Michael W Kraus
Biographic Data
| ID | 1663163 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Michael W Kraus |
| GIVEN NAMES | Michael W |
| FAMILY NAME | Kraus |
| SIGNATURE | KRAUS M W |
| AFFILIATIONS | Yale University |
| ORCID | 0000-0001-6320-4965 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 43 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 598 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 43 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2008 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2025 |
| H-INDEX | 10 |
Worker‐organization goal misalignment and support for collective action
As workplace inequality persists, understanding the psychological processes motivating collective action engagement becomes imperative. In one domain of collective action, labor unionization, membership in the United States has continuously declined since the 1980s. Despite this decline, recent surveys suggest that pro‐union sentiment is rising. Amid workplace inequity and rising public interest in unionization, we draw from research on collectiv…
The misperception of organizational racial progress toward diversity, equity, and inclusion
Despite a checkered racial history, people in the United States generally believe the nation has made steady, incremental progress toward achieving racial equality. In this article, we investigate whether this U.S. racial progress narrative will extend to how the workforce views the effectiveness of organizational efforts surrounding diversity, equity, and inclusion. Across three studies (N = 1,776), we test whether Black and White U.S. workers o…
Social class stigma and poorer health behaviors
How race influences perceptions of objectivity and hiring preferences
Psychological Science Is Not Race Neutral
In their analysis in a previous issue of Perspectives on Psychological Science, Roberts and colleagues argued that the editors, authors, and participants throughout subfields of psychological science are overwhelmingly White. In this commentary, we consider some of the drivers and consequences of this racial inequality. Drawing on race scholarship from within and outside the field, we highlight three phenomena that create and maintain racial ineq…
Framing, Context, and the Misperception of Black–White Wealth Inequality
In one large-scale experiment using U.S. respondents on Mechanical Turk ( N = 2,899), we studied how subtle differences in framing and context impacted estimates of the Black–White wealth gap. Across our 10 different experimental manipulations of framing and context, respondents consistently overestimated Black family wealth relative to White wealth. There was also substantial variation in the magnitude of these wealth estimates, which ranged fro…
Social class predicts preference for competent politicians
Disrupting Beliefs in Racial Progress
Although there has been limited progress toward economic equality between Americans over the past half-century, many Americans are largely unaware of the persistence of economic racial disparities. One intervention for this widespread ignorance is to inform White Americans of the impact of racism on the outcomes of Black Americans. In two studies, we attempted to improve the accuracy of Whites’ perceptions of racial progress and estimates of cont…
Disadvantaged group activists' attitudes toward advantaged group allies in social movements
High-Status Exemplars and the Misperception of the Asian-White Wealth Gap
In this research, we test the central hypothesis that perceptions of Asian Americans as a high-status “model minority” lead to overestimates of the extent of wealth equality between Asian and White Americans. We test this hypothesis across three studies that manipulate the salience of high- or low-status Asian American exemplars before soliciting estimates of Asian-White wealth equality. A meta-analysis of the results revealed that participants s…
Partner Commitment in Close Relationships Mitigates Social Class Differences in Subjective Well-Being
The present exploratory research examined the possibility that commitment in close relationships among lower class individuals, despite greater strains on those relationships, buffers them from poorer subjective well-being (SWB). In two samples of close relationship dyads, we found that when partners reported high commitment to the relationship, the typical deficits in relatively lower class individuals’ well-being compared to their upper-class c…
The association between objective and subjective socioeconomic status and subjective well-being
This meta-analysis tested if the links between socioeconomic status (SES) and subjective well-being (SWB) differ by whether SES is assessed objectively or subjectively. The associations between measures of objective SES (i.e., income and educational attainment), subjective SES (i.e., the MacArthur ladder SES and perceived SES), and SWB (i.e., happiness and life satisfaction) were synthesized across 357 studies, totaling 2,352,095 participants. Ov…
The Misperception of Racial Economic Inequality
Racial economic inequality is a foundational feature of the United States, yet many Americans appear oblivious to it. In the present work we consider the psychology underlying this collective willful ignorance. Drawing on prior research and new evidence from a nationally representative sample of adults ( N = 1,008), we offer compelling evidence that Americans vastly underestimate racial economic inequality, especially the racial wealth gap. In pa…
Dog whistle mascots
