Clara Kulich

University of Geneva | UNIGE · School of Psychology

This paper offers a new explanation of the gender pay gap in leadership positions by examining the relationship between managerial bonuses and company performance. Drawing on findings of gender studies, agency theory, and the leadership literature, we argue that the gender pay gap is a context-specific phenomenon that results partly from the fact t...

The present research examines individuals’ concern for the ingroup when they move from a socially disadvantaged inherited background (in terms of gender, ethnicity, and nationality) to a higher social standing through individual achievement. Studies 1-2 show that the status inconsistency between the disadvantaged and the achieved groups undermines...

Introduction Glass cliff evidence shows that women and ethnic, racial, and immigration (ERI) groups are more likely to face precarious leadership positions than majority groups. In politics, this is illustrated by minority candidates running for harder-to-win seats than majority candidates. Objective The present research extends these correlationa...

The glass cliff suggests that women are more likely to access leadership positions when organizations are facing a crisis. Although this phenomenon is well established, it is still largely unknown how variations in types of crises influence the strength of the think crisis-think female association, and whether female leaders and leaders with commun...

Research on glass cliff political candidacies shows that compared to men, women are more likely to run for office in districts where they are likely to lose. We examined if party differences in whether female candidates face these worse conditions in the United States could account for persistent and growing party and state variation in women’s rep...

One of the most robust findings in environmental psychology is that men report lower pro‐environmentalism than women. Whilst this difference is often attributed to personality or identity processes, there seems to be a lack of empirical research on potential ideological influences. We propose—and provide evidence through two correlational studies—t...

Atypical political candidates, such as those from ethnic, racial and immigration (ERI) minorities (vs. majority), are more likely to be chosen for hard-to-win seats than easy-to-win seats, a phenomenon known as the political glass cliff. This research aimed to uncover how the ERI status of decision makers played a role in this process. We hypothesi...

In times of crisis, decision-makers often appoint atypical candidates (i.e., women or ethnic minorities) as leaders, a phenomenon known as the “glass cliff.” Two online experiments (N = 607) with employees in Switzerland and France investigated whether media and stakeholder (i.e., third-party) attention toward the organization drives these preferen...

Contrary to expectations about solidarity and sisterhood between women, women managers sometimes distance themselves from junior women in the workplace when facing identity threat, that is, the feeling that one's social identity—such as race or gender—is devalued or undermined. For example, women managers might distance themselves from lower status...

In the present work, we addressed the relationship between parental leave policies and social norms. Using a pre‐registered, cross‐national approach, we examined the relationship between parental leave policies and the perception of social norms for the gender division of childcare. In this study, 19,259 students (11,924 women) from 48 countries in...

Collective action is a powerful tool for social change and is fundamental to women and girls’ empowerment on a societal level. Collective action towards gender equality could be understood as intentional and conscious civic behaviors focused on social transformation, questioning power relations, and promoting gender equality through collective effo...

The glass cliff is characterized by a higher tendency for women than men to be appointed to precarious positions of power. Little research has focused on what may lead people to qualify female appointments as instances of the glass cliff. We analyzed Élisabeth Borne's appointment as Prime Minister, investigating how ideological attitudes and percei...

Political glass cliffs arise when candidates from low-status groups disproportionately run for less-winnable seats. The burden of these worse odds has been shown to negatively impact election outcomes, slowing progress toward fair political representation. Relying on research suggesting signaling motives for glass cliff appointments, we investigate...

Socially mobile minority members (i.e., those who acquire a higher status membership) adjust their social identities, and eventually show negative attitudes towards minorities, as compared to non-mobile members. We examined whether these changes could be understood as the result of individual mobility achievements, or if they already occur at an ea...

Using data from 15 countries, this article investigates whether descriptive and prescriptive gender norms concerning housework and child care (domestic work) changed after the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. Results of a total of 8,343 participants (M = 19.95, SD = 1.68) from two comparable student samples suggest that descriptive norms about unpai...

