Dominant men make decisions faster

Men who exhibit high social dominance make faster decisions than low-dominance men even outside a social context, finds a large behavioral study from EPFL. Hierarchies exist across all human and animal societies, organized by what behavioral scientists refer to as dominance. Dominant individuals tend to climb higher up the hierarchy ladder of their particular society, earning priority access to resources. But dominance itself depends partly on the ability to make decisions faster than others. This allows the individual to act first in social situations, which might confer an evolutionary advantage. However, behavioral scientists do not know whether dominant individuals show this fast decision-making outside of social contexts. Now, the labs of Carmen Sandi and Michael Herzog at EPFL have carried out a large behavioral study on men to examine this question.