What do people desire in others? A sociofunctional perspective on the importance of different valued characteristics.

TLDR

Humans frequently judge others’ suitability for interdependent social relations, yet existing research offers limited insight into this process. The study aims to identify which characteristics of others guide judgments of suitability for interdependent social relations, hypothesizing that trustworthiness and cooperativeness are universally valued while other traits vary by context. The authors conducted three studies in which participants evaluated the importance of various traits for ideal members of interdependent groups and relationships, guided by a sociofunctional framework. Across studies, trustworthiness emerged as universally critical for interdependent others, cooperativeness showed mixed importance, and other traits were valued mainly in relation to the specific group or relationship context, underscoring trust as the foundation of human sociality and validating the proposed framework.

Abstract

Humans, as discriminately social creatures, make frequent judgments about others' suitability for interdependent social relations. Which characteristics of others guide these judgments and, thus, shape patterns of human affiliation? Extant research is only minimally useful for answering this question. On the basis of a sociofunctional analysis of human sociality, the authors hypothesized that people highly value trustworthiness and (to a lesser extent) cooperativeness in others with whom they may be interdependent, regardless of the specific tasks, goals, or functions of the group or relationship, but value other favorable characteristics (e.g., intelligence) differentially across such tasks, goals, or functions. Participants in 3 studies considered various characteristics for ideal members of interdependent groups (e.g., work teams, athletic teams) and relationships (e.g., family members, employees). Across different measures of trait importance and different groups and relationships, trustworthiness was considered extremely important for all interdependent others; the evidence for the enhanced importance of cooperativeness across different interdependence contexts was more equivocal. In contrast, people valued other characteristics primarily as they were relevant to the specific nature of the interdependent group or relationship. These empirical investigations illuminate the essence of human sociality with its foundation of trust and highlight the usefulness of a theoretically derived framework of valued characteristics.