Arrogant or self-confident? The use of contextual knowledge to differentiate hubristic and authentic pride from a single nonverbal expression

Abstract

Two studies tested whether observers could differentiate between two facets of pride—authentic and hubristic—on the basis of a single prototypical pride nonverbal expression combined with relevant contextual information. In Study 1, participants viewed targets displaying posed pride expressions in response to success, while causal attributions for the success (target's effort vs. ability) and the source of this information (target vs. omniscient narrator conveying objective fact) were varied. Study 2 used a similar method, but attribution information came from both the target and an omniscient narrator; the congruence of these attributions was varied. Across studies, participants tended to label expressions as authentic pride, but were relatively more likely to label them as hubristic pride when (a) contextual information indicated that targets were arrogant and (b) no mitigating information about the target's potential value as a hard-working group member (i.e., that success was actually due to effort) was presented.

Keywords:

• Authentic pride
• Hubristic pride
• Emotion recognition
• Context
• Causal attributions

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

We wish to acknowledge the generous support of the Social Science and Humanities Research Council of Canada, Standard Research Grant #410-2009-2458, and a Michael Smith Foundation for Health Research Scholar Award [CI-SCH-01862(07-1)].

Notes

¹In previous research, we labelled the first facet “authentic” to emphasise that it is based on actual accomplishments and accompanied by genuine feelings of self-worth (Tracy & Robins, 2007a). However, as we noted at the time, this label should not be taken to imply that hubristic pride is not an authentic emotional experience. Rather, the elicitors of hubristic pride may be more loosely tied to actual accomplishments, and involve a self-evaluative process that reflects a less authentic sense of self (e.g., distorted and self-aggrandised self-views); yet, both facets are likely to be equally authentic (i.e., “real”) emotional experiences.

²We did not test for gender effects, because we lacked sufficient statistical power to perform the necessary tests to fully interpret any significant results (e.g., any participant gender effects would be difficult to interpret without testing for target gender effects and participant–target interactions.). There were no effects of success domain in either study.

³A one-tailed test was justified here, given the clear, unidirectional prediction based on previous research.