This research examined whether female (vs. male) leaders are preferred during a pandemic when stereotypically feminine leadership is deemed useful. We hypothesized that citizens prefer female (vs. male) politicians when the crisis is framed as a social (vs. economic) crisis because they believe it requires feminine (vs. masculine) leadership. In a...

Economic inequality has consequences at the social-psychological level, such as in the way people make inferences about their environment and other people. In the present two preregistered studies, we used a paradigm of an organizational setting to manipulate economic inequality and measured ascriptions of agentic versus communal traits to employee...

Despite global commitments and efforts, a gender‐based division of paid and unpaid work persists. To identify how psychological factors, national policies, and the broader sociocultural context contribute to this inequality, we assessed parental‐leave intentions in young adults (18–30 years old) planning to have children (N = 13,942; 8,880 identifi...

People in economically advantaged nations tend to evaluate their life as more positive overall and report greater well-being than people in less advantaged nations. But how does positivity manifest in the daily life experiences of individuals around the world? The present study asked 15,244 college students from 62 nations, in 42 languages, to desc...

Social role theory posits that binary gender gaps in agency and communion should be larger in less egalitarian countries, reflecting these countries’ more pronounced sex-based power divisions. Conversely, evolutionary and self-construal theorists suggest that gender gaps in agency and communion should be larger in more egalitarian countries, reflec...

Economic inequality shapes the degree to which people and different social groups are perceived in stereotypical ways. Our research sought to investigate the impact of the perception of economic inequality in an organizational setting on expectations of social diversity in the organization’s workforce, across the dimensions of gender and ethnicity....

Research on underrepresented groups in leadership has shown that women and ethnic minorities are preferred as leaders during a crisis. In the present study, we investigated factors that shape voter preferences for minority political leaders in the COVID-19 crisis. We examined participant perceptions of the severity of the COVID-19 crisis in health,...

Inequalities in health behaviours (i.e., the tendency of socially disadvantaged people, compared to more advantaged people, to engage in fewer healthy behaviours) have been mostly accounted for by individual and environmental factors. The present research proposed to consider a social identity perspective by examining the combined impact of class-r...

The ranges of response alternatives presented in frequency scales influence respondents’ behavioral estimates. This research aimed at complementing the existing cognitive interpretations of this scale effect (e.g., Schwarz, 1994). We propose a normative interpretation, according to which targets associated with generic behavioral norms, and with in...

Precarious manhood beliefs portray manhood, relative to womanhood, as a social status that is hard to earn, easy to lose, and proven via public action. Here, we present cross-cultural data on a brief measure of precarious manhood beliefs (the Precarious Manhood Beliefs scale [PMB]) that covaries meaningfully with other cross-culturally validated ge...

Présentation de nos recherches s'intéressant au processus de naturalisation en tant que trajectoire de mobilité sociale ascendante. La capsule vidéo est consultable à l'adresse suivante : https://osf.io/vkfw9/?view_only=773e613c7f6c449895cdb8f672958fd5&fbclid=IwAR0H79UTYM8XHHM3Olm5iYD3hKpj9DOGNMCKXIliA3AJynfOXMkG4YMCxGk (vidéo en français)

Abstract What does it mean to be happy? The vast majority of cross-cultural studies on happiness have employed a Western-origin, or “WEIRD” measure of happiness that conceptualizes it as a self-centered (or “independent”), high-arousal emotion. However, research from East�ern cultures, particularly Japan, conceptualizes happiness as including an in...

Objective The current exploratory study sought to examine dispositional optimism, or the general expectation for positive outcomes, around the world. Method Dispositional optimism and possible correlates were assessed across 61 countries (N = 15,185; mean age = 21.92; 77% female). Mean‐level differences in optimism were computed along with their r...

We investigated how sexism affected leadership in mixed-gender alpine climbing-dyads. We asked whether benevolent sexism would impair, and hostile sexism would increase (as a form of resistance) women’s leadership; and whether benevolent sexism would increase men’s leadership (as a form of paternalism). A correlational study assessed reported leadi...

