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Socioeconomic Status Shapes Dyadic Interactions: Examining Behavioral and Physiologic Responses
Jacinth J X Tan1, Tessa V West2, Wendy Berry Mendes3
1School of Social Sciences, Singapore Management University.
Psychological Science
|July 14, 2025
Summary
People of lower socioeconomic status (SES) show greater social attunement to partners, regardless of partner
Area of Science:
- Social Psychology
- Sociology
- Behavioral Economics
Background:
- Diverse social interactions are increasing.
- Little is known about social dynamics between different socioeconomic statuses (SES).
Purpose of the Study:
- Investigate social-attunement patterns in dyadic interactions involving differing socioeconomic statuses (SES).
Main Methods:
- Examined physiological linkage during dyadic interactions between similar- and different-SES partners.
- Assessed attunement by measuring how one person's physiological changes predict another's over time.
- Recruited 130 unacquainted adult dyads from a US community.
Main Results:
- Lower-SES participants exhibited stronger physiological linkage, indicating greater attunement, across all SES partners.
- Participants reported greater comfort interacting with lower-SES partners.
- No SES differences in conversational dominance were observed.
- Participants reported higher liking for similar-SES partners post-interaction.
Conclusions:
- Lower-SES individuals appear more other-focused during interactions than higher-SES individuals.
- In-group preference influences social interactions, with individuals tending to prefer partners of similar SES.
- Findings suggest complex attunement dynamics influenced by socioeconomic status.
Keywords:
dyadic interactionperson perceptionphysiologic linkagephysiological reactivitysocioeconomic statusMore Related Videos
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