PSY Chapter 5: Perceptions of Self & Others
Terms
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- Self-concept
- is an organized collection of beliefs about the self
- Possible selves
- refer to one's conceptions about the kind of person one might become in the future
- Self-discrepancy
- the mismatching of self-perceptions; actual self vs the ideal self
- Social comparison theory
- proposes that individuals compare themselves with other in order to assess their abilities and opinions (ie how attractive they are, how they did on the history exam etc)
- Reference group
- is a set of people against whom individuals compare themselves (ie the history test, the reference group is the entire class)
- Individualism (independent)
- involves putting personal goals ahead of group goals and defining one's identity in terms of person attributes rather than group members.
- Collectivism (interdependent)
- involves putting group goals ahead of personal goals and defining one's identity in terms of the groups one belongs to.
- Self-esteem
- refers to one's overall assessment of one's worth as a person; it is the evaluative component of the self-concept
- Roy Baumeister
- Self-esteem means "self-concept confusion". Individuals with low self-esteem simply don't know themselves well enough to strongly endorse many personal attributes on self-esteem tests
- Narcissism
- the tendency to regard oneslf as grandiosely self-important
- Self-attributions
- are inferences that people draw about the causes of their own behavior
- automatic processing (mindlessness)
- default mode of handling information (shower, drink coffee, check email...things you do without much thought_
- controlled processing (mindfulness)
- when important decisions arise or when you're trying to understand something like why you didn't get the job that you wanted.
- Internal attributions
- ascribe the causes of behavior to personal dispositions, traits, abilities and feelings
- External attributions
- ascribe the causes of behavior to situational demands and environmental causes
- Stable internal
- a sense of humor and intelligence
- Stable external
- include laws and rules (speed limits, no smoking areas)
- Unstable internal
- mood (good or bad) and motivation (strong or weak)
- Unstable external
- weather and the presense or absence of people
- Attributional style
- refers to the tendeny to use similar casual explanations for a wide variety of events in one's life. (either optimistic explanatory style or pessimistic explanatory style)
- Accuracy motive
- is reflected in people's desire for truthful information about themselves
- Consistency motive
- drives people toward information that matches what they already know about themselves
- Self-verification theory
- people prefer to receive feedback from others that is consistent with their own self-views. (those with a positive image prefer to hear positive feedback)
- Self-enhancement
- the tendency to maintain positive feelings about the self.
- Downward social comparison
- the defensive tendency to compare oneself with someone whose troubles are more seroius that one's own
- self-serving bias
- the tendency to attribute one's successes to personal factors and one'sf ailures to situational factors
- Basking in reflected glory
- the tendency to enhance one's image by publicly announcing one's association with those who are successful (CORFing is similar..cutting off reflected failure)
- Self-handicapping
- the tendency to sabotage one's performance to provide an excuse for possible failure
- Self-regulation
- the work of directing and controlling one's behavior
- Self-efficacy (Albert Bandura)
- people's conviction that they can achieve specific goals. According to Bandura, efficacy beliefs vary according to the person's skills. You may have high self-efficacy when it comes to making friends but low self-efficacy when it comes to speaking in public.
- Developing self-efficacy
- Matery experiences (mastering new skills), Vicarious experiences (watching others perform a skill you want to learn), Persuasion and encouragement (through the encouragement of others), Interpretation of emotional arousal (the interpretation of the responses you give from certain events)
- Self-deflating behaviors
- are seemingly intentional actions that thwart a person's self interest (deliberate self-destruction, tradeoffs, counterproductive strategies)
- Public self
- an image presented to others in social interactions
- Impression management
- refers to usually conscious efforts by people to influence how others think of them
- Ingratiation
- is behaving in ways to make onself likable to others (ie giving compliments, doing favors etc)
- Self-monitoring (Mark Snyder)
- refers to the degree to which people attende to and control the impressions they make on others
- Which of the following statements about the self-concept is false?
-
A) It is composted of one dominant belief about the self
b) It is composed of many self-beliefs
c) It is relatively stable over time
d) It influences present as well as future behavior - Mismatches between one's actual and ought selves result in lower self-esteem and:
-
a) dejection-related feelings
B) agitation-related feelings
c) feelings of self-enhancement
d) No particular feelings - A person reared in a collectivist culture is like to have a(n) _____self-view, whereas a person reared in an individualistic culture is likely to have a(n) ____ self view.
- interdependent, independent
- Low self-esteem is associated with:
- self-concept confusion
- Agression in response to self-esteem threats is more likey to occur in people who are:
- narcissistic
- Which of the following is not a basic principle of self-perception?
-
A) People are "cognitive spenders"
b) People's explanatory style is related to adjustment
c) People prefer to receive information that is consistent with their self-views.
d) Pople want to maintain positive feellings about the self - Keisha is upset when a textbook is stolen, but she feels better after she hears that a classmate's book bag, including her cell phone, was stolen. This is an example of:
- downward comparison
- Which of the following statements about self-efficacy is true?
-
A) It can be developed by persevering through failure util one achieves success
b) It is something that one is born with
c) It refers to a person's general self-confidence
d) It refers to conscious efforts to make a certain impression on others. - The self-presentation strategy of ingratiation involves trying to make others:
- like you.
- Which of the following will not help you bild high self-esteem?
- Comparing yourself with those who are the best in a given area.