Emily Reit’s research while affiliated with Stanford University and other places

Individuals who have more ambition—a persistent striving for success, attainment, and accomplishment—are more likely to become leaders. But are these ambitious individuals also more effective in leadership roles? We hypothesize that leader ambition is related to positive self-views of leader effectiveness that remain uncorroborated by relevant third-party actors. In a multiwave, preregistered study, we find evidence for this hypothesis using a sample of executives (N = 3,830 ratings of 472 leaders) who were rated by peers, subordinates, managers, and themselves on ten leadership competencies, including their ability to motivate others, manage collaborative work, coach and develop people, and present and communicate ideas. We consider the implications of our findings for both scholars and practitioners interested in leadership selection and development.

Dominant actors are neither liked nor respected, yet they are reliably deferred to. Extant explanations of why dominant actors are deferred to focus on deferrers' first-order judgments (i.e., the deferrers' own private assessment of the dominant actor). The present research extends these accounts by considering the role of second-order judgments (i.e., an individual's perception of what others think about the dominant actor) in decisions to defer to dominant actors. While individuals themselves often have little respect for dominant actors, we hypothesized that (1) they think others respect dominant actors more than they do themselves, and (2) these second-order respect judgments are associated with their decision to defer dominant actors above and beyond their own first-order respect judgments. The results of four studies provide support for these hypotheses: across a variety of contexts, we found evidence that individuals think others respect dominant actors more than they themselves do (Studies 1–3), and perceptions of others' respect for dominant actors is associated with individuals' own decisions to defer to them, above and beyond first-order respect (Studies 3–4). Results highlight the importance of considering second-order judgments in order to fully understand why dominant actors achieve high social rank in groups and organizations.

Whom do individuals blame for intergroup conflict? Do people attribute responsibility for intergroup conflict to the in-group or the out-group? Theoretically integrating the literatures on intergroup relations, moral psychology, and judgment and decision-making, we propose that unpacking a group by explicitly describing it in terms of its constituent subgroups increases perceived support for the view that the unpacked group shoulders more of the blame for intergroup conflict. Five preregistered experiments ( N = 3,335 adults) found support for this novel hypothesis across three distinct intergroup conflicts: the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, current racial tensions between White people and Black people in the United States, and the gender gap in wages in the United States. Our findings (a) highlight the independent roles that entrenched social identities and cognitive, presentation-based processes play in shaping blame judgments, (b) demonstrate that the effect of unpacking groups generalizes across partisans and nonpartisans, and (c) illustrate how constructing packed versus unpacked sets of potential perpetrators can critically shape where the blame lies.

Social norm perception is ubiquitous in small groups and teams, but how individuals approach this process is not well understood. When individuals wish to perceive descriptive social norms in a group or team, whose advice and behavior do they prefer to rely on? Four lab studies and one field survey demonstrate that when individuals seek information about a team’s social norms they prefer to receive advice from lower-ranking individuals (Studies 1–4) and give greater weight to the observed behavior of lower-ranking individuals (Study 5). Results from correlation (Study 3) and moderation (Study 4) approaches suggest this preference stems from the assumption that lower-ranking team members are more attentive to and aware of the descriptive social norms of their team. Alternative mechanisms (e.g., perceived similarity to lower-ranking team members, greater honesty of lower-ranking team members) were also examined, but no support for these was found.

Social norm perception is ubiquitous in small groups and teams, but how individuals approach this process is not well understood. When individuals wish to perceive descriptive social norms in a group or team, whose ad- vice and behavior do they prefer to rely on? Four lab studies and one Teld survey demonstrate that when in- dividuals seek information about a team’s social norms they prefer to receive advice from lower-ranking indi- viduals (Studies 1–4) and give greater weight to the observed behavior of lower-ranking individuals (Study 5). Results from correlation (Study 3) and moderation (Study 4) approaches suggest this preference stems from the assumption that lower-ranking team members are more attentive to and aware of the descriptive social norms of their team. Alternative mechanisms (e.g., perceived similarity to lower-ranking team members, greater honesty of lower-ranking team members) were also examined, but no support for these was found.

In predicting what others are likely to choose (e.g., vanilla ice cream or tiramisu), people can display a commonness fallacy-overestimating how often common (but bland) options (e.g., vanilla ice cream) will be chosen over rarer (but exciting) options (e.g., tiramisu). Given common items are often chosen merely because they are frequently offered, not because they are preferred (tiramisu is rarely offered as a dessert), commonness is not necessarily diagnostic of future choice. Studies 1a and 1b document the commonness fallacy in forecasts of single and repeated choices. Study 2 replicates it in an incentive-compatible choice context. Studies 3 and 4 uncover when and why perceived commonness is relied upon. Perceived commonness is spontaneously used as a guide when forecasting others' choices (as though people blur what has been chosen with what people will choose), but not when forecasting what others would be pleased to receive. Choice forecasters leaned upon perceived commonness over and above many other cues, including their own choices, the goods' prices, and even how much others were thought to like each option. Upon conscious reflection, choice forecasters abandon commonness and gravitate toward more normatively defensible input. Studies 5 and 6 used correlational and experimental methods, respectively, to examine antecedents of the commonness fallacy. Study 7 illustrates a literally costly consequence: A 2-part marketplace simulation study found amateur sellers' reliance on perceived commonness prompted them to systematically misprice goods. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2019 APA, all rights reserved).

Research on hierarchy often examines how hierarchy influences group members. In contrast, we propose that leaders and followers have agency to actively shape the hierarchies they are part of. Thus, hierarchy's functionality or dysfunctionality depends not only on what hierarchy does to people, but also on what people do with hierarchy. We offer two complementary lenses through which readers may consider hierarchy's functions and dysfunctions: a rational-functional perspective and a relational-communal perspective. We review recent research related to our dual focus on agency and relatedness, and highlight leadership behaviors that research suggests can potentially boost group performance and support group members' wellbeing simultaneously.