How to be Popular (and Why it Might not Matter)

I am sorry to hear that you do because in actuality it is the most "popular" people who are at higher risk for a range of negative life outcomes. But you should know that you are in good company. Many of us feel that way because we are biologically created to care about what others think about us, - quite acutely in adolescence especially - and most high schools create a crucible where the consequences of being lower in status-forms of popularity are made especially salient. As we grow up, neuroscience research suggests that we call forth those old memories far more than we ever realize to compare current and evaluate our social experiences. In other words, we are kind of reliving our high school days all the time, at least a little, and that adolescent version of ourselves is still affecting who we think we are today. But now that you know, you can override this by testing whether you are seeing the world through your 14 year old eyes, or taking it in based on who you really are today.

It does, far more than we think, which is why it is so unfortunate that we don't explicitly talk about and teach social skills in most schools. But the type of popularity we are talking about really matters, because our likeability leads to positive outcomes and our status popularity leads to negative outcomes even decades later. Psychologists consider our social interactions to involve a deeply intertwined product of what we observe, what we think, and how we behave all informed by our past experiences. Research shows that every social cue we see (or don't notice) every day, the way we think about what we have observed, and the way we respond to it all ties back quite predictably to what our experiences with peers were as a child. We can change it, and we can improve ourselves, but we have to start by talking about how important popularity is.

Get off your phone when near your kids - it teaches them what you value in social relationships. And today more than ever, kids need to learn that the world values people who are likeable - caring, empathic, kind, and inclusive. Parents must work to counteract the very explicit message kids are getting today that suggests that our worth is measured in the number of our likes and followers, and our impact is only as important as our fame, visibility, or status. Teach kids about both kinds of popularity, and which one matters. Teach them how to be likeable. And reward them when they focus on making others feel happy, valued, and included.

Facial attractiveness (which has a lot to do with facial symmetry and "averageness") is remarkably related to both likeability and status popularity. Body attractiveness (which often refers to similarity to highly unrealistic societally-promoted body ideals) is most closely associated with status popularity only. Through a complex cycle, research shows that attractive people are treated differently - even by infants - and each new interaction offers new opportunities to learn, grow, develop, etc until there may be true differences in the skills/abilities (including social skills) of some attractive people compared to the rest of us. So, that's another reason to feel resentful!

It used to be that after high school, many went to college or work which provided a great reset button on our social lives. We entered new communities that cared more about our likeability than our status. That is different today more than ever before in the history of our species. We now have a virtual high school with popularity metrics that we see each time we log into our social media profiles, and we are pushed to continually seek status long after we should. That's a problem. Caring about our likeability, however, is not. Being likeable is not about being at the whim of other's needs - it's about forming supportive, inclusive relationships and that is critically important for our psychological and physical well-being for our entire life.

Absolutely! It's a bit complex to get into in full detail here, but the process requires us to confront what biases and behaviors we developed as kids based on our experiences with peers, and then a careful self-assessment of the ways that is influencing us today. Are we still seeing others as hostile towards us when maybe they are not? Do we still anticipate we will be rejected, more than is likely to actually happen? How is that changing our behavior and how is it affecting even our non-verbal behaviors in ways that are remarkably contagious and surprisingly influential in our relationships?

It often will, which is why we must create environments that reward what we value as a community. Interestingly, in our research we studied correlates of likeability and status popularity in the USA and China. In both countries, aggressive behavior was related to lower likeability. But in the USA, aggression was related to higher status popularity, and in China aggression was related to lower status popularity. The results nicely demonstrate that we can influence predictors of popularity by what we explicitly state we value in our homes, classrooms, and communities.

About 60,000 years ago, humans developed a dependency on one another. Our species (unlike other human-like species) communicated and worked together to keep each other fed, safe, and to work cooperatively. Soon, our bodies adapted to prepare us for imminent injury or illness when we became ostracized from our social group. That's why even today, our brains react to social rejection in many of the same ways we respond to physical pain - with a warning and alert system to make us change our behavior. And dormant DNA is expressed following social rejection too in ways that may protect our health if we lived millennia ago, but today instead can create risks for depression instead.

Our likeability reflects how much people enjoy spending time with us, experience positive affect/emotions and feel good about themselves when with us. Our status reflects how much we are powerful, dominant, visible (i.e., everyone knows who we are), and influential. We are all built to care what others think about us, and in adolescence (and these days long afterwards thanks to social media) we are pushed towards status-seeking in particular. But beware - likeability predicts good life outcomes, and status leads us to poorer outcomes.