate, and the unemployment rate) people escalate their support for dominant leaders. Further, we find that this phenomenon is mediated by participants' psychological sense of a lack of personal control. Together, these results provide large-scale, globally representative evidence for the structural and psychological antecedents that increase the preference for dominant leaders over their prestigious counterparts.
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“Indeed, especially in times of economic or personal uncertainty, groups have been shown to elect more dominant (Kakkar & Sivanathan, 2017) and narcissistic (Nevicka, De Hoogh, Van Vianen, & Ten Velden, 2013) leaders.”
From The "Why" and "How" of Narcissism: A Process Model of Narcissistic Status Pursuit (2020) · cites this paper as Kakkar & Sivanathan, 2017
Citations
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“We draw upon relevant literature in social psychology (6, 7), political psychology (8), and evolutionary psychology (9, 10) to develop our theoretical arguments.”
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“The prestige path to attaining an influential position in the group hierarchy is unique to humans; individuals help in disseminating important cultural knowledge that helps others overcome evolutionary selection pressures and increase their adaptation capabilities (20).”
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The "Why" and "How" of Narcissism: A Process Model of Narcissistic Status Pursuit
Grapsas, S., Brummelman, E., Back, M. D., & Denissen, J. J. A. (2020) · Perspectives on Psychological Science · doi:10.1177/1745691619873350 · Cited by 312
“Indeed, especially in times of economic or personal uncertainty, groups have been shown to elect more dominant (Kakkar & Sivanathan, 2017) and narcissistic (Nevicka, De Hoogh, Van Vianen, & Ten Velden, 2013) leaders.”
BackgroundAutocratic leaders and authoritarian followers revisited: A review and agenda for the future
Harms, P. D., Wood, D., Landay, K., Lester, P. B., & Lester, G. V. (2017) · The Leadership Quarterly · doi:10.1016/j.leaqua.2017.12.007 · Cited by 230
Fall from Grace: The Role of Dominance and Prestige in the Punishment of High-Status Actors
Kakkar, H., Sivanathan, N., & Gobel, M. S. (2020) · Academy of Management Journal · doi:10.5465/amj.2017.0729 · Cited by 120
Self-citationTwo signals of social rank: Prestige and dominance are associated with distinct nonverbal displays.
Witkower, Z., Tracy, J. L., Cheng, J. T., & Henrich, J. (2019) · Journal of Personality and Social Psychology · doi:10.1037/pspi0000181 · Cited by 137
A Dual Model of Leadership and Hierarchy: Evolutionary Synthesis
van Vugt, M., & Smith, J. E. (2019) · Trends in Cognitive Sciences · doi:10.1016/j.tics.2019.09.004 · Cited by 111
Metadata
- Authors
- Kakkar, H., & Sivanathan, N.
- Affiliations
- London Business School (GB)
- Venue
- Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
- Publisher
- National Academy of Sciences
- Published
- 2017-06-12
- Volume
- 114
- Issue
- 26
- Pages
- 6734-6739
- ISSN
- 0027-8424 (ISSN-L)
- 1091-6490
- PMC
- PMC5495227
- OpenAlex
- W2626998810
- Cited by
- 254
- References
- 43
- Citations by year
- 2026: 17 · 2025: 21 · 2024: 50 · 2023: 38 · 2022: 31 · 2021: 35 · 2020: 17 · 2019: 23 · 2018: 8 · 2017: 12
- FWCI
- 21.37
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- bronze
- doi.org
- Locations
- Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (publishedVersion)
- PubMed Central (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- London Business School Research Online (London Business School) (submittedVersion)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Experimental and Cognitive Psychology › Evolutionary Psychology and Human Behavior
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Social and Intergroup Psychology
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Social Power and Status Dynamics
- Keywords
- leadership emergence, dominance, prestige, economic uncertainty, poverty, vacant housing, unemployment, perceived personal control, political support
- MeSH terms
- Adult, Female, Humans, Leadership, Male, Middle Aged, Models, Psychological, Social Behavior
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