The price of power

If you want wisdom it is hard to go past the lyrics of glam rock bands of the 1980s. Sure the ancient Greeks threw up a philosopher or two and Europe in the 19th century bred a couple of reasonable thinkers but searing insights like “love is like oxygen” and “doo-doo doo doo da-da da da” are hard to surpass . Perhaps one of the truly wise observations of 1980s pop though was made by British duo Tears for Fears when they wrote, “everybody wants to rule the world”. Maybe we do all want power but a new study has highlighted that a slight change in aspiration might be good for you.

It is undeniable that being a leader has its advantages. All manner of things are more likely to be done as you like them when you are a leader but that comes at a price according to Princeton University researchers.

To establish this the researchers examined baboons who not only look quite a bit like some humans but have similar social structures. Over a 40 year period data has been collected from a group of baboons living in Kenya. For nine of those years the researchers collected foecal samples from the baboons and tested them for levels of glucocorticoid hormones and testosterone. Both of these hormones are elevated under stress.

The sheer volume of the data available makes this study possibly one of the most complete of any non-human primate group and allowed the researchers to precisely determine what it was that was impacting hormone levels.

The results showed that alpha males, the leaders of the group, had much higher stress hormone levels than beta males who were directly below them in the hierarchy. This was true even during periods of peace and social stability within the baboon group.

So while alpha males might have advantages in terms of getting their own way and even in reproduction this comes at the cost of increased stress and stress is not good for health. It is likely that the stress comes from having to maintain a position at the top and the researchers say that what is true for baboons is also probably true for humans.

So while it might be wonderful to live in big white houses and have a press throng hang on your every word , having to grapple with debt ceilings, carbon taxes, and potential overthrow might eat away at your inner wellbeing. Perhaps being CEO isn’t all it’s cracked up to be and middle management might be a boon (or is that a baboon?) after all.

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