Angry Men Are More Influential Than Angry Women

Do you know that if you are a man chances are high that you use your anger to influence others? If you are a woman then when you get angry, you actually lose your influence over others. This has been revealed in a new study focused on jury consideration behaviours.

Co-author Jessica Salerno of the Arizona State University said that their study suggested that women might not have the same opportunity to influence when they express anger.

The study featured 210 jury eligible undergraduates who viewed a 17-minute presentation that was based on evidence from a real case in which a man was tried for murdering his wife.

Participants read summaries of the opening and closing statements and eyewitness testimonies. They also viewed photographs of the crime scene and the alleged murder weapon.

All participants read essentially the same arguments, but for some, the points were made with anger, others were made in the spirit of fear and the rest were conveyed in an emotionally neutral tone.

The researchers stated that participants' confidence in their own verdict dropped significantly after male holdouts expressed anger, adding that participants became significantly more confident in their original verdicts after female holdouts expressed anger, even though they were expressing the exact same opinion and emotion as the male holdouts.

Salerno said that their results had implications for any woman who was trying to exert influence on a decision in their workplace and everyday lives, including governing bodies, task forces and committees.

She concluded that the results from this study suggested that if female political candidates express their opinion with anger, during the debates for example, it was possible that they might have less influence than if they do not express with anger.

The study is published in the Journal Law and Human Behavior.

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