In this research we examine how normative expressions of prejudice shape university communities. Across four studies, we examine the prevalence of a former university mascot depicting harmful stereotypes about Native Americans and how exposure to that mascot influences people's attitudes and behaviors. In Study 1, images of the mascot persist on >10% of university apparel worn by students, in 50% of campus spaces, and in 5% of images searched onl…
Americans misperceive racial economic equality
Significance Race-based economic inequality is both a defining and persistent feature of the United States that is at odds with national narratives regarding progress toward racial equality. This work examines perceptions of Black–White differences in economic outcomes, both in the past and present. We find that Americans, on average, systematically overestimate the extent to which society has progressed toward racial economic equality, driven la…
Signs of Social Class
By some accounts, global economic inequality is at its highest point on record. The pernicious effects of this broad societal trend are striking: Rising inequality is linked to poorer health and well-being across countries, continents, and cultures. The economic and psychological forces that perpetuate inequality continue to be studied, and in this theoretical review, we examine the role of daily experiences of economic inequality—the communicati…
Cultural Expressions of Social Class and Their Implications for Group‐Related Beliefs and Behaviors
In the wake of the Great Recession, rising inequality has increased social‐class disparities between people in society. In this research, we examine how differences in social class shape unique patterns of cultural expression, and how these cultural expressions affirm ingroup beliefs. In Study 1 ( N = 113), we provide evidence that cultural expressions of social class on an online social network can signal the social class of targets: by simply v…
Voice-only communication enhances empathic accuracy
This research tests the prediction that voice-only communication increases empathic accuracy over communication across senses. We theorized that people often intentionally communicate their feelings and internal states through the voice, and as such, voice-only communication allows perceivers to focus their attention on the channel of communication most active and accurate in conveying emotions to others. We used 5 experiments to test this hypoth…
Social Class and Prosocial Behavior
Associations between social class and prosocial behavior—defined broadly as action intended to help others—may vary as a function of contextual factors. Three studies examined how making prosocial actions public, versus private, moderates this association. In Study 1, participation in a public prosocial campaign was higher among upper than lower class individuals. In Studies 2 and 3, lower class individuals were more prosocial in a dictator game …
The Emerging Psychology of Social Class
The objective material conditions of our lives shape social perceptions and relationships in fundamental ways. In this essay, I survey research examining the influence of one's social class position in society on basic psychological processes—including conceptions of the self and relationships with others. Insights from this research indicate that relatively lower class individuals are characterized by contextualized selves—selves that are more i…
Americans overestimate social class mobility
In this research we examine estimates of American social class mobility—the ability to move up or down in education and income status. Across studies, overestimates of class mobility were large and particularly likely among younger participants and those higher in subjective social class—both measured (Studies 1–3) and manipulated (Study 4). Class mobility overestimates were independent of general estimation errors (Study 3) and persisted after a…
The Social Ladder
Scholars across the social sciences have studied social class for centuries. In this review, we suggest that social class is a fundamental means by which individuals are ranked on the social ladder of society. A rank-based perspective on social class shines light on several future areas of research: Specifically, understanding how social class ranks individuals vis-à-vis others leads to predictions about how class is signaled in interactions, inf…
A winning smile? Smile intensity, physical dominance, and fighter performance
The smile is perhaps the most widely studied facial expression of emotion, and in this article we examine its status as a sign of physical dominance. We reason, on the basis of prior research, that prior to a physical confrontation, smiles are a nonverbal sign of reduced hostility and aggression, and thereby unintentionally communicate reduced physical dominance. Two studies provide evidence in support of this prediction: Study 1 found that profe…
Social class rank, essentialism, and punitive judgment
Recent evidence suggests that perceptions of social class rank influence a variety of social cognitive tendencies, from patterns of causal attribution to moral judgment. In the present studies we tested the hypotheses that upper-class rank individuals would be more likely to endorse essentialist lay theories of social class categories (i.e., that social class is founded in genetically based, biological differences) than would lower-class rank ind…
Pride displays communicate self-interest and support for meritocracy
The present studies examined how observers infer moral attributes and beliefs from nonverbal pride displays. Pride is a self-focused positive emotion triggered by appraisals of the self's success, status, and competence. We hypothesized that when a target emits nonverbal cues of pride, he or she will be viewed by observers as higher in self-interest and therefore more likely to endorse ideologies that would benefit the self-specifically, merit-ba…
