Show Me More! Powerlessness Drives Variety Seeking

People play different power roles every day. A stern boss who runs a company may be a docile son in the presence of his parents; a tender wife at home can turn into a tough professor when supervising her students. The rapid switch of power state leads to an interesting and important research question, i.e., the downstream consequences of power on human behaviors. Yet, little research speaks to the potential effect of power on variety seeking behavior, leaving an intriguing question unexplored. We propose that feeling powerless will enhance variety-seeking behavior and that need for autonomy accounts for this effect. Prior research provides initial theoretical support for these hypotheses. For example, researchers consistently find that feeling powerless is aversive (e.g., Keltner, Gruenfeld, and Anderson 2003; Rucker and GalinskY 2008). In particular, Lammers et al. (2016) show that powerless experiences threaten individuals’ perceived autonomy and freedom. Furthermore, Levav and Zhu (2009) document that freedom deprivation leads to variety seeking. We conducted five studies to test these hypotheses.