Understanding Status: The Science Behind Respect and Influence (And What It Means for Parenting) w/ Professor Alison Fragale
4/3/202649 min
In today’s episode, I sit down with psychologist and professor Alison Fragale to explore the concept of status—what it really means, why the need to be respected is such a fundamental human drive, and how it shapes the way our kids navigate friendships, school, and their broader social world. We talk about how status often shows up differently for girls, the balance between being likable and being confident, and how subtle habits like self-deprecation can influence how our kids see themselves. We discuss a simple, powerful framework for understanding behavior through the lens of warmth and competence, along with practical ways to help kids build confidence, interpret social feedback, and develop relationships rooted in real respect rather than external validation.
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Clips
Transcript preview
First 90 secondsAlison Fragale· Guest0:01
The following podcast is a Dear Media production.
Aliza Pressman· Host0:03
[upbeat music] I learned about status in a completely different way than I understood status to be, and I'm really excited for you to listen to this episode because status is so related to the parent-child relationship, to navigating the social world of adolescence, to understanding our social worlds. It impacts relationships, professions. It's really a big deal. And so teaching our kids how to build status and relationships without chasing external validation, and helping our girls in particular understand why status is harder for daughters than for sons, and just so many interesting conversations in this one discussion with Allison Fragale. She's a business school professor and research psychologist, and I loved, loved this conversation about status. She wrote a book called Likable Badass, and she has studied power, status, and negotiation for over 20 years. I'm Dr. Aliza Pressman, and this is Raising Good Humans podcast. But what I wanted to tell you, which is so bizarre, or such a small world- Yes ... is that I was just, uh, working in Northern California,