Chapter 11 Flashcards
What is self understanding
the cognitive representation of the self, the substance of self conceptions
Basically mental picture or idea of yourself
-Based in part with roles like ur jobs or positions
-membership categories: what group you’re part of like family, school, culture
Self understanding lays the foundation for building your identity which is overall picture (so what you think about yourself leads to who you feel you are truly deep down)
What age do babies show early signs of recognizing themselves and what is mirror technique.
What age do most babies start showing signs of recognition and when do they develop a conscious awareness of their bodies?
-rudimentary form or early understanding of self recognition appears at three months
-Mirror technique is one strategy for testing infants’ visual self-recognition.
With rouge on the nose, increased nose-touching means that the infant recognizes the
self in the mirror.
Signs of self-recognition appear at 15-18 months.
Infants develop a conscious awareness of their bodies by their second year.
What’s the the main characteristics in young children when it comes to self understanding?
Main characteristics of self-understanding in young children:
-Confusion of self, mind, and body-don’t understand mind and self are separated from body
-Concrete descriptions- they are most focused on themselves at this age and they describe things by what they see or touch
Physical descriptions-they distinguish themselves with physical and material attributes
Active descriptions- they describe themselves in terms of actions, behaviors, and activities
Unrealistic positive overestimations- they can’t distinguish between desired and current self
•”I’m never scared.”
There are individual variations; and some children are vulnerable to negative self-attributions.
At what age do children seem to consider another’s perspective when predicting actions?
At what age do they begin describing themselves and perceiving others in terms of psychological traits?
13 months is when they consider another’s perspective when predicting actions
-4-5 yrs old when they begins describing themselves using personality traits
Ex: “I’m kind and I’m funny”
Generally they also understand that people do not always say what they truly think or believe (lying or hiding their feelings)
Are child more socially sensitive and perceptive than previously envisioned?
Yes and Children appear more socially sensitive and perceptive than previously envisioned.
• Debate continues over whether they are socially sensitive or basically egocentric.
•Remember inherit difficulty of understanding the thoughts and motivations of young children and infants
(Hard for children to fully explain thoughts at that age)
-Social interactions and relationships contribute significantly to young children’s development of the self and understanding of others.
Children’s self-understanding becomes more complex during middle and late childhood. What are the key changes?
Key changes characterize this complexity:
• Increasingly describe themselves in terms of psychological characteristics and traits.
• Begin to include social references in their self-descriptions. (Seeing themselves as part of social world: Kids start to describe themselves for talking about their relationships and how they fit into groups)
• Make increasing reference to social comparison.
• Begin to distinguish between their real and ideal selves.
• Self-evaluations become more realistic.
What’s perspective taking? What’s cognitive inhibition and cognitive flexibility? What’s re pro social and antisocial behaviors?
Perspective taking: the ability to assume another person’s perspective and understand their thoughts and feelings.
(Putting yourself in someone else’s shoes)
Thought to be especially important in determining whether children will develop prosocial or antisocial attitudes and behaviors.
(Pro social behaviors; kindness and empathy)
(Antisocial behavior)- mean or selfish
Executive functions are at work, including cognitive inhibition and cognitive flexibility.
Cognitive inhibition: ability to stop thinking about your own perspective and focus on someone else’s
Ex: a child had to stop thinking “I like this game” to consider “my friend might not like it”
Cognitive felixibility: ability to switch between different perspectives, yours and someone else’s
Ex: a child might think “I’m happy”, but “my friend is sad”, switching between your own feelings and their friends
This serves as a fundamental underpinning of secondary education.
In middle and late childhood, children become increasingly skeptical of some sources of information about psychological traits.
What are the developments in adolescent self understanding?
Developments in adolescent self-understanding:
• Begin thinking in more abstract and idealistic ways,
Increasingly likely to be self-conscious.
Plaget’s imaginary audience
-Become aware of potential contradictions between their differentiated selves.
-Self-understanding fluctuates across situations and time.
-Sense of real and ideal selves develops further.
More to come later
-Self-understanding becomes more integrative.
-Possible selves: what adolescents hope to be and what they dread becoming.
What are developments in adolescents towards understanding others
-Adolescent development includes perceiving others’ traits, understanding multiple perspectives, and monitoring their social world.
-Adolescents come to understand that others are complex and have public and private faces.
-Cognitive monitoring is an important activity in metacognition that becomes helpful in social situations.
A key part of this development is metacognition, or “thinking about thinking.” Within that, cognitive monitoring being aware of and managing one’s own thoughts- becomes especially useful in social situations. It helps adolescents navigate relationships, understand social cues, and respond appropriately to others’ actions and emotions.
What is self awareness? What’s attribution error?
Self-awareness becomes more important in early adulthood
-degree to which a young adult is aware of their psychological make up, including strengths and weaknesses
Many individuals do not have a good awareness of their psychological makeup and skills, as well as the causes of their weaknesses.
