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Nice Guys Never Win (Neither Do Mean Girls)
- run4yourlives 15y agoRather than a raving psychopath, a disagreeable person is “more likely than people high in trait agreeableness to behave disagreeably in certain situations by, for instance, aggressively advocating for their position during conflicts (van de Vliert & Euwema, 2004).” In other words, confidence and decisiveness is viewed as an attractive trait in males. Nothing new here really.
- Jun8 15y agoTrue, but if you generalize to managers in corporations you get some interesting insight, which is to my surprise doesn't seem to be known or practiced by some managers. Some managers in large corporations where many different project ideas and proposals compete, are in the mindset of "the good ideas will eventually win over the other ones". Experience (mine at least) have proven time and time again otherwise, the truth is more like the squeaky wheel gets gets the grease: i.e. people who aggressively push their ideas and use political maneuvering almost always (i) have their project funded and (ii) get promoted.
- deleted 15y ago[deleted]
- theaeolist 15y agoAlternative title: successful men are seen as less agreeable.
- __rkaup__ 15y agoMuch better. This has more to do with income than "seduction" theory or whatever.
- pyoung 15y agoA valid point that was brought up in the discussion on the blog: "I’m surprised no one has asked how the studies accounted for survivorship bias. One could easily imagine that while a certain number of, ahem, disagreeable men, stand out and increase their earning, it seems likely that this cohort is also terminated in greater numbers."
- jpdoctor 15y agoBad research, lousy generalizations, and crappy conclusions. > The hypotheses were supported across four studies. I wonder which study Warren Buffet, that disagreeable guy, fell into?
- corin_ 15y agoRegardless of opinion on the quality of the research, how does one person prove anything. What's that quote, "the plural of anecdote isn't data"?
- jpdoctor 15y ago> how does one person prove anything. When the article includes the statement "Nice guys do not necessarily finish last, but they do finish a distant second in terms of earnings", it is a sign of either: 1. Imprecise writing, or 2. Wrong conclusions. If their conclusions are wrong, then the article is a waste of bits. If their writing is imprecise, then just how imprecise are the generalizing statements that cannot be disproved with an obvious counterexample? In either case, the article looks like all noise and no signal to me.
- corin_ 15y agoIf their conclusion is correct (and I have no idea if it is or isn't), the quite obviously that statement is a generalisation, and a perfectly fine use of one too. It quite clearly means "as a general trend", not "in absolutely every case". Did you honestly read that and think "aha, I can think of somebody who doesn't fit that statement, they're clearly wrong"?
- maw 15y agoNo, but the plural of datum is. Datum: Buffett has done rather well for himself. Doesn't show much by itself, but then neither does trotting out an old saw.
- corin_ 15y agoThe fact that it's a much over-used phrase doesn't make it any less correct. The point stands that naming somebody who doesn't fit into research does not disprove it. My dad and I are both smokers, neither of us has lung cancer - I'm still pretty sure there's a link between those two despite by two pieces of datum.
- pasbesoin 15y agoCited study .doc file in Google Docs viewer: http://docs.google.com/gview?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.freakonomics.com%2Fmedia%2FAOM_Beth_Nice%2520v11%2520%282%29.doc http://docs.google.com/gview?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.freakonomi...