The Psychological Architecture of Social Hierarchies
Some people are driven to flatten hierarchies while others work to protect them. This session explores Social Dominance Theory, which explains how individual dominance orientations shape ideology, policy, and institutional practices that sustain group-based inequality. We will examine the psychological drivers of hierarchy maintenance, how dominance-based narratives normalize prejudice, and how to challenge these patterns.
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Understand how power, ideology, and identity sustain social hierarchies
🧠 Social Dominance Orientation
🧠 Psychology of Political Attitudes
🧠 Individual Differences
☑️ Define social dominance orientation
☑️ Learn how hierarchy-supporting narratives gain traction
☑️ Recognize the emotional roots of status threat and group-based bias
☑️ Explore strategies to confront dominance without reinforcing polarization
You’re navigating status-based resistance
Conversations about equity are causing defensiveness or backlash
Civic Educators
Who want clearer frameworks for explaining how power, policy, and belief systems sustain social hierarchies
Policymakers
Seeking insight into how institutional norms reproduce unequal access and status-based outcomes
Political Campaigners
Who need ways to challenge hierarchy without triggering in-group defensiveness or polarization
DEI Teams
Looking to understand why equity efforts meet resistance – and how dominance ideology operates beneath the surface