Coercive Power and Reward Power: Personal Versus Impersonal Forms
In our original statement, we considered coercive and reward power in terms of tangible rewards and real physical threats: threats of being fired or fined, promises of monetary rewards and bonuses or promotion within an organization, etc. However, it should be clear that personal approval from someone whom we like can result in quite powerful reward power; and a threat of rejection or disapproval from someone whom we value highly can serve as a source for powerful coercive power. Considering personal, as well as impersonal, forms of reward and coercion helped us to understand certain forms of influence that had previously been inappropriately categorized as referent power (which also depends on the target's evaluating the influencing agent positively).

Legitimate Power: Position, Reciprocity, Equity, Responsibility
Legitimate power is based on a structural relationship between the influencing agent and the target. Implicitly, or explicitly, the agent says, "I have a right to ask you to do this and you have an obligation to comply." Thus terms such as "obliged" or "obligated," "should," "ought to," "required to" may signal the use of legitimate power. Legitimate power is most obvious when it is based on some formal structure - a supervisor or a higher ranking military officer influencing a subordinate, what Cialdini (1988) has called "authority pressure," and what others (e.g., Etzioni, 1961) have called "position power." The strength of such legitimate power, when used by an experimenter to influence a subject, is demonstrated all too vividly in Milgram's (1974) classic study of obedience. That is the way we originally conceived of legitimate power. However, we have had to recognize that there are other forms of legitimate power that may be more subtle, that draw on other social norms.

Legitimate power of reciprocity. "I did that for you, so you should feel obliged to do to this for me" (Gouldner, 1960). The obligation to return a favor, even an unsolicited favor, has been demonstrated experimentally (Goranson & Berkowitz, 1966; Regan, 1971).

Legitimate power of equity. "I have worked hard and suffered, so it is only fair that you should do something which I ask of you," or "You have not listened to me in the past. . .," or "You have done things which caused pain or difficulty for me, so you should feel obliged to do what I ask to compensate for this" (Walster, Walster, & Berscheid, 1978; this might also be referred to as a "compensatory norm").

Legitimate power of responsibility or dependence. According to this norm, we have some obligation to help others who cannot help themselves, or others who are dependent upon us (Berkowitz & Daniels, 1963; this form of legitimate power has sometimes been referred to as the "power of the powerless"). The supervisor could conceivably say, "Look, I am not about to force you to follow my method, but it is absolutely essential to me that you do so in order to get the job done this way. I really depend upon you to do this for me."

We might note that particularly with regard to legitimate power of reciprocity, equity, and responsibility, failure to adhere to these norms is often accompanied by feelings of guilt, and this will become particularly relevant as we see these bases of power utilized in a religious context.