• attribution error: assuming it was something about ones or other peoples personality, instead of considering external factors
Early adult hood is a time when individuals can benefit considerably from addressing weaknesses
Adulthood possible selves
Adults in their 20s mention many possible selves they would like to and might become.
• Mostly universal, but higher education promotes
As individuals age, they often describe fewer possible selves and portray them in more realistic ways.
•By middle age, adults frequently describe possible selves in areas of their lives in which they have already performed.
Older adults are more concerned with maintaining what they have, avoiding health
problems and dependency.
Many individuals continue to revise and adapt their possible selves.
What’s life review and what is Reminence therapy?
Life review involves looking back at one’s life experiences, evaluating them, interpreting them, and often reinterpreting
them.
Identifying and reflecting on the positive aspects and on the regrets.
• Much of Erikson’s later stages like integrity vs despair
Reminiscence therapy: discussion of past activities and experiences with another individual or a group.
What is self concept and self esteem
• The term self-concept is a general term used to refer to how someone thinks about, evaluates or perceives themselves
• Self-esteem is an individual’s subjective evaluation of their own worth.
• Often these two are mistakenly used synonymously.
Foundations of self-esteem and self-concept emerge from the quality of parent -child interactions in infancy, childhood, and adolescence.
Changes in self conceptions and what are the three self concepts?
• Self-conception is the way individuals think about and characterize themselves (traits and attributes)
• Children identify concrete, physical qualities (I’m tall or
I’m fast)
• During adolescence, more complex, abstract self-conceptions develop
• Differentiated self-concept:
• actual self
• ideal self
• feared self
What is false self behavior
• False-Self Behavior
• acting in a way that one knows is inauthentic or fake
• most likely to happen in dating situations
• least likely to happen around close friends
Components of Self-Esteem
What is the difference between global self-esteem and domain specific self-esteem?
• Global self-esteem and domain-specific self-esteem
Global self: how you feel about yourself as a whole
Domain: how you feel about specific aspect of your life
• Some dimensions of self-esteem contribute more to an adolescent’s global self-esteem than others like
• physical self-esteem (most predictive of overall self-esteem)
° peer relationship self-esteem
• Interestingly, adolescents self-report that their physical appearance is one of the least important contributors to how they feel about themselves.
-Consequences of low self esteem
-For youths with lower self esteem low life satisfaction at….
-High self esteem does not lead directly to….
-Self esteem is strongly related to….
Low self-esteem has negative consequences in many areas of life.
• Implicated in overweight, obesity, anxiety, depression, suicide, and delinquency.
• For youths with low self-esteem, lower life satisfaction at 30.
-High self-esteem does not lead directly to good academic performance; and correlations with adult job performance vary greatly.
-Self-esteem is strongly related to happiness.
Self-esteem fluctuates across the life span!
Tell me the age ranges it fluctuates
Is Self esteem higher in women or men in most age periods?
• One large cross-sectional study suggests it decreases in adolescence, increases in the 20s, levels off in the 30s, ris the 50s and 60s, and drops off in 70s and 80s.
In most age periods, the self-esteem of males is higher than esteem of females.
-Accuracy of self evaluations increase across what years?
-Fluctuations in adolescence, self image, most likely occur between what ages
-Inflated praise towards people with low self esteem will cause…
years.
Adolescents have long been described as having low self-esteem, but most have a positive self-image.
• Fluctuations in adolescents’ self-image most likely to occur between the ages of 12-14
. Gender differences in self-esteem emerge by early adolescence
(ethnic differences as well)
Children enter first grade with roughly equivalent levels, but by the middle school years, girls’ self-esteem is slightly lower.
Inflated praise may cause those with low self-esteem to avoid learning from important challenges.
Self esteem in older adulthood
Many older adults do not interpret “losses” as negatively and don’t become as emotionally upset.
• Older adults compare themselves with other older adults.
-some aspects of their life require continuous support for self-esteem
• Older adults’ self-esteem benefits when they know they are accepted by others.
Deteriorating physical health and negative societal attitudes may explain the decline in self-esteem for some older adults.
What are strategies for increasing self-esteem?
Identify the causes of low self-esteem and the domains of competence important to the self.
-Provide emotional support and opportunities for social approval.
-Take responsibility for one’s own self-esteem.
-Achieve goals.
-Develop effective coping strategies.
What is identity
Overall sense of who you are
Examples
Vocational/career identity.
Political identity.
Religious identity.
Relationship identity.
Achievement, intellectual identity.
Sexuality and gender.
Cultural/ethnic identity.
Interests.
Personality.
Physical identity.
Ericksons view identity versus identity confusion and what does psychosocial Moratomrium mean
Adolescents go through the identity versus identity confusion developmental stage.
Faced with deciding who they are, what they are all about, and where they are going in life-questions that arise throughout life but are especially important in adolescence.
