Competence (6) Flashcards
Competence
basic desire for ability, success, and a sense of effectiveness
Core motives should elicit goal-oriented bahavior
the need for competence serves an evolutionary role in encouraging humans to learn, develop and adapt to their environment
Core motives should be adaptive and beneficial
Feeling competent is linked to many positive benefits
- improved physicial health
- better mental health
Core motives should be universal
Competence is an equality valued in both Western and Easter cultures
People differ in their expression and fulfillment of the competence need
- Belief about where competencies come from (entity vs incremental beliefs)
- Perception of competency level (self-efficacy)
- Achievement motivation (individual differences in motivation)
- Types of goal (learning vs performance goals)
entity vs. incremental beliefs
Some people think their competencies are something they were born with whereas others think their competencies are something they had to work to achieve
individual differences in motivation
Some people are just more driven to fulfill their competence need than others
Learning vs. Performance goals
Some people adopt the goal to improve their competence whereas others adopt the goal to prove their competence
Entity theorist
Traits and abilities are fixed and are determined by stable factors like aptitude or genetics (intelligence is not changeable)
Incremental theorist
Traits and abilities are determined by more malleable factors like effort and persistence (intelligence is changeable)
Incremental (growth) mindset
a. Embrace challenges
b. Persist in the face of setbacks
c. See effort as the path to mastery
d. Adopt learning goals
Entity, fixed mindset
a. Avoid challenges
b. Give up easily
c. See the effort as fruitless or worse
d. Adopt performance goals
Self-efficacy
- Self-efficacy refers to the perception or belief about our ability to accomplish a particular task
- The greater our self-efficacy, the more we believe we have the skills necessary to successfully accomplish something.
Forming attribution regarding (Self-efficacy)
-> Success
a. Internal attributions increase feelings of pride and accomplishment
b. and stable attributions increase hope that good performances will occur again
Forming attribustions regarding (self-efficacy)
-> Failure
a. Internal attributions increase feelings of guilt and shame
b. and stable attributions decrease hope
Flow state
a subjective state in which people feel completely absorbed and focused on an activity
Factors that determine flow
- Skill level
2. Challenge level
Self-concept
an individual’s collection of self-knowledge
-> serves as a mor source of motivation
Goal Fusion
The extent that a goal is perceived to be integrated into a person’s self-concept
Self-Esteem
refers to how favorably or unfavorably people evaluate them-selves
-> It is a major motivator of human behavior
Self-evalutaion
Whenever people attempt to judge aspects of their self-concept, including their competencies and abilities, they are engaging in self-evaluation
Social comparison theory (leon Festinger)
Often only know who we are and what we are capable of by comparing ourselves to others
Motives to evaluate own competencies
- Self- Assesment
- Self-Verification
- Self-Enhancement
- Self-Improvement
Self-assesment
identifying how competent we really are and reducing uncertainty about our skill level
Behavioral consequences of Self-assesment
Preference for disgnostic tasks (provide accurate info and reduce unercertainty about one’s ability level)
Self-Verification
The motivation to maintain consistency between self-conceptions and new information
Behavioral consequences of Self-Verification
- people seek out info that verfies their self-view
2. People seek out the company of others who verify their self-view
Symbolic Self-completion theory
We present ourselves to others in ways that encourage them to treat us in a way that is consistent with our self-views
(Self-verification)
Self-enhacement
Self-enhancement refers to the motivation to enhance the positive aspects and decrease the negative aspects of our self-concept
Behavioral consequences of Self-enhancement
- Positive feedback
- Positive illusions (The better-than-average effect)
- Downward social comparison
- Self-affirmation theory
Self-improvement
Self-improvement refers to the motivation to improve one’s traits, abilities, and well-being
Self inprovement vs Self-enhancement
- Self enhacement: feeling like competent
- Self-improvement: becoming more competent (first step is to recognize that you are not as good as you want to be -> contradicting self-enhacement)
Upward social comparison (Self-improvement)
we are inspired to become more competent in a domain and we gain insights into the steps necessary to improve our skills
Self-defense strategies
allow us to externalize information when it threatens our sense of competency
- Self-serving attribution
- Self-handicapping
- Excuse making
Self-serving attributional bias
Maintaining overly positive self-evaluations in the face of contradictory evidence through the strategic use of internal and external attributions
Self-handicapping
The tendency to create an external obstacle that blocks one’s own performance
Exuse making
Excuse making reflects an attempt to shift attributions for a negative outcome from internal causes to external causes
Costs of Self-handicapping
- people who self-handicap put far less effort, time and practice into preparing a task
- they are also evaluated more negatively by others
Excuse making vs. Self-handicapping
- > both strategies involve attribution failure to a external source to avoid personal blame
- > self-handicapping is a behvaioral strategy (before the impeding failure)
- > excuse making is a cognitive strategy (after the failure)
Self-improvement vs. Self-enahcement
- > both are concerned with seeking positive self-views
- > self- enhacement (feeling competent)
- > self-improvent (becoming actually more competent) -> here we have to recognize first that we are not as good as we want to be
