Choosing the best (wo)man for the job: The effects of mortality salience, sex, and gender stereotypes on leader evaluations

Hoyt, Crystal L.; Simon, Stefanie; Reid, Lindsey

doi:10.1016/j.leaqua.2009.01.016

Cited by 66 publications

(63 citation statements)

References 51 publications

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“…This might be expected since women and men set different standards against which to judge their own or the opposite sex (Rojahn and Willemsen, 1994;Broder, 1993;Bagues and Esteve-Volart, 2010). Such behavior is often linked to the prevalence of in-group bias, which induces people to prefer a boss of their own gender (Hoyt et al, 2009;Furnham et al, 2012). This idea is evaluated in more detail in Figure 3.…”

Section: Combining and Extending The Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Firstly, sex categorization easily triggers gender stereotypes (Deaux and Major, 1987). As such stereotyping can strengthen the perceived 'lack of fit' between feminine characteristics and the requirements for success in particular jobs (Heilman, 1983(Heilman, , 1995Hoyt et al, 2009;Geys and Mause, 2014), likeability may be particularly disadvantageous for female managers. Secondly, the near-automaticity of sex stereotyping might make the male/likeable combination more conspicuous and perceptible since it does not conform to expectations (Judge et al, 2012).…”

Section: H1: Likeable Managers Are Less Preferred By Employees Than Lmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Better not look too nice? Employees' preferences towards (un)likeable managers

Geys

2014

The Leadership Quarterly

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Recent research shows that, all else equal, most people prefer likeable colleagues. In this article, two experiments are employed to analyze preferences with respect to (un)likeable superiors. We thereby focus on perceptions of likeability based on appearance rather than as a behavioral characteristic, which allows us to concentrate on the impact of quick, unconscious evaluations in zero-acquaintance situations. The results indicate that, all else equal, managers of higher perceived likeability are less preferred than managers of lower perceived likeability.Such likeability-aversion emerges among male and female respondents, affects male and female managers, and holds both for preferences expressed from the perspective of employees (Experiment 1) or a HR department (Experiment 2). Keywords: Likeability, Relational Leadership, Leader-Member Exchange, RoleIncongruence, Thin-slice Impressions.Word count: 8448 words * I am grateful to all respondents for their time, as well as to Jørgen Juel Andersen, Jon Fiva, Stefan Gänzle and Dag-Ingvar Jacobsen for access to their students, and to Gianmarco Daniele, Tom-Reiel Heggedal, Leif Helland, Joshua Holm, Helge Hånes, Justin Jansen, Lars Monkerud, Zuzana Murdoch, Panu Poutvaara and two anonymous referees for insightful suggestions. I also thank Panu Poutvaara for access to the second set of pictures (and the evaluations thereof). Financial assistance from FWO Vlaanderen (grant number G.0022.12) is gratefully acknowledged.

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Section: Combining and Extending The Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: H1: Likeable Managers Are Less Preferred By Employees Than Lmentioning

confidence: 99%

Better not look too nice? Employees' preferences towards (un)likeable managers

Geys

2014

The Leadership Quarterly

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“…That is, people's ILTs will likely become more agentic in nature. In support of this prediction, Hoyt, Simon, and Reid (2009) have shown that mortality salience impacts people's preferences for political leaders based on gender stereotypicality. Examining people's preferences for gubernatorial candidates, they found that mortality salience resulted in a general increased preference for the agentic candidate over the communal candidate.…”

Section: Terror Management Theorymentioning

confidence: 90%

“…Employing procedures similar to those of Hoyt et al (2009), participants were told that they were taking part in research designed to understand the relationship between personality factors and attitudes. Augmenting this cover story, participants initially completed two filler items: the relationship questionnaire (Bartholomew & Horowitz, 1991) and the 10-item personality inventory (Gosling, Rentfrow, & Swann, 2003).…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Taking a Turn Toward the Masculine: The Impact of Mortality Salience on Implicit Leadership Theories

Hoyt

Simon

Innella

2011

Basic and Applied Social Psychology

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The present research investigates the influence of subtle death-related thoughts (i.e., mortality salience) on people's images of effective leaders (i.e., their implicit leadership theories [ILTs]). We test the prediction that mortality salience will change the content of these implicit theories to be more gender stereotypical such that individuals will conceive of effective leaders in a significantly more masculine, or agentic, manner. To test this prediction, we assessed the communal and agentic components of participants' ILTs after they were presented with a mortality salience or control manipulation. Results show that priming individuals to think about their mortality with two open-ended questions resulted in a significant shift in their ILTs such that an effective leader is described in significantly more agentic terms compared to the control condition. This masculine shift in people's ILTs was demonstrated in both women and men, and mortality salience did not influence perceptions of effective leaders' communal traits. This work contributes to research on gender bias in leadership, ILTs, and terror management theory and has implications for female leaders.

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“…Both male and female leaders are impacted by gender stereotypes; male leaders are expected to be assertive and decisive, female leaders are expected to show warmth and concern for others (Hoyt, Simon, & Reid, 2009). Transformational leadership fits more closely with how women are expected to lead than how men are expected to lead (Bass, Avolio, & Atwater, 1996;Eagly & Johannesen-Schmidt, 2001).…”

Section: Leader Sex As a Moderatormentioning

confidence: 99%

The moderating role of leader and follower sex in dyads on the leadership behavior–leader effectiveness relationships

Douglas¹

2012

The Leadership Quarterly

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Choosing the best (wo)man for the job: The effects of mortality salience, sex, and gender stereotypes on leader evaluations

Cited by 66 publications

References 51 publications

Better not look too nice? Employees' preferences towards (un)likeable managers

Better not look too nice? Employees' preferences towards (un)likeable managers

Taking a Turn Toward the Masculine: The Impact of Mortality Salience on Implicit Leadership Theories

The moderating role of leader and follower sex in dyads on the leadership behavior–leader effectiveness relationships

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