Self-Concept Flashcards
Self-Concept
Self Concept comes from culture and reflected appraisals. Basically, it is all the knowledge that you have about your life and experiences- it’s who you are. It’s also how the social world affects the person and the power of the situation to influence a person’s thinking and action.
Individualist Cultures
In individualist cultures, like US and Australia, people are socialized to view themselves as unique and relatively independent of others
Collectivist Cultures
In collectivist cultures, like China or India, people are socialized to view themselves as interdependent, and define themselves more in relation to others
Cultural Self Study
The theory of this is the individualist and collectivist cultures. The hypotheses: 1. Members of individualist cultures will define themselves more in terms of global traits that are the same across social contexts 2. Members of collectivist cultures will not define themselves using global traits because they think about themselves in more context specific ways – Who am I? Questions; I am…. Traits. Global traits.
- Responses to 20 “I am_____” statements
- Proportion of self-descriptions made by American and Japanese students that were global traits —- US 60% Japan 20%
Reflected Appraisals
- Significant people in our lives reflect back to us (much like a looking glass, or a mirror) who we are by how they behave toward us.
- Parents often tell kids what their traits are before they even know what the traits are. Appraisal is essentially how you are treated. People use this mirror to define who they are. We use significant others in our lives as a basis for defining ourselves.
- We also use these to make judgments about ourselves to determine whether or not our actions are good or bad.
My Advisor is Watching Study
Graduate students evaluated their own research ideas after being subconsciously primed with…
IV: A picture of their adviser scowling OR a stranger scowling
DV: How positively did P’s rate themselves?
Results: P’s rated themselves less positively after exposure to the disapproving adviser face (even though subliminal!)
Independent Self-Control
o Ingroup (us and our close friends/family)
• Not stable, changeable
• Fluid relationships
• Self is contained and less fluid
o Outgroup (strangers)
• Independent self does not mean you don’t have connections
Interdependent Self-Control
o Ingroup (us and close family/friends) • Self is fluid rather than ingroup • Self is defined by the ingroup • Close relationships are stable o Outgroup (strangers) interdependent self does not mean their close relationships are perfect
Residential Mobility Study
o American Ps indicated the centrality of independent and interdependent aspects of their selves:
• List 5 personality traits that define you. How central are these to who you are?
• List 5 groups you belong to. How central are these to who you are?
o Ps listed the times they have moved to a different city throughout their lives
• Number of moves counted, excluding those before the age of 5
• Relationship between the number of moves and the traits they chose
o Results: greater number of moves: increased importance of independent self (personal attributes); decreased importance of interdependent self (group memberships/social roles) and vice versa
Pen Choice Study
• American and Asian Ps recruited at the airport
• Ps fill out short filler questionnaire and are offered a pen as a gift
- Researcher offers 5 pens and asks the Ps to pick one
- Two pen colors to choose from and one color is always less common (either 4-1 or 3-2 distribution of colors)
- Which pens with Americans and Asians prefer?
• Results: Americans more often chose the “special” color of pen because it added to their individualism in both conditions
- Preference for uniqueness rather than conformity among independent Americans
Self-Esteem Change Study
o On average, north Americans score higher on self-esteem measure than east Asians
• North Americans →greater tendency to self-enhance
• East Asians→greater tendency to self-criticize
o Does exposure to western culture influence self-esteem of Asians? And vice versa?
• Does length of exposure matter?
• Yes, exposure to different context may lead people to adopt its cultural tendencies
• With increase exposure to Canadian culture, self-esteem increases and vice versa
• People vary context to context in their modes of operation rather than have a combo of both
