Dominance Structures: Obtained and Sustained Through Power and Influence Strategies

Social control is often applied through specific behavior clusters that are important and relevant to the situation, the social structure, and the expression of power.  In nearly all aspects of daily life, the situational impact of holding power over others is too strong to go unnoticed.  Influence strategies differ for men and women.  Whereas men typically employ approaches that involve coercion based on individual resources and competent legitimate, expert, and direct informational influence, women tend to use personal reward and sexuality strategies, both of which are less aggressive and direct than those of their male counterparts.  Influence strategies may involve manipulation, supplication, bullying, autocracy, disengagement, and bargaining between one or more members of an interaction (Lips, 1991).  Different reactions by targeted individuals are produced from the various styles of influence and the multiple ways of using power, depending on the interaction situation.

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Sex/Gender Differences in Popular Media

Stereotypical images of women and men are conveyed continually through popular media, sending us messages of what people are supposed to be like.  These messages encompass behaviors, personality features, intelligence, occupations, and physical attributes.  The ongoing primary message of the media is that men are the norm.  Sex/gender differences in employment conditions, ways of thinking, brain structure, societal positions and behavior are commonly revealed through the press.

In the August 2006 issue of Inc. Magazine, a report on how to make great hires in the workplace highlights a systematic approach to evaluating job candidates.  Opposed to the typical job interview, this science-based approach is recommended to provide employers with a comprehensive, more balanced, and open-minded view of candidates.  Typical interviews produce biased and limited analyses of job applicants.  In these situations, interviewers often discuss topics relative to his or her interests.  It is suggested that subject matters irrelevant to the desired job qualifications are most often addressed, and tend to focus around personal hobbies of the interviewer and physical attributes of the candidates.  The author of the article explains, “He could dismiss the candidate before she’s even started speaking because she’s overweight or overdressed, or he could lose focus because he’s having a rotten day” (Clifford, 2006).  Overall, it is common that the interviewer will judge candidates on fewer criterions than intended, and that prejudices involving race and gender impede on the decision-making process of hiring.  

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