-Search for an identity is aided by a psychosocial moratorium: the gap between childhood security and adult autonomy.
-Adolescents who do not successfully resolve this crisis can suffer from identity confusion.
Contemporary thoughts on identity and what is the narrative approach?
Identity development is a lengthy process.
• Often more gradual and less of a crisis than Erikson suggested.
• Individuals with healthy identities are flexible and adaptive.
At a minimum, identity formation involves commitment to a vocational direction, an ideological stance, and a sexual orientation.
Narrative approach: asking people to tell and evaluate their life stories-is used by researchers. (To see how they think or see themselves)
• Narrative identities: the stories people construct and tell in order to define who they are for themselves and others.
What are the four statuses of identity based on crisis or commitment that Marcia the researcher proposes? (She expanded on eriksons views)
Crisis: a period of identity development during which the individual explores alternatives.
-Commitment: a personal investment in identity.
-Identity diffusion: no crisis, no commitments.
-Identity foreclosure: commitment but no crisis.
-Identity moratorium: in the midst of crisis, but commitments are absent or only vaguely defined.
-Identity achievement: has undergone a crisis and has made a commitment.
During early adolescence, most are primarily in the identity status is of?
What are the two cycles in the dual cycle identity model?
During early adolescence, most youth are primarily in the identity statuses of diffusion, foreclosure, or moratorium.
• Confidence in parental support, an established sense of industry, and a self-reflective stance toward the future are important to identity formation.
Dual cycle identity model separates identity development into two separate processes:
• Formation cycle- exploring options and then commiting to one
• Maintenance cycle- they may go through a phase of reevaluation like is this really right for me and will either stick with it or change their commitment
Researchers have developed a consensus that key changes in identity are most likely to take place in emerging what?
Researchers have developed a consensus that key changes in identity are most likely to take place in emerging adulthood, not adolescence.
• Many young adolescents are identity diffused.
• Further exploration takes place during the college years.
Increased complexity in reasoning along with new experiences may stimulate individuals to integrate identity dimensions to a greater degree.
Does identity remain stable throughout one’s life
What are MAMA cycles? does identity consolidation continue?
Identity does not necessarily remain stable throughout one’s life.
• Some follow “MAMA” cycles, changing from moratorium to achievement and back again.
Identity consolidation continues into early adulthood and possibly into the early part of middle adulthood.
Many individuals become more certain about their identity.
Are parents important an adolescent identity development?
Define individuality and connectedness
Parents are important in adolescent identity development.
• Poor communication with mothers and persistent conflict with friends are linked to less positive identity development.
Family atmosphere that promotes individuality and connectedness is important.
-Individuality: self-assertion and separateness.
Having and communicating a point of view; and able to express how one is different from others.
-Connectedness: mutuality and permeability.
Respect for and openness to others’ views.
Identity and social context, peer/ romantic relationships
The capacity to explore one’s identity in adolescence an emerging adult hood is linked to the quality of friendships and romantic relationships. Why?
• Friends often serve as a safe context for exploring identity-related experiences.
• Two individuals in a romantic relationship are both in the process of constructing their own identities, each providing the other with context.
How does the digital world lead to youth expressing and exploring the identity?
Digital world has introduced new ways for youth to express and explore their identity.
• Especially social media platforms.
Adolescents and emerging adults often cast themselves as positively as they can on their digital devices.
-Online world provides opportunities for both expressing identity and getting feedback about it.
Identity formation is influenced by culture. Give me some examples
• Adolescents and emerging adults in the United States and Canada grow up in contexts that value individual autonomy.
• Elsewhere, individuals may be influenced by a collectivist emphasis on fitting in and connecting with others.
Identity development may take longer in some countries done and others
For some, significant identity exploration may be postponed beyond adolescence and emerging adulthood.
What groups of people take their culture identity for granted specifically
What members or culture are more likely to be an important part of their identity?
Many may take their cultural identity for granted.
• Non-Latinx White people in the United States do not often spend much time thinking of themselves as “White American.”
For members of ethnic minorities, culture is more likely to be an important part of their identity.
Ethnic minority groups often struggle to maintain an ethnic identity while bending in with the dominant culture.
What does ethnic identity and what is bi cultural identity?
Ethnic identity is your sense of belonging to a specific ethnic group, and it includes how you feel about that identity
-add a dimension to identity formation, the choice between two or more sources of identification
• Bicultural identity: identifying in some ways with one’s ethnic group and in other ways with the majority culture.
(where individuals from immigrant or minority backgrounds may feel torn between their ethnic culture and dominant culture. This is when they may have to navigate and balance, both.
Indicators of identity often differ for each succeeding generation of immigrants.
Positive ethnic identity is related to positive outcomes for ethnic minority adolescents.
What does racial identity
Racial identity is the collective identity of any group of people socialized to think of themselves as a racial group.
Researchers have found that racial identity is positively associated with self-esteem.
