delta male

English

Noun

delta male (plural delta males)

1. A male without an authoritative position or role in social or group hierarchy; commoner
   • 2010, John G., Small Talk: It’s Only My Opinion, page 89:

     The delta male is a highly caring and sensitive man. They are the ones who like to ask you first before going on a head with something, they like your input in everything that goes on in the relationship.

   • 2010, Stewart Lee, How I Escaped My Certain Fate, page 323:

     Scott, who runs the Classic and promotes me here, said I was wrong about the heckler being the alpha male of the sport fan group. He said the alpha male would have money, cars, women and be silent. The heckler was a kind of delta male, the jester to the king alpha male. He would spend his life in the orbit of power, trailing it, circling it, but never achieving it.

   • 2014, R W Docherty, Reaching the Endgame, page 17:

     The Delta male is in fact quite an attraction to certain women. Shyness in a man can be mistaken for the mystique in the Bravo male and can initiate an attraction, which can lead to more.

   • 2020, Abigail Padgett, Blue:

     You're right that Camacho was just a delta male as you call them, but jerks like that are a dime a dozen. They work for somebody for peanuts, do anything, anything they're told, just like BB said.

2. A male animal that ranks fourth in the social hierarchy.
   • 1969, Clarence Ray Carpenter, H. O. Hofer, Proceedings: Behavior, page 33:

     In one multi-male group, the alpha male assumed the aggressive role 45 % of the time, nine times more frequently than the delta male.

   • 2012, Will Self, Great Apes, page 433:

     There was some scrapping between Henry, the stolid Busner beta male, and David, the rather more excitable delta male, but it didn't amount to a fight and fusion quickly emerged

   • 2013, Leonard A. Rosenblum, Primate Behavior: Developments in Field and Laboratory Research, page 354:

     One instance of ejaculation followed an intense grooming sequence between the alpha and delta male in troop II.

Coordinate terms

• alpha female
• beta male
• gamma male
• sigma male
• omega male