Women’s lower economic power is one of the symptoms of a hierarchical organization of societies. Creating economic gender equality needs to be a core interest of policies and research as it is a key to better well-being for other social groups and has advantages for society at large. This chapter first presents current trends in the understanding o...

We present a theoretical model which lines out the circumstances under which benign versus hostile motives lead to a leader selection of minority individuals in crisis situations.

The current project measures personality across cultures, for the first time using a forced-choice (or idiographic) assessment instrument - the California Adult Q-set (CAQ). Correlations among the average personality profiles across 13 countries (total N = 2,370) ranged from r = .69 to r = .98. The most similar averaged personality profiles were be...

Archival findings have illustrated that ethnic minority candidates likely run for less winnable seats than majority candidates, a phenomenon which aligns with “glass cliff” evidence showing that women are particularly chosen for precarious leadership positions. The present research extends correlational findings for ethnic minorities to an experime...

High identifiers are generally more willing to affiliate to their group and, as a result, perceive themselves and behave as prototypical members of their group. But is this always the case? The present research investigates the when and the why of the positive relationship between ingroup identification and assimilation by focusing on the role of t...

Glass-cliff research shows that female leaders are preferentially selected in a crisis to signal change and not for their leadership qualifications. In parallel, the management literature urges for agentic “masculine” leadership to turn around organizations in crisis. We hypothesized that, regardless of their gender, agentic leaders should be prefe...

Empirical findings suggest that members of socially disadvantaged groups who join a better-valued group through individual achievement tend to express low concern for their disadvantaged ingroup (e.g., denial of collective discrimination, low intent to initiate collective action). In the present research, we investigated whether this tendency occur...

The glass ceiling and the glass cliff are metaphors that point to discriminatory obstacles that handicap qualified women or other minorities in their professional upward mobility regardless of their actual performances. This entry defines these concepts, gives research illustrations of the phenomena and their causes, and points to real-life example...

This work reconciles previous discrepancies regarding when and how the demographic composition of supervisor-subordinate dyads relates to perceived supervisor support. We draw from social identity theory to argue that building relationships with higher status group members, while distancing oneself from the lower status group, is a contextually ind...

http://business.oxfordre.com/view/10.1093/acrefore/9780190224851.001.0001/acrefore-9780190224851-e-42 A wealth of research has previously shown that gender stereotypes and discrimination keep women from climbing the corporate ladder. However, women who break through this “glass ceiling” are likely to face new barriers. Research on the glass cliff...

L’idée selon laquelle l’égalité sociale s’établira automatiquement lorsque davantage de membres de groupes désavantagés atteindront des postes à responsabilités est très répandue. Pourtant, un nombre croissant d’observations indique que les individus issus de ces groupes désavantagés s’en détournent après une réussite sociale ou professionnelle. Un...

Previous research shows that gender vanguards (individuals who demonstrate gender-atypical skills and behavior) suffer backlash in the form of social and economic penalties (Rudman & Phelan, 2008). This study examined backlash against female and male job applicants who were either gender-atypical or typical. Professionals (N = 149) evaluated female...

Past research illustrates that when members of socially disadvantaged groups join a better-valued group through individual achievements (e.g., women become directors, ethnic minority individuals achieve a prestigious occupation), they express lower concern for their disadvantaged ingroup. In the present study, we investigate this effect in a new co...

This chapter first reviews the historical rise and the developments of psychological research on sexism which led to the differentiation between biological sex and cultural gender, and highlights commonalities between gender relations and other status-based intergroup relations. Old-fashioned, overt and explicit forms of sexism are then distinguish...

The glass cliff describes the greater likelihood for women to be selected as leaders under precarious circumstances. In this chapter, we refine the conditions of the glass cliff by showing that it occurs as a consequence of flawed management rather than as a consequence of a general economic crisis. Moreover, we discuss potential functions of this...

