Discussion
Raciel1990
Ch3TheSelfpart1.pptxChapter 3
The Self
Today’s Outline
What is the Self?
Its roles
How we learn about ourselves
Introspection
Social comparison
Self-awareness
Motivation to learn about ourselves
Ok this lesson starts off a little slow
But it gets very interesting when we get to social comparison!
What is the Self?
We all know and use the concept of self on a daily basis, myself, yourself, etc.
But it’s actually pretty hard to operationally define the self
Furthermore, neuroscience research can usually identify nodes/areas of the brain associated with something
E.g. there’s an area of your brain related to birds, you also have a specific Johnny Depp area of your brain, an area for your best friend, etc.
Oddly though, no one has been able to find the ‘self’ area of the brain
Perhaps the concept is too complex and diffused over many areas of the brain
The Self
One way is to define the self by its roles
Self-Knowledge/Self-Concept
What you have accomplished, what color your hair is, etc.
Public/interpersonal Self
The image you present to others, e.g. dressing up for a social event
Agent/Executive Self
Mediates between the other two
E.g. you want the last donut but you don’t want to take it from your friend
The Self
One reason the self may have developed is related to another recurring theme from social psychology:
inner traits of human beings (such as the self) exist to serve interpersonal functions
Without the concept of selves it’d be hard to operate in society
If you grew up on a deserted island, how different would your self-concept be?
Differences in Self across cultures
Famous study by Markus & Kitayama (1991)
They had Westerners (European and North American participants) and Easterners (Japanese, Chinese, and Korean participants) create a list of traits/descriptors that define who they are
Westerners had many more independent traits, so traits related just to himself/herself (motivated), whereas Easterners listed more interdependent traits (good team player)
Cultural ideals about what the best self would look like influence the development of these traits
The Self
Another way we define ourselves is in roles.
Take a second and think of the top 5 roles that describe you?
For example, some of my most important roles are: psychologist, hobbyist, uncle, competitor, and bird-dad (lol).
Gizmo hiding from a loud
thunderstorm
Where does self-knowledge come from?
How do we learn about ourselves?
One of two main ways, the first of which seems obvious: Introspection
Introspection – we refer to our own thoughts/feelings and inner states
In this way, some have said we have “privileged access” to our own mind
Self-Knowledge: Introspection
There is some truth to introspection, but it didn’t take long for researchers to find flaws with introspection
If you have men watch car ads they are given information about the cars, such as safety, mileage, etc. and some cars are paired with beautiful women
The men mostly choose the cars paired with women
When asked why, though, they cite other explanations, such as safety
Self-Knowledge: Introspection
Similarly, in another study, people selected the last pair of socks presented to them, even though they cited reasons like “they look soft,” etc.
Based on findings like those two studies, introspection can certainly tell if someone likes something, but the why of it may not be accurate
The duplex mind (conscious vs. non-conscious) can explain those findings
Self-Knowledge: self-perception
Perhaps rather than introspection, Bem (1965) suggested ‘self-perception theory’
There is no “privileged access” to our mental states
But we can and do observe our own actions
If Jim had told his friends he highly values health/fitness, but he observes that he hasn’t gone to the gym in months
He may come to change his attitude to be in line with his behavior, and state he values fitness less. Or he may change his behavior and go more, once he realizes this!
Self-Knowledge: Self-perception
Why we perform any given behavior can have different motivations
‘Intrinsic motivations’ are when we are motivated to do things because we like them, they’re inherently fun to us
E.g. I listen to music because it’s enjoyable
‘Extrinsic motivations’ are when we are motivated to do something because of the outcome
E.g. I work to get paid or I study just to get a good grade
Self-Perception – Overjustification Effect
In an incredibly interesting finding on self-perception, it was discovered that if you reward someone (extrinsic motivation) for something they do for fun (intrinsic motivation), their self-perception will shift to believe they are doing it to receive the reward
E.g. if a kid likes washing dishes,
and then the mom/dad start to
pay the kid for washing dishes,
his/her intrinsic motivation to do
the task decrease
The kid self-perceives and sees
‘oh, I do this because I get paid’
(Implications for pro sports players or pro anything really)
Self-Knowledge: Social Comparison
Beyond Introspection, the other main way we learn about ourselves is through ‘social comparisons’ (Festinger, 1954)
***The drive to make social comparisons is one of the most deep-seated drives in human nature
This theme will come up time and time again in the psychology literature and in your life
It is both pleasing to us and also causes our own worst nightmares/problems
Say you can beat your sibling at tennis, or swim a mile in a certain time, or perform well in a competitive video game, or get a score on the GRE’s…
What does any of that really mean outside of a frame of reference??? What percentile did your score fall in for the GRE’s?
Self-Knowledge: Social Comparison
If you found out your GRE test score was in the top .03% of other students’ in the nation, you’d feel amazing
Thus, you would have learned something about yourself (you’re good at what the GRE measures, math and English vocabulary) through comparison with other people
Self-Knowledge: Social Comparison
But who do you compare yourself to?
If you’re a tennis player and you compare yourself to one of the Williams sisters, you’re going to feel like you suck
Comparing yourself to someone better is called an
upward social comparison
Upward social comparisons are
helpful in that they can set a good
standard for us to work toward,
even though we feel bad about
how far we are from it
We keep the comparisons
plausible/helpful, e.g. if Serena
is too far above, then maybe
just the best person at your
club or the state champ
Self-Knowledge: Social Comparison
Downward social comparison is the opposite
This can bolster our self-esteem
E.g. well at least I’m still smarter than Bob, or have more money than Sally, or am prettier than Marta
It can make people feel better in the face of tragedies/illness too, ‘at least I don’t have it as bad as that guy.’
