Developmental psychology - Week 10

Self and Emotion

Socialisation and Self

Sense of self - Goal-directed actions and theory of mind. We aren’t born with self-concept because the self is a product of social experiences.

The “I” is the self as a creative subject (unsocialized self), whereas the “Me” is the self as a reflexive object (learned behaviors). - George Mead (1863, 1931).

Socialization develops the sense of self.

Self-concept

It is the general term for how people think about themselves—i.e., their identity. It can encompass appearance, personality, ability, gender, etc.

Implicit self - the awareness of self is distinct from the surrounding world, physical and emotional.

Looking glass self - a child’s self-concept is largely determined by the ways other people respond to him or her (Cooley, 1902)

Infants gradually start to distinguish themselves from the external environment over the first 2-6 months. Development continues into age 4-5 and beyond. Self development is a continuous process.

Self-recognition

The ability to recognise oneself in a mirror or photograph. A conceptual system made up of one’s thoughts and attitudes about oneself. 18–24-month-old toddlers display true self recognition, which depends on cognitive development & social experiences

The mirror test

It was done in Amsterdam (1972). The approximate timeline: 6-12 months—it's another baby! (Yay! Playmate!). 13-20 months - feeling shy. Self conscious? 20-24 - It’s me!!

Critique: small sample size, only 4 infants in each age group. Also, children might not have ever seen a mirror before or play in front of one veryday.

Lewis & Brooks-Gunn (1978, 1979)

They examined mirror behaviour in 9-24-month-old infants (a larger sample than Amsterdam). They observed ‘nose directed behaviour’ in front of a mirror before and after the red spot was placed on the nose; this was never observed prior to 15 months. Suggests that self awareness develops from 15-24 months.

Categorising the self

The continued development of the self is evident through language. It takes social experiences and cognitive development to become self-aware.

By 2 years old, toddlers use personal pronouns to refer to the self. - I me, my, mine.

Preschoolers’ self-concept is very concrete and physical. - Their self description is usually based on physical appearance, possessions, typical activities or skills. Examples: ‘I’m THIS big!’, ‘I have a puppy’, I go to preschool’, I can tie my own shoes’.

Young children are less likely to mention their psychological traits or inner qualities. - Instead, they tend to use global terms such as nice, mean, good, or bad.

Why is the ‘relative’ self-important

Able to determine “How good am I at…?”, tend to measure ourself against others.

Important for two aspects of self-identity: 1. Self-efficacy (confidence) - how good am I at completing a task? 2. Self-esteem (evaluation of self-worth, happiness, emotional well-
being).

When? Begin to compare along psychological as well as physical dimensions in middle childhood (6 months – 10 years) (e.g., Harter, 1999). Children begin to develop a more nuanced sense of self.

Self efficacy

It is the perception of our competence (Bandura, 1997). For children, this belief in their competence is key to how well they perform in school, sports, or other activities. Studies show that children with high self-efficacy — who believe they’re good at something — tend to do better.

Collins (1982) showed that children with high self-efficacy tend to be more accurate, work quicker, and persist through failure because they have more confidence in their abilities and believe themselves to be as good as their peers. With children who have low self-efficacy, however, are less likely to do these things as they are less confident in their self abilities so they are more likely to struggle more and give up more easily. This could be explained that a belief in their own abilities acts as a self-fulfilling prophecy.

How self-efficacious should we be?

Bandura (1997) proposed that the optimal level is having a slightly overestimated view of your abilities. This is because it is more motivating, as we are more likely to take on demanding tasks and tackle challenges that we otherwise might find intimidating if we didn’t believe we were ‘good enough’. People with low self-efficacy might avoid the same challenging tasks.

Additionally, people with an overestimation of their abilities would have a different response to failure, it would become a motivator to them instead to try harder rather evidence of their inability. Collins (1982) found that more self-efficacious individuals found failure to be an indicator of needing to try harder, whereas less self-efficacious individuals tended to blame external factors - “it was too hard” or a indicator of their inability.

Sources of self-efficacy

Parental modeling - parents serve as a key source of influence. A study conducted by Jennings and Abrew (2004) investigated how a mother’s mental health, specifically whether they were clinically depressed or not, impacted the self-efficacy development of their infants (as early as 18 months). The simple tasks for infants included putting blocks in holes, and the researchers measured persistence, mastery (how effectively infants completed the task), pleasure, pride (emotional reactions to completing the tasks), and number of prompts required (guidance from mothers). The results showed that infants with nondepressed mothers were more persistent, showed more pride/pleasure, and had fewer prompts to complete the tasks in comparison to infants with depressed mothers.

Long-term effects of self-efficacy

Pinquart et al. investigated the long-term effects of self-efficacy, in particular its predictive role in the school-to-work transition. Higher self-efficacy in school was associated with more favorable employment outcomes later in life, including less unemployment and higher job satisfaction. The study’s measures were the range of self-efficacy matched with academic success from 12-15 years old. The results showed that individuals with high self-efficacy had more job satisfaction.

