Going at it alone: Zero-sum beliefs inhibit help-seeking

Abstract

What inhibits people from asking for help? Four studies of fully employed British and American participants (N = 1973, including three pre-registered studies) document the negative effect of lay beliefs about status on help-seeking. Specifically, I find that zero-sum beliefs about status—the belief that one employee's success comes at other employees' expense—discourage people from asking their colleagues for help with work-related problems. The more people view success at their workplace as zero-sum, the less they ask their colleagues for help. Moreover, I find that zero-sum beliefs causally reduce help-seeking and that this is due to people's skepticism about their colleagues' willingness to help (and, to a lesser extent, to their fear that asking for help would harm their status). The paper concludes with a discussion of how zero-sum beliefs can shape people's interactions with their peers and colleagues.