Women receive lower monetary compensation than men in all occupations and across all ranks. For managers, this gender pay gap is substantially higher than in average working populations. The goal of this chapter is to enhance our understanding of the managerial gender pay gap and its particularities. We first outline the problem using archival evid...

Research into the glass cliff indicates that adverse company circumstances, compared to favorable ones, increase the likelihood of women to be appointed in leadership positions. Study 1 refined the conditions under which a glass cliff occurs by demonstrating a preference for a female leader when a company's performance was attributed to past leader...

An archival study of UK General Election results from 2001, 2005, and 2010 revealed that Conservative Black and Minority Ethnic (BME) candidates were less successful than their White counterparts. However, mediation analyses demonstrate that this lack of success can be explained by the lower winnability of BME candidates’ seats, such that the oppos...

The metaphor of the glass ceiling points to the discriminatory forces that limit women's access to top leadership positions. One of its major causes is that women are stereotypically ascribed feminine traits that are deemed inappropriate for a management context and thus lead to less favourable evaluations of women's performances and suitability as...

This study examined the representations conveyed by the French titles, and the association between their use and sexist attitudes. Whereas no difference in terms of competence and expression was observed between women as they call themselves “Mademoiselle” or “Madame”, the distance between the expressiveness attributed to the woman and the expressi...

Examination of candidates’ gender in the 2005 UK General Election by Ryan, Haslam, and Kulich (2010) revealed that Conservative women were more likely than men to be candidates in 'glass cliff' positions in the sense that their seats were harder to win. In this paper, an archival study of UK General Election results from 2001, 2005, and 2010 reveal...

Despite burgeoning literature on knowledge transfer, relatively little is known about how strategic knowledge is created and exchanged and, specifically, the influence of leadership in stimulating and marshalling successful innovation. We frame this process as a dynamic capability that is primarily inter-organisational; it is also highly complex, h...

This paper presents a comprehensive archival examination of FTSE 100 companies in the period 2001–2005, focusing on the relationship between the presence of women on company boards and both accountancy-based and stock-based measures of company performance. Consistent with work by Adams, Gupta and Leeth this analysis reveals that there was no relati...

Recent archival and experimental research has revealed that women are more likely than men to be appointed to leadership positions when an organization is in crisis. As a result, women often confront a “glass cliff” in which their position as leader is precarious. Our first archival study examined the 2005 UK general election and found that, in the...

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The article discusses sex discrimination against women executives in terms of pay equity. It is said that a gender gap exists between the wages earned by men and women which is only partially explained by differences in career choices or experience. This differential is said to increase along with rank in the corporate hierarchy, so that entry-leve...

This paper extends prior research on the romance of leadership by examining (a) whether the romance of leadership holds for women as well as for men, and (b) the impact of the romance of leadership on performance-based pay. An experimental study (N= 210) suggests that the romance of leadership does exist for both men and women but that the process...

The glass cliff refers to the phenomenon whereby women are overrepresented in leadership roles associated with high risk and an increased chance of failure. Research into the glass cliff has focused on documenting the existence of the phenomenon and understanding the psychological processes that contribute to the appointment of women to precarious...

Die lexikographische Analyse ist eine deskriptive Methode zur Visualisierung von freien Assoziationsdaten. Identische Assoziationen werden aufgrund (a) ihrer Häufigkeiten und (b) ihres Ranges in einer Assoziationskette in einem zweidimensionalen Koordinatensystem dargestellt. Die Analyse gibt einen Einblick in die organisatorischen Eigenschaften so...

In 2001, 2002 and 2003 a survey, based on Serge Moscovici’s Theory of Social Representations (1961, 1967, 2001), was conducted to measure the development of the Social Representations of the European single currency Euro and changes in the Social Representations of the national currency Schilling. The sample consisted of 613 Austrian students, of w...

Women are paid less than men in comparable occupations when human capital factors are controlled for. This gender pay gap is particularly prominent in upper management where on average female leaders are allocated 30 per cent less pay than male leaders. This thesis examines the underlying causes and the consequences of the gender pay gap in manager...