%0 Journal Article
%T Who Belongs? How Status Influences the Experience of Gemeinschaft
%A Cary Beckwith
%J Social Psychology Quarterly
%@ 1939-8999
%D 2019
%R 10.1177/0190272518811812
%X Belonging is a central human aspiration, one that has drawn attention from sociologists and social psychologists alike. Who is likely to realize this aspiration? This paper addresses that question by examining how ¡°we-feeling¡±¡ªthe experience of gemeinschaft¡ªis distributed within small groups. Previous research has argued that the feeling of belonging is positively related to a person¡¯s social status through a cumulative advantage process. But high status can recast the responsibilities of group life as burdens if a person regards them as incongruent with his or her rank, and this can dim one¡¯s feelings toward the group. This paper proposes that a ¡°high-status penalty¡± diminishes we-feeling for high-ranking individuals, thereby concentrating we-feeling in the middle of a status hierarchy. It tests this theory using data from the Urban Communes Project, a survey of 60 naturally occurring communities. The findings suggest that status-incongruent responsibilities can suppress the benefits of status at the top of a hierarchy
%K belonging
%K communes
%K gemeinschaft
%K small groups
%K status
%K we-feeling
%U https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/0190272518811812