Abstract
Making friends is critical to well-being. We also live in a society where the display of status is ubiquitous and billions of dollars are spent on high-status consumer goods. In the present analysis, we introduce the Status Signals Paradox: When making new friends, people tend to think that displaying high-status markers of themselves (e.g., a BMW, a Tag Heuer watch) will make them more attractive to others than neutral markers (e.g., a Honda, a generic brand watch); however, from the perspective of would-be friends, individuals who display high-status markers are found to be less attractive as new friends than those with neutral status markers. Six studies provide converging evidence of the status signals paradox.
Original language | American English |
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Pages (from-to) | 690-696 |
Number of pages | 7 |
Journal | Social Psychological and Personality Science |
Volume | 10 |
Issue number | 5 |
DOIs | |
State | Published - 1 Jul 2019 |
Keywords
- decision-making
- naive realism
- presenter paradox
- social comparison
All Science Journal Classification (ASJC) codes
- Social Psychology
- Clinical Psychology