Title

Social Power and Emotional Experience: Actor and Partner Effects Within Dyadic Interactions

Author Info

Carrie A. Langner, University of California - BerkeleyFollow
Dacher Keltner, University of California - Berkeley

Recommended Citation

Postprint version. Published in Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, Volume 44, Issue 3, May 1, 2008, pages 848-856.

NOTE: At the time of publication, the author Carrie A. Langner was not yet affiliated with Cal Poly.

The definitive version is available at https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jesp.2007.08.002.

Abstract

A dyadic methodological and statistical approach to social power is used to test the notion that an individual’s power and a partner’s power have distinct effects on the individual’s emotional experience. Two studies examined actor and partner effects of social power on emotion within dyadic interactions. Across interpersonal contexts and measures of social power, the individual’s own social power, theorized to activate behavioral approach, was associated with positive emotion (an actor effect). In contrast, being subject to a partner’s elevated social power, theorized to activate behavioral inhibition, was associated with increased negative emotion (a partner effect). The discussion focuses on how dyadic methodological and statistical approaches point to new lines of inquiry in the study of social power.

Disciplines

Psychology

Copyright

2007 Elsevier Inc.