2. The self

Question 1

When do humans develop a sense of self?

Answer 1

Happens around 18 months.

Question 2

Rouge test

Answer 2

Draw a dot on a baby’s forehead and put them in front of a mirror. If they just play with a mirror, don’t have a sense of self. If they have a sense of self they will try and rub the dot off.

Question 3

Theory of mind

Answer 3

Understanding that other’s beliefs, desires, intentions, emotions, and thoughts may be different from one’s own.

Question 4

4 main constructs of the self

Answer 4

Self-concept, self-esteem, self-knowledge, social-self.

Question 5

Self-schemas

Answer 5

Beliefs about self that organise and guide the processing of self-relevant information.

Question 6

Self-reference

Answer 6

The self-reference effect is the tendency to process efficiently and remember well information related to oneself.

Question 7

Possible selves

Answer 7

Images of what we dream of or dread becoming in the future.

Question 8

Self-discrepancy theory

Answer 8

The actual self, regarding features people believe they possess.
The ideal self, which includes characteristics that people wish or hope to possess.
The ought self, concerning attributes that people believe they have a responsibility to possess.

Question 9

Things that determine our self-concept

Answer 9

The roles we play, the social identities we form, the comparisons we make with others, our successes and failures, how other people judge us, the surrounding culture.

Question 10

Spotlight effect

Answer 10

Wouldn’t worry so much about what others think of you if you knew how little they actually thought about you. People aren’t examining you because they are worrying about themselves. You think there is a spotlight on you when actually there is not.

Question 11

Self-serving bias

Answer 11

The tendency to perceive oneself favourably.
People attribute positive outcomes to oneself and negative outcomes to something else (self-serving attributions).
Most people see themselves as better than the average person on subjective and socially desirable dimensions. However, this is not possible based on how averages work.

Question 12

Unrealistic optimism

Answer 12

The belief that we are far more likely to experience positive life events and far less likely to experience negative life events than others. Implications for outreach and advertising. Smoking and lung cancer which is very common and illogically think it won’t happen to us.

Question 13

False consensus effect

Answer 13

The tendency to overestimate the commonality of one’s opinions and one’s undesirable or unsuccessful behaviours.

Question 14

False uniqueness effect

Answer 14

The tendency to underestimate the commonality of one’s abilities and one’s desirable or successful behaviours.

Question 15

Self-serving bias as adaptive

Answer 15

It allows one to feel good about oneself and to enter the stressful circumstance of daily life with the resources conferred by a positive sense of self.

Question 16

Self-serving bias as maladaptive

Answer 16

People who blame others for their social difficulties are often unhappier than people who can acknowledge their mistakes.

Question 17

Self-efficacy

Answer 17

One’s sense of competence and ability to handle different situations and produce and intended result.

Question 18

Locus of control

Answer 18

A person’s belief about who or what is responsible for what happens. Can either be internal or external.

Question 19

Internal loc

Answer 19

We can change what happens. In the long run, people get the respect they deserve in the world. What happens to me is my own doing. The average person can have an influence on government decisions.

Question 20

External loc

Answer 20

Outside factors effect what happens. Unfortunately, people’s worth passes unrecognised no matter how hard they try. Sometimes I feel that I don’t have enough control over the situation. This world is run by the few in power and there is not much the little guy can do about it.

Question 21

Learned helplessness

Answer 21

The hopelessness and resignation learned when a human or an animal perceives no control over repeated bad events. Strong external locus of control can feel a strong sense of helplessness.

Question 22

Perceived self-control

Answer 22

Uncontrollable bad events -> perceived lack of control ->learned helplessness.

Question 23

Agents of socialisation (socialisers)

Answer 23

Family, peers, religion, government, media, work, ethnic background, clubs/social groups, school.

Question 24

Behaviourism

Answer 24

A learner is essentially passive, responding to environmental stimuli. Early view - we are blank slates who will regurgitate behaviour we have seen before. Classical conditioning - a neutral stimulus is associated with a natural response. Operant conditioning - a response is increased or decreased due to reinforcement or punishment. Observational learning - learning occurs through observation and imitation of others.

Question 25

Social learning theory

Answer 25

Emphasises the importance of observing, modelling, and imitating the behaviours, attitudes, and emotional reactions of others. Attention (stimuli focus), retention(rehears encode), motor production (practice feedback), motivation (reward reinforce). Environmental stimuli to our receiver, but many reasons we are not able to take in properly. Behaviour we reproduce may be similar but not the same as we have mutated it slightly.

Question 26

Gender non-conforming example

Answer 26

Main character is a female construction worker. Child distracted for 5 mins. Asked to recall and remember it as a male construction worker. Fall back on their original foundations of knowledge and remember it as gender traditional.

Question 27

Self-categorisation theory

Answer 27

People will perceive collections of people (including themselves) as a group, as well as the consequences of perceiving people in group terms. Humans are prone to grouping information as it makes it easier to process. Schemas.

Question 28

Evolutionary psychology approach to self-categorisation theory

Answer 28

Believe they can explain human tendency to group information. Trace back to early man and woman when brain processing wasn’t as developed. Prone to be weary of new social info in case it is dangerous. Goes into a group we already know. Problematic for stereotypes and introduces issues that need to be combatted by training or deeper thinking.

Question 29

Sherif’s robbers cave

Answer 29

In-group, out-group, group identification. Intuitive judgements. Stereotypes.
Primed them not to like the other group and then had them compete for resources.
Showed how we are very prone to making categorizations on things, such as are you in my ingroup.

Question 30

Attribution bias (Jones & Nisbett, 1971)

Answer 30

The errors made when people evaluate or try to find reasons for their own and other’s behaviours. Different rule for ourselves and other people.
The self - overemphasise the situation and underemphasise character.
Others - overemphasise character and underemphasise the situation.

Question 31

Limitation of attribution bias

Answer 31

The results from this study were believed and built upon for over 30 years, but a meta-analysis done in 2006 showed exactly what I have experienced:
The tendency to attribute character to others and situation to self was different when
▪ The other person was portrayed as strange.
▪ It took place within intimate relationships.
When background context was made known.

Question 32

Hostile attribution bias

Answer 32

The tendency to interpret other’s behaviours as having hostile intent, even when the behaviour is ambiguous or benign.
▪ Causes - children who are aggressive, or who experience hostile situations frequently in their daily lives, are expected to have more well-established and accessible hostility-related schemas.
▪ Related outcomes - shorter lifespan, those with a higher degree of hostile attribution bias are more likely to die before 50. Relationship difficulties.
▪ Intervention - relatively stable but can be reduced in adults and children.
Hostile attribution questionnaire