Self-Perception and Attribution

Practice flashcards for key concepts related to self-perception and attribution.

What is the term for the tendency to enhance one’s image by associating with successful people?

Basking in reflected glory.

Define collectivism.

Involves putting group goals ahead of personal goals and defining one’s identity in terms of the groups to which one belongs.

What is downward social comparison?

A defensive tendency to compare oneself with someone whose troubles are more serious than one’s own.

What does explanatory style refer to?

The tendency to use similar causal attributions for a wide variety of events in one’s life.

What are external attributions?

Attributions that ascribe the causes of behavior to situational demands and environmental constraints.

What is impression management?

Conscious efforts by people to influence how others think of them.

Define individualism.

Putting personal goals ahead of group goals and defining one’s identity in terms of personal attributes rather than group memberships.

What is ingratiation?

Behaving in ways to make oneself likable to others.

What are internal attributions?

Attributions that ascribe the causes of behavior to personal dispositions, traits, abilities, and feelings.

What are possible selves?

One’s conceptions about the kind of person one might become in the future.

Define public self.

An image presented to others in social interactions.

What is a reference group?

A set of people used as a gauge in making social comparisons.

What is self-attributions?

Inferences that people draw about the causes of their own behavior.

Define self-concept.

A collection of beliefs about one’s own basic nature, unique qualities, and typical behavior.

What are self-defeating behaviors?

Seemingly intentional actions that thwart a person’s self-interest.

What is self-discrepancy?

A mismatch between the self-perceptions that make up the actual self, ideal self, and ought self.

What does self-efficacy refer to?

One’s belief about one’s ability to perform behaviors that should lead to expected outcomes.

What is self-enhancement?

The tendency to seek positive information and reject negative information about oneself.

Define self-esteem.

One’s overall assessment of one’s worth as a person.

What is self-handicapping?

The tendency to sabotage one’s performance to provide an excuse for possible failure.

What does self-monitoring refer to?

The degree to which people attend to and control the impressions they make on others.

What is self-regulation?

The process of directing and controlling one’s behavior to achieve desired goals.

Define self-serving bias.

The tendency to attribute one’s successes to personal factors and one’s failures to situational factors.

What does social comparison theory propose?

Individuals compare themselves with others to assess their abilities and opinions.

What are the two distinct motives in seeking to understand oneself?

The self-assessment motive and the self-enhancement motive.

What strategies are common in self-enhancement?

Making downward comparisons, self-serving attributions, basking in reflected glory, and self-handicapping.

What is self-presentation?

The various images that individuals project to others.

What is the difference between high and low self-monitors?

High self-monitors pay more attention to impressions they make on others than low self-monitors do.