Social Hierarchies In Rock Climbing Gym

This study explores social hierarchies among students within a southern Californian university’s rock climbing gym. Communication, ability and personality differ among the climbers in regards to climbing, especially between the top roping area and the bouldering area of the rock gym, but play an important role in the interactions that occur. In particular, this study examines the factors of social hierarchy within the rock gym, and for what reason this type of power structure exists.
The sport of climbing has grown in popularity over the past few years, with the number of people becoming involved in this technical sport constantly increasing. Indoor rock climbing gyms are becoming readily available in many cities across the US, and magazines,

such as Sports Illustrated, have been paying more attention to this sport. As interest in the sport grows, it is interesting to see the climbers who have been climbing since they were young, interact and communicate among the “newbies,” as they input themselves into the new environment. This particular gym is open to every student enrolled at the university, allowing access to over twenty thousand people, which includes both the experienced climbers with excellent ability and communication skills, and the new climbers with no ability. With this type of accessibility, climbers range from experienced to beginner, male to female, upper to lower class, and across many races, which allows for an extensive study on what creates hierarchies within the gym.
Communication is also a relatively new field of study, yet has become prominent in this day in age through both verbal and nonverbal communication. Carmen Preja gives a particularly interesting account of verbal and nonverbal communication within sports in general, arguing communication within certain cultures are socialized and culturally constructed. Because this current study focuses on rock gyms in particular, Carmen’s work provides further evidence on communication’s ability to make a person feel comfortable in their environment. David Llewellyn and Xavier Sanchez challenge the notion that a homogeneity exists within a risk taking population and that this personality trait transfers to the types of sports a person may seek, by studying a rock climbing population. Personality also plays a huge part in the comfortability of a person, and transcends through the boundaries of hierarchy if allowed to do so.