Lifting Me Up or Tearing You down

Dominance and prestige represent two fundamental strategies people use to navigate social hierarchies. Despite a growing literature on the psychology of dominance- and prestige-oriented leaders, less is known about how those strategies operate at relatively low positions in the hierarchy. The current research investigated whether, among people at lower ranks within a social hierarchy, dominance and prestige would be reflected in relatively high levels of malicious versus benign envy, respectively. Two correlational studies (Studies 1 and 2) demonstrated associations between individual differences in dominance and prestige and the tendency to display benign and malicious envy. Two additional studies used experimental procedures to activate orientations toward dominance and prestige and examine benign and malicious envy in the context of hypothetical scenarios (Study 3) and a laboratory group interaction (Study 4). Across the four studies, individual differences in prestige were positively associated with benign envy, and negatively associated with malicious envy. Individual differences in dominance were positively associated with both malicious and benign envy. Across the two experiments, being in a status hierarchy (intended to prime prestige), relative to a power hierarchy (intended to prime dominance), caused people to display higher levels of benign envy. Across the two experiments, no effects on malicious envy were found. The current research illustrates the value of investigating the psychology of subordinate group members from the perspective of dual strategies theory.