Having less, giving more
Lower social class (or socioeconomic status) is associated with fewer resources, greater exposure to threat, and a reduced sense of personal control. Given these life circumstances, one might expect lower class individuals to engage in less prosocial behavior, prioritizing self-interest over the welfare of others. The authors hypothesized, by contrast, that lower class individuals orient to the welfare of others as a means to adapt to their more …
Social class, sense of control, and social explanation
Lower social class is associated with diminished resources and perceived subordinate rank. On the basis of this analysis, the authors predicted that social class would be closely associated with a reduced sense of personal control and that this association would explain why lower class individuals favor contextual over dispositional explanations of social events. Across 4 studies, lower social class individuals, as measured by subjective socioeco…
Americans overestimate social class mobility
In this research we examine estimates of American social class mobility—the ability to move up or down in education and income status. Across studies, overestimates of class mobility were large and particularly likely among younger participants and those higher in subjective social class—both measured (Studies 1–3) and manipulated (Study 4). Class mobility overestimates were independent of general estimation errors (Study 3) and persisted after a…
The power to be me
Class, chaos, and the construction of community
Chaotic conditions are a prevalent and threatening feature of social life. Five studies examined whether social class underlies divergent responses to perceptions of chaos in one's social environments and outcomes. The authors hypothesized that when coping with perceptions of chaos, lower class individuals tend to prioritize community, relative to upper class individuals, who instead tend to prioritize material wealth. Consistent with these predi…
Social class rank, essentialism, and punitive judgment
Recent evidence suggests that perceptions of social class rank influence a variety of social cognitive tendencies, from patterns of causal attribution to moral judgment. In the present studies we tested the hypotheses that upper-class rank individuals would be more likely to endorse essentialist lay theories of social class categories (i.e., that social class is founded in genetically based, biological differences) than would lower-class rank ind…
Cultural Expressions of Social Class and Their Implications for Group‐Related Beliefs and Behaviors
In the wake of the Great Recession, rising inequality has increased social‐class disparities between people in society. In this research, we examine how differences in social class shape unique patterns of cultural expression, and how these cultural expressions affirm ingroup beliefs. In Study 1 ( N = 113), we provide evidence that cultural expressions of social class on an online social network can signal the social class of targets: by simply v…
Social power facilitates the effect of prosocial orientation on empathic accuracy
Power increases the tendency to behave in a goal-congruent fashion. Guided by this theoretical notion, we hypothesized that elevated power would strengthen the positive association between prosocial orientation and empathic accuracy. In 3 studies with university and adult samples, prosocial orientation was more strongly associated with empathic accuracy when distinct forms of power were high than when power was low. In Study 1, a physiological in…
Disadvantaged group activists' attitudes toward advantaged group allies in social movements
Voice-only communication enhances empathic accuracy
This research tests the prediction that voice-only communication increases empathic accuracy over communication across senses. We theorized that people often intentionally communicate their feelings and internal states through the voice, and as such, voice-only communication allows perceivers to focus their attention on the channel of communication most active and accurate in conveying emotions to others. We used 5 experiments to test this hypoth…
Dog whistle mascots
In this research we examine how normative expressions of prejudice shape university communities. Across four studies, we examine the prevalence of a former university mascot depicting harmful stereotypes about Native Americans and how exposure to that mascot influences people's attitudes and behaviors. In Study 1, images of the mascot persist on >10% of university apparel worn by students, in 50% of campus spaces, and in 5% of images searched onl…
How race influences perceptions of objectivity and hiring preferences
Striving to be known by significant others
Extending research on the automatic activation of goals associated with significant others, the authors hypothesized that self-verification goals typically pursued with significant others are automatically elicited when a significant-other representation is activated. Supporting this hypothesis, the activation of a significant-other representation through priming (Experiments 1 and 3) or through a transference encounter (Experiment 2) led partici…
Pride displays communicate self-interest and support for meritocracy
The present studies examined how observers infer moral attributes and beliefs from nonverbal pride displays. Pride is a self-focused positive emotion triggered by appraisals of the self's success, status, and competence. We hypothesized that when a target emits nonverbal cues of pride, he or she will be viewed by observers as higher in self-interest and therefore more likely to endorse ideologies that would benefit the self-specifically, merit-ba…
