Feenstra Sanne, Begeny Christopher T, Jordan Jennifer, Ryan Michelle K, Stoker Janka I, Rink Floor A
Department of Experimental and Applied Psychology, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, Amsterdam, Netherlands.
Department of Psychology, University of Exeter, Exeter, United Kingdom.
Front Psychol. 2022 Dec 15;13:931314. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2022.931314. eCollection 2022.
More and more women are breaking the glass ceiling to obtain positions of power. Yet with this rise, some women experience threats to their power. Here we focus on women's perceived threats to the stability of their power and the degree to which women feel they do not deserve their power positions, as reflected in their impostor feelings. The present research identifies key workplace characteristics that are associated with these internalized power threats with survey data collected among 185 women in high-power positions. We find that negative workplace experiences (i.e., gender discrimination, denigrating treatment, lack of cultural fit, and lack of mentoring) are associated with a greater sense of power threat, which in turn relates to adverse workplace outcomes (i.e., reduced job satisfaction and increased emotional exhaustion and opting-out intentions). With this unique sample of high-powered women, our findings help illustrate the forces that make women experience power as precarious, thereby shedding light on the disadvantages these women face. We provide suggestions on how to reduce women's internalized power threats.
越来越多的女性正在打破职场天花板，获得权力职位。然而，随着这种情况的增加，一些女性感受到了对其权力的威胁。在这里，我们关注女性对自身权力稳定性的感知威胁，以及女性认为自己不配拥有权力职位的程度，这体现在她们的冒名顶替感中。本研究通过对185名担任高权力职位的女性收集的调查数据，确定了与这些内化权力威胁相关的关键工作场所特征。我们发现，负面的工作场所经历（即性别歧视、诋毁性待遇、文化不契合以及缺乏指导）与更强的权力威胁感相关，而这反过来又与不良的工作场所结果（即工作满意度降低、情绪耗竭增加以及离职意愿）相关。通过这个独特的高权力女性样本，我们的研究结果有助于说明使女性将权力视为不稳定的因素，从而揭示这些女性所面临的劣势。我们提供了关于如何减少女性内化权力威胁的建议。
