Graded Status in Expectation State Theories

Status differences in expectation states theories are traditionally treated as binary, demarcating only low and high statuses. But some status differences, such as education, can have many discrete states. In this chapter the authors review the empirical evidence suggesting that, when available, humans do respond to not just differences in kind, but also differences in magnitude. The authors also describe existing methods for capitalizing on this quantitative information in order to make more precise theoretical and mathematical predictions. The two methods reviewed enable researchers to generate fine-grained predictions based on subtle status information as well as explicit quantitative information. They also discuss new developments in the expectation states tradition and how they align with conceptualizing status characteristics as graded or having more than two ordered states.