Social class stigma and poorer health behaviors
Social class predicts preference for competent politicians
Transference occurs across group boundaries
Signs of Socioeconomic Status
Socioeconomic status (SES) is a primary determinant of health vulnerabilities and social affiliations. To ascertain if SES is signaled in brief patterns of nonverbal behavior, we had participants of varying SES backgrounds engage in a brief interaction with a stranger. Videos of 60-s slices of these interactions were coded for nonverbal cues of disengagement and engagement, and estimates of participants' SES were provided by naive observers who v…
Social class, sense of control, and social explanation
Lower social class is associated with diminished resources and perceived subordinate rank. On the basis of this analysis, the authors predicted that social class would be closely associated with a reduced sense of personal control and that this association would explain why lower class individuals favor contextual over dispositional explanations of social events. Across 4 studies, lower social class individuals, as measured by subjective socioeco…
Striving to be known by significant others
Extending research on the automatic activation of goals associated with significant others, the authors hypothesized that self-verification goals typically pursued with significant others are automatically elicited when a significant-other representation is activated. Supporting this hypothesis, the activation of a significant-other representation through priming (Experiments 1 and 3) or through a transference encounter (Experiment 2) led partici…
Social Class, Contextualism, and Empathic Accuracy
Recent research suggests that lower-class individuals favor explanations of personal and political outcomes that are oriented to features of the external environment. We extended this work by testing the hypothesis that, as a result, individuals of a lower social class are more empathically accurate in judging the emotions of other people. In three studies, lower-class individuals (compared with upper-class individuals) received higher scores on …
Tactile communication, cooperation, and performance
Tactile communication, or physical touch, promotes cooperation between people, communicates distinct emotions, soothes in times of stress, and is used to make inferences of warmth and trust. Based on this conceptual analysis, we predicted that in group competition, physical touch would predict increases in both individual and group performance. In an ethological study, we coded the touch behavior of players from the National Basketball Associatio…
Transference occurs across group boundaries
Having less, giving more
Lower social class (or socioeconomic status) is associated with fewer resources, greater exposure to threat, and a reduced sense of personal control. Given these life circumstances, one might expect lower class individuals to engage in less prosocial behavior, prioritizing self-interest over the welfare of others. The authors hypothesized, by contrast, that lower class individuals orient to the welfare of others as a means to adapt to their more …
The Relational Self
Social Class Rank, Threat Vigilance, and Hostile Reactivity
Lower-class individuals, because of their lower rank in society, are theorized to be more vigilant to social threats relative to their high-ranking upper-class counterparts. This class-related vigilance to threat, the authors predicted, would shape the emotional content of social interactions in systematic ways. In Study 1, participants engaged in a teasing interaction with a close friend. Lower-class participants—measured in terms of social clas…
Social Class as Culture
Social class reflects more than the material conditions of people’s lives. Objective resources (e.g., income) shape cultural practices and behaviors that signal social class. These signals create cultural identities among upper- and lower-class individuals—identities that are rooted in subjective perceptions of social-class rank vis-à-vis others. Empirical studies find that perceptions of social-class rank influence patterns of contextual versus …
Class and compassion
Previous research indicates that lower-class individuals experience elevated negative emotions as compared with their upper-class counterparts. We examine how the environments of lower-class individuals can also promote greater compassionate responding-that is, concern for the suffering or well-being of others. In the present research, we investigate class-based differences in dispositional compassion and its activation in situations wherein othe…
The power to be me
Social power facilitates the effect of prosocial orientation on empathic accuracy
Power increases the tendency to behave in a goal-congruent fashion. Guided by this theoretical notion, we hypothesized that elevated power would strengthen the positive association between prosocial orientation and empathic accuracy. In 3 studies with university and adult samples, prosocial orientation was more strongly associated with empathic accuracy when distinct forms of power were high than when power was low. In Study 1, a physiological in…
The Local-Ladder Effect
Dozens of studies in different nations have revealed that socioeconomic status only weakly predicts an individual’s subjective well-being (SWB). These results imply that although the pursuit of social status is a fundamental human motivation, achieving high status has little impact on one’s SWB. However, we propose that sociometric status—the respect and admiration one has in face-to-face groups (e.g., among friends or coworkers)—has a stronger e…
Social class, solipsism, and contextualism
