Perceived mobility makes people pursue the status forms they lack

Evidence

At the same time, social mobility always appears to be possible, making us feel responsible for our own status. Folk wisdom asserts we can improve our lot in life by cleaning up, going back to school, being nicer, getting a better job, putting in longer hours, and practice, practice, practice. We’re told virtue leads to a greater accumulation of capital. And so we are unlikely to feel fated to the status level we have at any particular time. Even the highest-ranking individuals often seek to achieve more. Those with high educational capital want economic capital. Those with high economic capital want social capital and political capital. In the 1960s many young people from Old Money families, like Edie Sedgwick, who possessed “inherited wealth, inherited beauty, and inherited intelligence,” rushed to New York City to obtain the one thing they lacked: fame. — W. David Marx, Status and Culture, 91

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Beliefs about social permeability, not objective structure, shape whether people pursue mobility or change — John T. Jost and Jim Sidanius, Political Psychology: Key Readings, 2680; Mixed individuals often fall back on individual mobility rather than collective status strategies — Anna X. Huang, Jacqueline M. Chen, and Juliane Degner, Being One or the Other, Both or…, 71; High relational mobility makes people shift group loyalty opportunistically with status (+5 more)

Broader Connections

• Beliefs about social permeability, not objective structure, shape whether people pursue mobility or change #expands (0.88) — John T. Jost and Jim Sidanius, Political Psychology, 2680
• Mixed individuals often fall back on individual mobility rather than collective status strategies #exemplifies (0.82) — Anna X. Huang, Jacqueline M. Chen, and Juliane Degner, Being One or the Other, Both or Neither, 71
• Low-status individuals seek local status in splinter groups while still competing globally #exemplifies (0.80) — W. David Marx, Status and Culture, 305
• High relational mobility makes people shift group loyalty opportunistically with status #expands (0.78)
• Status seeking acts as an invisible hand generating culture #expands (0.76) — W. David Marx, Status and Culture, 25
• Mixed-identity individuals cannot pursue collective status mobility without being accepted as group members #complicates (0.74) — Anna X. Huang, Jacqueline M. Chen, and Juliane Degner, Being One or the Other, Both or Neither, 70
• Guaranteed equal opportunity converts social mobility into perceived competition #qualifies (0.72)
• People trade off imitation against distinction based on their status position #expands (0.72) — W. David Marx, Status and Culture, 182