Ch. 5 The Self

self-concept

overall set of beliefs that we have about our personal attributes, an individual’s sense of morality

independent view of the self

a way of defining oneself in terms of one’s own internal thoughts, feelings, and actions (Western world)

interdependent view of the self

a way of defining oneself in terms of one’s relationships to other people, recognizing that one’s behavior is often determined by the thoughts, feelings, and actions of others (Eastern world)

introspection

looking inward and examining our thoughts, feelings, and motives

self-perception

when attitudes, feelings, or other aspects of self-concept are uncertain, we infer their states by observing our own behavior and the situations in which they occur. we treat ourselves like strangers and assess our behavior to find clues about who we are

self-awareness theory

when people focus their attention on themselves, they evaluate and compare their behavior to their internal standards and values, we become objective, judgmental observers of ourselves

Fazio, Effrein, & Falender

IV: ps asked to verbally respond to questions that tapped into intro/extraversion (Trying to use uncertainty to shape their response/assessment of behavior)

DV: score on a self-assessment of intro/extraversion

ppl who were told to come up with things to liven up a party rated themselves more extraverted, while ppl told to come up with reasons why they hate parties rated themselves more introverted

causal theories

theories about the causes of one’s own feelings and behaviors, often we learn such theories from culture, can be things like schemas & theories we apply to ourselves that result in incorrect judgments

intrinsic motivation

engaging in an activity for enjoyment, not external pressure/reward

extrinsic motivation

engaging in an activity to gain external reward or avoid punishmnet

social comparison theory (leon festinger)

we learn about our own abilities and attitudes by comparing ourselves to other people (upward, downward, lateral social comparison)

upward social comparison

comparing yourself to people who are better than you in some way, motivating you to improve by setting an attainable standard of excellence

downward social comparison

comparing oneself to people worse than we are with regard to a particular trait/ability, goal is to feel good about ourselves/boost ego

lateral social comparision

goal is to accurately evaluate the self, compare ourselves to relevant standards

fixed mindset

abilities are set/stable

growth mindset

abilities are malleable and can be improved

misattribution of arousal

people’s inference about the origin of their emotional response is faulty

self-control

the ability to subdue immediate desires to achieve long-term goals

implementation intentions

people’s specific plans about where, when, and how they will fulfill a goal and avoid temptations

impression management

attempt by people to get others to see them as they want to be seen, ingratiation or self-handicapping (behavioral or reported)

ingratiation

using flattery or praise to make yourself likeable to another, often a person of higher status

self-handicapping

people create obstacles/excuses for themselves so that if they do poorly on a task, they can avoid blaming themselves, usually causes the poor performance we feared, attributing failure to something that isn’t inherently me

behavioral self-handicapping

ppl act in ways that reduce the likelihood that they will succeed on a task so that if they fail, they can blame it on the obstacles they created rather than their lack of ability, women less likely to engage in this type of self-handicapping

reported self-handicapping

people devise ready-made excuses in case they fail

Pysczcynski, Greenberg, & Laprelle

Ps given a faux social sensitivity test

IV 1: ps told their scores were high/low

IV 2: others’ relative scores (ps told if others did better/worse than them)

DV: % asking to see others’ relative scores

Results: ppl who did badly and were told others did worse were more likely to ask to see scores so that they could feel better about themselves

Berglas & Jones

Pre/post-test with drug administration in between. Everyone told they did great after pre-test, then asked to choose which drug to take, one that increased ability and one that decreased

IV: difficulty of logic problems (solvable or impossible)

DV: percent of people who chose each drug

People who had the impossible pretest were more likely to choose the drug that decreased ability in order to self-handicap, they want to blame the second attempt on the drug