Beyond specific comparisons to certain people, you can compare yourself to ‘most people’ as well
Exercise
Let’s do an exercise in social comparison!
I want you to rate your skill at 5 tasks compared to everyone else in the world
Once this activity is done I will have you email me the results
I want you to estimate what percentile of people you’re better than at certain tasks (next slide)
For example, Lebron James would be better than 99.9% of people at basketball
If Larry has usually received C’s in his math courses, he may estimate he’s an average math student, so better than 50% of people at math
Get a sheet of paper and write down what percentile of people you would be better than at each of these activities?
Driving ____
Cooking ____
Swimming ____
Critical thinking/logic ___
Leadership ability ___
Generalized social comparisons
If we were to do this exercise in a physical class, you’d see that on average, most people would rate themselves rather highly on most things
Now, you don’t need to email me your estimations, I just wanted you to think about it
But our general comparisons are flawed/biased
If almost everyone thinks they’re better than 80% or more of drivers, that’s of course logically not possible
On most tasks, people will fall onto
a bell curve, with some extreme
outliers on either end and most
people in the middle somewhere
Generalized social comparisons
To give you an example of how extreme these kind of results with generalized social comparison are:
In one study of over a million high school students
Not a single one rated himself/herself as below average in ability to get along with others
Only 2% said they were below average in leadership ability
Another study found that 90% of people thought they were above average drivers
Generalized social comparisons
It’s not possible for everyone to be great at everything
But of course each of us would assume we’re the exception or outlier
And without any evidence to the contrary, we are inclined to believe how great we from a downward comparison standpoint
E.g. our self-esteem is boosted by the positive illusion
Generalized social comparisons
To expand on this, there’s an effect everyone should be aware of:
The Dunning-Kruger Effect (1999)
Their article was titled “Unskilled and Unaware of it”
They found that people who are measured and found to be low ability on a task typically think they’re much better than they are
Because of their lack of ability/knowledge about the task, they can’t conceive of why they are, in fact, bad at it.
Implications of the Dunning-Kruger Effect
Think about it: have you ever watched someone who is bad at something you’re good at blame their poor performance on luck and continue to think they’re good?
Even when you could point to a million mistakes/reasons why their performance was abysmal?
Implications of the Dunning-Kruger Effect
Consider all the places this applies to the real world:
Someone gets hired as district manager for a company because their daddy owns the company, but really they know nothing about the company’s product or procedures
A politician that is appointed for a position for an area that they have no training/background in
E.g. most of our politicians are generalists, how does that work when they end up making laws on topics of specific expertise, such as science, education, healthcare, etc.?
In all these cases, people will be too ignorant to know how ignorant they are, and will remain confident that they can perform the job
Implications of the Dunning-Kruger Effect
My thoughts on the Dunning-Kruger Effect:
If our society wants to improve, we need to focus on being a meritocracy (people get what they earn)
No buying or cheating one’s way into positions
Similarly, if there’s someone spouting off opinions about a topic, their credentials in that field should be scrutinized before anyone listens to them
In sum, too many ignorant opinions, not enough science and deference to scientific experts
Relevance of Social Comparison
Before we move on, consider all the various spheres of social comparison people may engage in on a daily basis:
Knowledge
Money
Career success
Power
Popularity/Social influence
Happiness
Who does the most good for the world
Attractiveness
Success at one’s favorite pastime or art
And anything else you can think of…
Social comparisons continued:
When we compare ourselves to other people, we often feel badly because we don’t live up to certain standards
One way many people will try to feel better is by essentially reducing their self-awareness
Binge eating and getting drunk have both been shown to make people temporarily feel better due to lack of self-awareness
Self-awareness can make people behave better though, for example dieters were more likely to resist temptation when they ate in front of a mirror
And students were less likely to cheat on a test when
taking it in front of a mirror
Self-knowledge
In sum, we’ve covered two ways that people learn about themselves
Introspection (and/or self-perception)
Social Comparison
Our self-knowledge can shift depending on the situation as well
E.g. if you’re the only man in a room full of women, your self-knowledge and awareness will change
You wouldn’t be as aware of being man in other contexts as you would be in a room of women
What motivates us to learn about ourselves?
In general, people are motivated to learn about themselves
Consider how many people have taken personality tests or hoped to gain information from horoscopes, etc.
There are 3 primary motivations:
1. Appraisal – to understand our abilities
E.g. You don’t want to try and lift something way too heavy or waste money/time applying to schools/jobs that are out of reach
2. Self-enhancement – we are motivated learn favorable
and flattering things about ourselves
We often dismiss/ignore/minimize unflattering things
3. Consistency – we want to learn things that are consistent with how we view ourselves
What motivates us to learn about ourselves?
Of those 3 motivations, Sedikides (1993), found that the motivations were not equal
1. Self-enhancement was strongest
2. Then consistency
3. Finally appraisal
We are motivated to protect our esteem/identity
And in general that’s a good thing, having some positive illusions is correlated with mental health
Self-handicapping
What we know about the order of motivations can explain self-handicapping
Self-handicapping
Doing something to impair your performance
E.g. drinking the night before an important test
Then, if the test goes well, great, if it goes badly, you can blame drinking
Thus, the need to self-enhance
trumps the need to appraise
Was also found that self-handicapping is more likely if the person already has a reputation to maintain, so consistency > appraisal as well
Self-handicapping
A cool example of self-handicapping can be seen when looking at this guy:
Deschapelles won mostly every game as a chess master
But he feared to lose to someone young/sharp as he got older
So, he insisted on only playing if he went second (a large disadvantage in chess)
Thus if he won, wow look how he still wins, but if he lost, oh well, he can just blame going 2nd
