Your career might depend on it, but your social class will influence whether you get involved in ‘sucking up’ and ‘slapping down’

Many careers involve a good deal of political gamesmanship – characterised as ‘sucking up’ and ‘slapping down’. But how willing and able are you to do this? A recent study conducted at Stanford University suggests that the answer depends (among other things) on social class. Measuring class is never straightforward, but one of the most widely used measures is this question:

Does at least one of your parents have a university degree? If you answered “yes” then – for the purposes of this exercise, at least – you’re middle class.

If you answered “no”, you’re working class (unless you plan to live off inherited wealth instead; in which case you are probably upper class).

In the same study, participants were told about a fictional company where what you needed most to rise up the ranks was “pragmatic political skill”. They were then asked: “Keeping in mind the things you need to do to get to the top, at which level do you most want to be in this organisation?”

1 Assistant consultant (lowest position)

2 Associate consultant

3 Consultant

4 Senior consultant

5 Managing consultant

6 Principal consultant (highest position)

Working-class participants were less likely to aspire to the highest positions. This wasn’t because they felt that they lacked competence, but playing politics simply wasn’t them. This is bad news for social mobility, which seems to require working-class people to engage in some behaviours that, according to follow-up questions in the study, they found distasteful (but that are second nature to the “sharp-elbowed middle class”).

A fully referenced version of this article is available at benambridge.com. Order Psy-Q by Ben Ambridge (Profile Books, £8.99) for £6.99 at bookshop.theguardian.com