Standing up straight is low-status, because you’re obviously doing it to make an impression on others—there’s no first-order benefit to yourself.
False. Slouching is a submissive gesture. It is signalling that you are not making a challenge to the more dominant members. Standing up straight but in a relaxed way is higher status. A strong core, head naturally raised, with gender specific variations. Remainder of the body should not be rigid but convey a balance of comfort and control. Gender specific variations tend to emphasize sexual organs in an offhand manner (where the low status signal is the reverse.)
Saying what’s on your mind is high-status, because you’re doing something pleasurable. This signal is most reliable when what you say doesn’t have any intellectual merit.
Agree up to the comma. (The rest varies with context.)
Making an effort to have a pleasant conversation is low-status. It’s high-status to talk about what you care about.
Yes.
Wearing the most comfortable possible clothes is high-status, because you’re clearly benefiting yourself. (Dressing in fashionable clothes is also high-status, through a different inferential pathway.)
I don’t agree with this one. Of the things people care about enough to signal through clothes, comfort tends to be low.
Apologizing is low-status because you’re obviously not doing it for yourself.
I don’t think adding ‘because you’re obviously not doing it for yourself’ aids in understanding the apologizing status-dynamic much...
Blowing your nose is high-status because it’s pleasurable and shows that you aren’t affected enough by others to stop.
You find that pleasurable? (Agree with the ‘affected enough’ part.)
Asking for permission is low-status. Compare: recognizing that proceeding would be pleasurable, and believing that you are immune to any negative consequences.
Pleasure is a distraction again. Just say ‘want’.
Showing off is low-status, because it reveals that the prospect of impressing your peers drives you to do things which aren’t first-order selfish. (Of course, the thing you are showing off might legitimately signal status.)
Insolence: “I want your status but I don’t have it… yet.”
It’s certainly higher status than submissiveness but not as high status as conveying that there isn’t an immediate authority to whom you need to be insolent towards (whether that is because you are granted an acceptably high status through rapport with those above or because you grant it to yourself without a challenge that you accept.)
At the Oxford Union, James Dray (President) wore a hoody to debates (everyone else being in black tie) and slouched in the President’s chair. It made him seem a little aloof and supremely confident.
Similarly, Caesar was excused from standing before the Senate.
(Voted back up towards 0.)
False. Slouching is a submissive gesture. It is signalling that you are not making a challenge to the more dominant members. Standing up straight but in a relaxed way is higher status. A strong core, head naturally raised, with gender specific variations. Remainder of the body should not be rigid but convey a balance of comfort and control. Gender specific variations tend to emphasize sexual organs in an offhand manner (where the low status signal is the reverse.)
Agree up to the comma. (The rest varies with context.)
Yes.
I don’t agree with this one. Of the things people care about enough to signal through clothes, comfort tends to be low.
I don’t think adding ‘because you’re obviously not doing it for yourself’ aids in understanding the apologizing status-dynamic much...
You find that pleasurable? (Agree with the ‘affected enough’ part.)
Pleasure is a distraction again. Just say ‘want’.
More or less.
I can think of times when it would be high-status; namely, if you’re already seen to be high-status, it can show insolence.
Insolence: “I want your status but I don’t have it… yet.”
It’s certainly higher status than submissiveness but not as high status as conveying that there isn’t an immediate authority to whom you need to be insolent towards (whether that is because you are granted an acceptably high status through rapport with those above or because you grant it to yourself without a challenge that you accept.)
At the Oxford Union, James Dray (President) wore a hoody to debates (everyone else being in black tie) and slouched in the President’s chair. It made him seem a little aloof and supremely confident.
Similarly, Caesar was excused from standing before the Senate.