Social class is shaped by an individual's material resources as well as perceptions of rank vis-à-vis others in society, and in this article, we examine how class influences behavior. Diminished resources and lower rank create contexts that constrain social outcomes for lower-class individuals and enhance contextualist tendencies--that is, a focus on external, uncontrollable social forces and other individuals who influence one's life outcomes. I…
A Road Map for an Emerging Psychology of Social Class
Though the scientific study of social class is over a century old, theories regarding how social class shapes psychological experience are in their infancy. In this review, we provide a road map for the empirical study of an emerging psychology of social class. Specifically, we outline key measurement issues in the study of social class – including the importance of both objective indicators and subjective perceptions of social class – as well as…
Relational Self-verification through Self-presentation
When a significant-other representation is activated, the goal to be known and understood by others—that is, self-verified—is automatically elicited, leading people to desire appraisals from others that verify their pre-existing relational self-conceptions (Kraus & Chen, 2009). The present study tested whether activating a significant-other representation would lead people to engage in behaviors designed to obtain self-verification—namely, presen…
Class, chaos, and the construction of community
Chaotic conditions are a prevalent and threatening feature of social life. Five studies examined whether social class underlies divergent responses to perceptions of chaos in one's social environments and outcomes. The authors hypothesized that when coping with perceptions of chaos, lower class individuals tend to prioritize community, relative to upper class individuals, who instead tend to prioritize material wealth. Consistent with these predi…
The Social Ladder
Scholars across the social sciences have studied social class for centuries. In this review, we suggest that social class is a fundamental means by which individuals are ranked on the social ladder of society. A rank-based perspective on social class shines light on several future areas of research: Specifically, understanding how social class ranks individuals vis-à-vis others leads to predictions about how class is signaled in interactions, inf…
A winning smile? Smile intensity, physical dominance, and fighter performance
The smile is perhaps the most widely studied facial expression of emotion, and in this article we examine its status as a sign of physical dominance. We reason, on the basis of prior research, that prior to a physical confrontation, smiles are a nonverbal sign of reduced hostility and aggression, and thereby unintentionally communicate reduced physical dominance. Two studies provide evidence in support of this prediction: Study 1 found that profe…
Social class rank, essentialism, and punitive judgment
Recent evidence suggests that perceptions of social class rank influence a variety of social cognitive tendencies, from patterns of causal attribution to moral judgment. In the present studies we tested the hypotheses that upper-class rank individuals would be more likely to endorse essentialist lay theories of social class categories (i.e., that social class is founded in genetically based, biological differences) than would lower-class rank ind…
Pride displays communicate self-interest and support for meritocracy
The present studies examined how observers infer moral attributes and beliefs from nonverbal pride displays. Pride is a self-focused positive emotion triggered by appraisals of the self's success, status, and competence. We hypothesized that when a target emits nonverbal cues of pride, he or she will be viewed by observers as higher in self-interest and therefore more likely to endorse ideologies that would benefit the self-specifically, merit-ba…
The Emerging Psychology of Social Class
The objective material conditions of our lives shape social perceptions and relationships in fundamental ways. In this essay, I survey research examining the influence of one's social class position in society on basic psychological processes—including conceptions of the self and relationships with others. Insights from this research indicate that relatively lower class individuals are characterized by contextualized selves—selves that are more i…
Americans overestimate social class mobility
In this research we examine estimates of American social class mobility—the ability to move up or down in education and income status. Across studies, overestimates of class mobility were large and particularly likely among younger participants and those higher in subjective social class—both measured (Studies 1–3) and manipulated (Study 4). Class mobility overestimates were independent of general estimation errors (Study 3) and persisted after a…
Social Class and Prosocial Behavior
Associations between social class and prosocial behavior—defined broadly as action intended to help others—may vary as a function of contextual factors. Three studies examined how making prosocial actions public, versus private, moderates this association. In Study 1, participation in a public prosocial campaign was higher among upper than lower class individuals. In Studies 2 and 3, lower class individuals were more prosocial in a dictator game …
Psychology (41 works) · Social Psychology (39 works) · Social and Intergroup Psychology (28 works) · Cultural Differences and Values (19 works) · Sociology (18 works) · Social class (17 works) · Political science (14 works) · Social and Cultural Dynamics (13 works) · Social Psychology (13 works) · Developmental psychology (12 works)