Power posing: the hormone-and-risk claim lacks robust support

Our assessment

Not robustly supported

The original experiment

Carney, Cuddy and Yap randomly assigned 42 participants to expansive or contractive postures. Participants held two poses for one minute each, provided saliva samples, made a gambling choice and reported feelings of power. The paper concluded that pose condition changed testosterone, cortisol and risk tolerance, alongside subjective power. Random assignment was a useful design feature, but a small study can still produce unstable effect estimates. Our assessment concerns this specific endocrine-and-risk package, not whether posture can ever affect experience or communication. [1]

What the larger replication found

Ranehill and colleagues studied 200 participants with experimenters blind to pose condition. They did not find significant hormone or risk-taking effects, while reproducing an effect on self-reported power. This was a conceptual replication: pose duration and instructions differed. They also disclosed increasing the sample after the first 100 observations. These qualifications deserve attention, but they do not turn the absent endocrine results into confirmation. A subjective response is a different endpoint from a salivary hormone change or gambling behavior. [2]

Analytical fragility

Credé and Phillips reanalyzed the original results using plausible alternative choices about outliers, outcome specification and control variables. Their 2017 paper found hormone-effect conclusions highly sensitive to those choices. This is evidence about robustness, not proof of intent or a demonstration that a particular analyst knowingly selected a preferred answer. A persuasive result should not depend heavily on one defensible analysis when other reasonable analyses produce a different conclusion. That issue independently lowers the methods assessment, rather than merely counting a failed replication twice. [3]

The follow-up record is not uniformly null

Barel and colleagues' 2024 experiment enrolled 92 young adults. It did not reproduce the testosterone or felt-power findings, while reporting partial support involving cortisol and risk-taking. The distinction is important: its discussion describes an association between cortisol changes and risk-taking, while its main hormonal analysis did not find a significant time-by-pose effect for cortisol. An association within the follow-up analysis does not establish that the pose manipulation reliably caused the original hormone-and-behavior package. The authors themselves frame their findings cautiously. This review includes that mixed result rather than claiming every later experiment found nothing. [4]

Editorial judgment

Taken together, the selected evidence does not justify presenting a brief power pose as a dependable way to alter testosterone, suppress cortisol and raise risk tolerance. The low grade is attached to that conjunctive claim. It is not a judgment about any author's character, a diagnosis of misconduct, or a verdict on all research involving body posture. The appropriate uncertainty is narrower than either popular enthusiasm or a blanket dismissal: subjective effects and specific contextual effects need their own endpoints and evidence. This site did not collect new participants, recompute the datasets or conduct a systematic meta-analysis. The score records a reasoned assessment of the cited studies, with room for revision if stronger directly relevant evidence appears.

Documented problems & their consequences

How we reached the grade

What this review does not establish

Selected primary studies, not a complete systematic review. The grade is confined to the endocrine/risk claim and does not decide all subjective posture effects. Replication protocols differ; a nonsignificant result does not prove a mathematical zero effect.

The evidence over time

1. 2010-09-20

   Original power-posing article published online.

2. 2015-03-25

   Ranehill replication first published online, according to the publisher record.

3. 2017-06-19

   Credé and Phillips publish the analytical-robustness reanalysis.

4. 2024-12-05

   Barel and colleagues publish a follow-up with mixed endocrine results.