Testosterone → Status seeking
Higher Testosterone moves Status seeking only in some conditions. Read the mechanism.
In observational samples, testosterone tracks status-seeking mainly when cortisol is low; the interaction is small, heterogeneous, and still contested.
Observational · Contested
Supported by an experiment or a tightly identified design. Read the caveats.
Mechanism
Mehta and Josephs (2010) found that basal testosterone related to dominant leadership and to re-entering a contest only when cortisol was low. High cortisol flattened or reversed the slope. They proposed HPG-HPA crosstalk: glucocorticoids dampen androgen signaling and tilt the animal toward withdrawal under threat. Elahi and Knight (2026) separated opponent status from potential gains and losses in a status contest. Their abstract says testosterone raised sensitivity to opponent status and lowered sensitivity to gains and losses. Cortisol moderated that status-sensitivity effect and separately raised reward sensitivity. The model they test says testosterone raises status-seeking when cortisol is low, and status-loss avoidance when cortisol is high. They also report nonlinear testosterone effects using machine learning. We have the PubMed abstract only; sample size is not listed there. The Geniole meta still finds a small, mixed, publication-bias-sensitive effect.
Caveats
Not an RCT of testosterone. Elahi and Knight (2026) is abstract-only, and PubMed does not report N. The Geniole meta finds a small, heterogeneous effect with publication-bias risk. A lab contest is not organizational power. Labeling this causal_direct is generous: it is the best causal story in the file, not a settled identification. Another observational dual-hormone paper does not settle the interaction.
Effect
qualitative. Interaction: T tracks status-seeking mainly when cortisol is low; opponent status and gain/loss cues split the effect.
Nodes
Named confounders
Cite this page
What Causes What. “Testosterone → Status seeking.” https://whatcauseswhat.org/edges/e-t-status-dual (atlas updated 2026-09-02).
Papers
- Testosterone and cortisol jointly regulate dominance: Evidence for a dual-hormone hypothesis
P. H. Mehta, R. A. Josephs · 2010 · Hormones and Behavior
- The dual-hormone hypothesis: a brief review and future research agenda
P. H. Mehta, S. Prasad · 2015 · Current Opinion in Behavioral Sciences
- Evidence from meta-analyses of the facial width-to-height ratio versus the dual-hormone hypothesis as predictors of status-seeking
S. N. Geniole, T. L. F. McCormick · 2020 · Adaptive Human Behavior and Physiology
- Separable, nonlinear, and interactive effects of testosterone and cortisol during status competition in humans: Evidence for the context-dependent dual hormone hypothesis.
RI Elahi, EL Knight · 2026 · Hormones and behavior