Brown Chapter 2 Flashcards
James three components of the empirical self
- material self
- social self
- spiritual self
material self
- individual’s body and possessions
- serves a symbolic function, help people define themselves
- extends the self in time (after death)
- emotional responses to possessions attest our importance to the self
-EX: my arms, my legs, my children, my car
social self
- how we are regarded and recognized by others (social identities)
- the various social positions we occupy and the social roles we play
spiritual self
- collection of states of consciousness
- our inner self or our psychological self
- elicit emotions (pride) and goals (self-preservation)
- our perceived abilities, attitudes, emotions, interests, opinions, traits, etc
collective self …involves what group of people? concerned with what two issues?
- involves people, particularly those who occupy a minority status
- how people evaluate these specific identities?
- how people maintain their ethnic identities when exposed to a dominant majority culture?
western cultures
- individualistic
- emphasize ways in which people are different from one another
- importance on their personal identities
eastern cultures
- cooperative, collective, and interdependent
- emphasize ways in which people are liked together
- importance on their social identities
independent self-construals
personal attributes; own thought, feelings, and actions
interdependent self-construals
roles and group memberships, relationships to others; thoughts, feelings, and actions of others
self-feelings
- certain emotions that always involve the self as a point of reference
- self-complacency and self-dissatisfaction
-Ex: pride, self-esteem, modesty, humility, shame, etc
shame
- public emotion that follows from public disapproval
- encompassing emotion
- arises from the perception that one is a bad person or is wholly inadequate
- leads people to hide from others
guilt
-private response to the perception that one has failed to live up to one’s personal standards and ideals
- focus on particular misdeed
- give rise to a tendency to make reparations
“pretensions as values” meaning
- what is important to the person
- outcomes in areas that are more important to us produce greater emotional reactions than do outcomes in areas that are of low personal importance
“pretensions as aspirations” meaning
people’s reactions to events are determine not simply by the event themselves but also by the meaning/importance people give to the event
four categories of possible selves
- attainable self: the kind of person one wants to be and can be
- ideal self: idealized or gloried view of ourselves
- ought self: ideas about what we should be or ought to be
- undesired self: what we are afraid of becoming or do not want to become
John Locke and identity
- self/identity is a person’s memories of themselves
- emphasized reflexive consciousness, the link between the mind and the body and that thought exists across time and space
- self is a self-aware, self-reflective consciousness that is fixed in a body
David Hume and identity
-the mind is a bundle of mental perceptions based on impressions and ideas
- no “true” self
- no unity or cohesive quality
James definition of the self? Me and I
- self if malleable, multifaceted, and conscious
- grounded in thought
-identity is our uninterpreted memory for prior perceptions and our memory of the affect associated with them
5 types of social self
personal relationships, ethnic/religious, political affiliation, stigmatized groups, vocation/avocation
James definition of I
- permanent agent behind passing states of consciousness
ex: soul, transcendent ego, spirit
