Group dominance in hierarchy-attenuating and hierarchy-enhancing organizations: The role of social dominance orientation, need for cognitive closure, and power tactics in a person–environment (mis)fit perspective

We examined, in different work organizations, how subordinates high in social dominance orientation (SDO; individual desire to sustain group-based hierarchies) and in need for cognitive closure (NFCC, an individual's epistemic motivation to avoid uncertainty) comply with harsh power tactics as means to sustain asymmetrical intergroup relationships. We studied the interaction between SDO and NFCC in two organizations that differentially endorse hierarchy-attenuating and hierarchy-enhancing legitimizing myths. We compared the condition of person-environment (P-E) misfit in which subordinates high in SDO work for a hierarchy-attenuating organization and the condition of P-E fit where subordinates high in SDO work for a hierarchy-enhancing organization. We recruited participants from a hierarchy attenuating organization (N = 174) and another hierarchy-enhancing organization (N = 112). The study's variables were measured through an anonymous self-report questionnaire. A three-way interaction analysis confirmed our hypothesis. The simple-slope analysis revealed that the association between the subordinates' SDO and harsh power tactics only occurs in the hierarchy-attenuating (vs. hierarchy enhancing) organization at the conditional level of high (vs. low) NFCC. Since high-NFCC subordinates search for the attainment of cognitive closure, they attempt to solve the uncertainty of the P-E misfit trough the compliance with harsh power tactics, according to their desire to maintain stable intergroup hierarchies (e.g., high SDO).