Social status is a complex and multifaceted concept, and at the core of social inequality. It is used to describes a persons’ social standing based on income and occupation; to emphasize status distinctions in lifestyles; or in evaluating the prestige of a person or a position. It concerns both ascribed status (referring to attributes such as sex, race, ethnicity or age), and achieved status (describing accomplishments in e.g. education, career, ownership). Despite this complexity, in everyday life and in different ways, we take a stand on people’s social status based on a variety of status criteria: the car we drive, the type of housing and the neighbourhood we live in, the clothes we wear, the food we eat and the restaurants we visit, the places we travel to and the experiences we make. All these everyday elements are assessed and valued in terms of status.

Drawing on a survey questionnaire, in which about 1600 Swedes were asked to rate the importance of 14 common status criterion, this study explores the concept of social status and whether and whether women and men are attributed status through different status criteria. These research questions are addressed: What criteria are important for social status? Do status criteria differ depending on whether it is a woman or a man? What variations in perceptions of status criteria are there for a woman's and a man's social status, and how can variations be explained?

The analysis showed some tendencies of attributing a lager number of factors for a woman´s social status than for a man´s, indicating that it takes a little more for a woman to be attributed status. Moreover, that economic resources seemed to be more important for men’s social status, whereas criteria associated with social and cultural resources seemed to be more important for women.