Differences in effect of Height

[differenceblog]

While the effects of physical height on job success for men are well documented, it has been suggested that women would have a ceiling effect on height benefit, being negatively judged as too tall. However, Judge and Cable (2004) found that physical height was related to financial success for both men and women. Effects appeared to be slightly

Comments

[ukelele]

Were those studies broken down by sex? Teaching all boys I definitely see that height matters -- the boys are very aware of and sensitive about it (they compare themselves on every possible metric and height is an obvious one); size in general and height in particular are dominance things; and height is a major plus in most sports, and sports prowess confers social status. But I don't remember these things mattering as much for girls (not teaching any girls it's hard to say but I would expect that height plays a lot less into social status and, insofar as physical development does, it uses other markers). I wonder how much of that difference can be explained solely by the boys.

(And I note that there might be a real phenomenon there, not just a social prejudice about height, in that there are plenty of important social lessons one can learn from sports (so being a good athlete helps you there, and height is part of that), and having high social status (eg due to being a good athlete) is going to teach you a lot of lessons and give you a lot of opportunities that will, perhaps, shape you to have high status in the future. Also, in at least one case, I have seen sheer height and physical development propel a seventh grader into ninth grade social circles (ie the people the same size as him), which may have been a factor in his mind-boggling degree of social and psychological maturation over the last few years.)