Benefits of high self-efficacy: Motivates you to try harder, respond positively to failure.

Self-esteem (valued by other people)

Employment and academic success support self-esteem, as external validation is gained and positive feedback can make an individual feel more valued.

At the core, self-esteem is often rooted in the perception of how much others value or appreciate an individual (“am I valued by others?”) This could be manifested in social acceptance, recognition, and social identity.

This can be difficult for individuals when they retire, as they may lose a major source of validation and recognition that previously supported their self-esteem. If your status is removed, your self-esteem may dip.

Harter’s theory of self-esteem

This is based on the idea that an individual's self-esteem is largely determined by the gap between the person they believe themselves to be (their actual self) and the person they would like to be (their ideal self). The gap influences how individuals may feel about themselves and how they evaluate their worth. The smaller the gap, the higher the self-esteem, as your reality aligns with your standards which leads to the feeling of self-competence. However, a larger gap could lead to the feeling of inadequacy and failure.

When and why does self-esteem change?

Harter and Pike (1984) conducted a study assessing self-esteem in young children. In their study, they used a picture-selection task where children were shown pairs of images and asked, “Which one is most like you?” This was measured across two dimensions: cognitive and physical competence, and social acceptance.

Cognitive & physical:

• [1] cognitive competence - e.g., ‘good vs not good at counting’
  • [2] physical competence – e.g., ‘ good vs not good at climbing’

Social:

• [3] peer acceptance – e.g., ‘have vs not have lots of friends’
• [4] parental acceptance – e.g., ‘Mum likes vs does not like to play with you’

Results: Children who felt less confident in a cognitive domain were likely to feel less confident in a physical domain. Children who were accepted by their friends were likely to report being accepted by their parents as well.

What is the implication?

Coplan et al. (2004) Children ‘held back’ in school score low on physical-emotional competency measures, which might impact how accepted they feel.
• Children new to a school score low on
social acceptance which might impact how
competent they feel
• This is a vicious circle as preschoolers with less- positive self-perception are likely more socially withdrawn and more excluded by peers, so they have a less positive self-perception of themselves.

Emotional development

Key points of emotional development:

Producing emotions:

• Emotional state is signaled from birth, as infants can experience and express their emotions from the moment they are born.

• The earliest distinction is positive (which includes feelings of happiness, calmness, or contentment) or negative affect (which includes feelings of distress, discomfort, or frustration).

Campos et al. (1983) proposed that mothers can start to distinguish several emotions displayed by infants during the first few months of life, and are particularly attuned to the subtle differences in their infants emotional expressions.

Izard et al. (1987) showed that the difference between anger and pain becomes apparent in 7 months. Distinction between emotions allows caregivers to respond more appropriately to the infant’s needs and to better understand the source of their distress.

Parental mind-mindedness (the extent to which parents can interpret and respond to their child’s emotional states and mental processes). Meins et al. (2002) suggested that when parents engage in mind-mindedness, they are more able to understand their infant’s internal states and mental experiences (e.g., thoughts, feelings, desires.) This ability to tune in to the infant’s emotional cues helps foster secure attachment and supports healthy emotional development. The parent’s ability to correctly interpret the child’s emotions and provide appropriate responses (emotional support, soothing, encouragement) can help the child learn to regulate their emotions effectively over time.

Recognising emotions in others

Babies can recognize different emotions and produce basic ones as a response (imitation).

Social referencing refers to when an infant looks to a familiar caregiver to gauge a reaction before reacting themselves (Feinman, 1982). There is a wary reaction to strangers; some studies found a reaction in line with the mother’s facial expressions (Klinnert, 1984). More likely to cross the visual cliff (approach apparent danger) if mothers showed a happy expression rather than a fearful one (Sorce et al., 1985)

Primary vs secondary emotions

Primary emotion - no prior learning required (innate and instinctive - e.g. fear, sadness, happiness, etc).

Secondary emotion - Beliefs about our experience (guilt, embarrassment, gratitude, etc).

For instance, Self-reference is not a necessary precursor to fear, but you have to have a sense of self to feel embarrassed.

How to test fear vs embarassment?

Lewis et al. (1989) tested 3 groups (12 months, 18 months, and 24 months). The measure for fear looked at the response of a stranger, for instance, wariness. Whereas the measure for embarrassment looked at self-conscious behaviors such as averting gaze.

The results suggested that self-identity emerges during the second year of life. Fear was established as a primary emotion and embarrassment as a secondary.

Later development

As children grow, different situations elicit basic (primary) vs complex (secondary) emotions.

Reimer (1996) found that due to the cognitive growth (self-concept) that primary school-aged children had endured, they experienced shame and guilt in situations they wouldn’t have experienced as toddlers.