PSY2003:Exam:The social self Flashcards
McAdams and McClearn (2013) findings.(2)
People construct self-narrative and almost form movie in their mind of who makes them them, support that the best way to know somebody is by asking them.
Supported by Pronin et al.,2001 who said most assume most accurate information about a person comes from the person themselves.
However evidence to the contrary.
Epley & Dunning (2006) findings. (3)
Conducted 4 experiments, shown people are biased towards self-desirable features but peers more accurate
BUT past exp/thoughts/feelings info etc helped explaining individual differences for an individual which was usually better from them themselves
Supported by Vazire & Mehl (2005) asked Ps to predict 25 behaviours eg reading, Ps and peers were equally as good.
Social psychology stand of sense of self.(4)
-Dependant on other people William James (1890),
Mean (1913) describes people as actors on a stage, behave diff in diff context
-Haslam does this more modernly
-Self-reflections derived by reflective self-appraisals, looking-glass self (Cooley, 1902), when you look at another persons behaviour eg you tell a joke ands somebody laughs then they are reflecting back yourself
-starts early in childhood and shaped by these reactions from others.
Lieberman (2007).(2)
- increased medial PFC activity when thinking about ourselves and TPJ
- Supported by Pfeifer et al., (2009) adolescents show greater neural activity in these areas than adults suggesting we do play more attention to self whilst growing and over time.
Are older siblings different from younger siblings due to being first born?(1)
Frank Sulloway (1996, 2001) Born to Rebel hypothesis more freedom with more children so more rebellious.
Self-concept.(1)
How you view yourself, global self-concept made up of lots of constituents eg roles you play (student), relationships, central belief system, group identities, values, goals,
Independant vs Interdependant self-construals.(3)
Western cultures more Independent and describe their acheivements etc where as asian countries more interdependent and describe relationships with their family etc-more collectivist
- usually western samples but claim to be universal which isn’t necessarily given the above
- supported by self-esteem studies, more important for western than asian cultures but Tokado&Sogon (2008) say past studies are flawed and that Japanese are not more collectivist.
Trait vs State self-esteem.(3)
trait-constant over time eg temperament
state-change given a context eg confidence argue over intelligence but said more state based
We have both of these.
Not much research on which is better from the above^^
how complex sense of self and how malleable, rather than low/high self esteem
Contingencies of self-worth.(1)
Not sensible to put all eggs in one basket, base who you are on lots of different things to have high self-esteem focus on positives of yourself for incorporation into sense of self and avoid the worse ones, diff cultures will focus on different things in light of this.
More complex self=less vulnerable to self-esteem being attacked and questioning your self.
Protecting self through strategic evaluations.(3)
self enhancement, better-than-average effect (Alicke &Govorun, 2005)-occurs more strongly for ambiguous traits
can view things that dont fit with what you view yourself as could just be anomalous or emphasise different things (Schelling, 1978)
William et al. (2012) showed diff things count at diff times, eg we judge ourselves from our best whereas others may judge us at our worst or average
Strategies underlying self-evaluation.(3)
-upward and downward comparisons
-Social comparison theory (SCT) Festinger (1954)
we have a drive for positive self-evaluation and to maintain postivie self-esteem so downward comparisons make more sense
-found to make comparisons to those just slightly below how we view ourselves, maintaining self-esteem but also not making it an irrelevant comparison
if you want to improve, makes sense to make upwards comparisons
Motives underlying self-evaluation.(3)
-can maintain self-esteem even when we cant make a social comparison by
-1) Reflection-situation not as important
2)Comparison-important/relevant to self
-Reflection allows us to bask in reflected glory (BIRG) as we can be happy for others when not important to ourselves , comparison more problematic
Tesser & Smith (1980) does work to show this^
Exceptions to boost sense of self ie downplay abilities.(3)
- Self-verification theory, Swann et al. (1994) showed in couples more committed and happier if had consistent views even if negative
- Basically can include flaws but consistency is what matters in sense of self
- often displayed through behaviour, fashion, makeup, posture etc social media used to self-verify
Dont think this will come up as did practise essays on it.
Could be wrong, just focus more on other 2 for research.
