Leading through gaze: Enhanced social attention in high-rank members of a large-scale organization

Human attention is naturally directed where others are looking. Primate research indicates that this phenomenon is influenced by the social rank of the gazer. Whether this applies to human societies remains underexplored. Diverging from the typical approach based on transient social rank manipulations in convenience samples, we tested low- and high-rank individuals permanently working in a large-scale organization. Participants executed saccades toward positions matching or not the gaze direction of distractor faces varying in dominance level (low, neutral, and high). The analysis of saccadic reaction time revealed that high-rank participants were more interfered by face distractors, regardless of dominance. Our results suggest that an important feature of leadership is related to the fine-tuning of social attention. These findings not only contribute to understanding how hierarchical rank shapes social cognition but also have implications for organizational behavior and leadership training strategies.