Post-fight respect signals valuations of opponent’s fighting performance

The current research explores whether humans process inputs about combat (e.g.,assessments of formidability) that produce outputs of post-fight respect (e.g.,shaking an opponent’s hand when the fight ends). using an online questionnaire (study 1,n = 132),an in-person questionnaire (study 2,n = 131),and an in-lab fight simulation (study 3,n = 58),we investigated whether participants were more likely to receive (studies 1 and 3) and display (studies 2 and 3) post-fight respect as a function of the fight outcome (hypothesis 1),use of fight tactics (hypothesis 2),fighter asymmetries (hypothesis 3),fighter ranking (hypothesis 4),and the presence of witnesses (hypothesis 5). the results support hypotheses 1 to 4 concerning expectations of receiving post-fight respect,and support only hypotheses 2 and 3 concerning displays of post-fight respect. we suggest that post-fight respect signals positive valuations of fighting performance that may function to maintain valuable relationships within the social group. © 2017 by the society for personality and social psychology,inc.