Social Psychology: Chapter 6

Projection

Assigning to others those traits that people fear they possess themselves.

How can you maximize self-growth?

•Pursue goals that support core needs. •Get into the zone. •Act mindfully. •Expand your mind and explore the world. •Foster a positive mood. •Feel challenged rather than threatened.

Why self-preservation so prevalent and important?

- Achieves specific goals. - Conveys and protects self-image. - Supports meaningfulness of social interactions by enacting cultural scripts and roles. - Serves self-improvement and personal growth.

What are ways to reduce cognitive dissonance?

- Change one of the cognitions. - Add a third cognition that makes the original two cognitions seem less inconsistent with each other. - Trivialize the cognitions that are inconsistent.

Why do people need self-esteem?

- It serves as an anxiety buffer. - It helps maximize social status. - It indicates how much one is accepted by other people (sociometer model).

Self-monitoring

An individual difference in people's desire and ability to adjust their self-presentations for different audiences. - High self-monitors and low self-monitors

Self-concept clarity

A clearly defined, internally consistent, and temporally stable self-concept. - Most people prefer this despite certain inconsistencies.

Effects of clear self-narratives

- Enhances well-being by helping people cope with past traumas. - Provides a basis for effective action. - Aids in the prediction of future challenges. - Provides psychological security by connecting separate experiences together into a coherent whole that is more significant and longer lasting than a series of passing moments.

The fact that self-esteem can remain stable as a trait but vary as a state indicates that a number of factors influence it. What are some of those sources?

- Genetics: The stability of trait self-esteem from childhood to adulthood suggests that our self-esteem may result in part from certain inherited personality traits or temperaments. - Reflected appraisals and social comparisons: All else being equal, a child who better lives up to the standards of value conveyed by their parents and others is likely to receive more positive reflected appraisals and more favorable social comparisons, and therefore have greater self-esteem. - Cultural-based standards: Prescribe different standards of value for individuals at different stages of development.

Audience segregation

- People use different communication channels to convey different self-images (flattering someone on the phone while rolling your eyes for a friend who is with you). - People adopt a compromise position on an issue when two present audiences have different views. - People convey different images and are ambiguous when there multiple-audience situations.

People feel self-determined when these basic needs are met.

- Relatedness: Being meaningfully connected with others. - Autonomy: Feeling a sense of authentic choice in what one does. - Competence: Feeling effective in what one does.

Honing an image

- Self-promotion: We advertise our achievements. - Supplication: We reveal a little personal weakness to garner sympathy. - Ingratiation: Flattering others. - Presenting self as like others: - Disagreement: Can help us look more sincere. - Intimidation: Creating an image of power and strength.

Four self-related motives that guide human behavior

- We want to view ourselves as a coherent whole. - We want to see ourselves in a positive light. - We want to control how others perceive us. - We want to grow, learn, and improve.

The aroused dissonance level depends on several factors

- Weak external justification - Perceived choice - Commitment - Foreseeable aversive consequences - Cultural influences

Self-narrative

A coherent life story that connects one's past, present, and possible future. It integrate these various aspects of personal history, everyday experience, roles, and envisioned future into a unified, purposeful whole: This is what I was, how I've come to be, who I am, and what I am becoming.

The good, the bad, and the ugly of self-esteem

1. Self-esteem cannot be easily granted to people. 2. People with either unstable self-esteem or low self-esteem will struggle with psychological problems, which often result from attempts to avoid or alleviate these negative psychological feelings. 3. People pursue self-esteem in ways that fit with their cultural worldview, sometimes with harmful consequences. 4. Striving for self-esteem can have constructive or destructive consequences for the self.

Induced hypocrisy paradigm

A laboratory situation in which participants are asked to advocate an opinion they already believe in, but then are reminded about a time when their actions ran counter to that opinion, thereby arousing dissonance. - To reduce this dissonance, participants are motivated to engage in behaviors consistent with the belief they had just advocated. Has been used to promote water and resource conservation, safe driving, exercising, and volunteering.

Induced compliance paradigm

A laboratory situation in which participants are induced to engage in a behavior that runs counter to their true attitudes.

Free choice paradigm

A laboratory situation in which people make a choice between two alternatives, and after they do, attraction to the alternatives is assessed. - This is because all of the bad aspects of the alternative people chose, and all of the good aspects of the alternative they rejected, are inconsistent with their choice. The harder the choice, the more of these inconsistent elements there will be, and so the more dissonance there will be after the choice is made. - People cope with this dissonance by spreading the alternative.

Compensation

After a blow to self-esteem in one domain, people often shore up their overall sense of self-worth by bolstering how they think of themselves in an unrelated domain. - This has been further developed by self-affirmation theory.

Spreading the alternative

After the choice is made, people generally place more emphasis on the positive characteristics of the chosen alternative and the negative aspects of the rejected alternative.

Cultural influences

Although a consistent sense of self is an important aspect of being human, different situations may arouse dissonance for people who are from different cultures. For East Asians and people from other collectivistic cultures that value interdependence, public displays of inconsistency should arouse more dissonance, because harmonious connections with others are so important to them. - Whereas Westerners displayed the most spreading of alternatives (emphasizing the positive aspects of the chosen alternative and the negative aspects of the rejected alternative) when they completed the task in private, East Asians displayed the most spreading of alternatives when they thought about how others could be watching them.

When people face a self-esteem threat, do they prefer to minimize it directly, by enhancing their standing on the valued self-aspect, or indirectly, by affirming an unrelated self-aspect?

Although self-affirmation is a powerful strategy for indirectly minimizing self-esteem threats, people generally prefer to compensate for their shortcomings directly. Consistent with symbolic self-completion theory, this is especially true when the threat pertains to an important identity goal.

Choice

As the work on the free choice paradigm might suggest, a key factor in creating dissonance in the induced compliance paradigm is perceived choice. To study the role of perceived choice, Brehm and Cohen (1962) developed what has become the most common method for creating dissonance through induced compliance. It involves asking participants to write a counterattitudinal essay. - Low choice condition: Low dissonance - High choice condition: High dissonance

Basking in reflected glory (BIRGing)

Associating oneself with successful others to help bolster one's own self-esteem. - If you're associated with an individual or group that is successful, then that reflects positively on you. Such reactions, moreover, are especially likely to occur after people experience a threat to their self-image.

Self-compassion

Being kind to ourselves when we suffer, fail, or feel inadequate, recognizing that imperfection is part of the human condition, and accepting rather than denying negative feelings about ourselves. - Has three elements: self-kindness; recognition that no one is perfect; and mindfulness (accepting negative thoughts and emotions as they are rather than suppressing or denying them). This is a healthier approach to maintain high self-esteem.

Maintaining face

Bending the truth, often to save a person's sense of public value. - Women were equally likely to lie for themselves or for someone else. Men, in contrast, were more likely to save their own face than someone else's.

Social comparison and identification and self-esteem

Comparing ourselves with others who are superior to us leads to upward comparisons that can threaten self-esteem, whereas comparing ourselves with others who are inferior leads to downward comparisons that help us feel better about ourselves. - Generally, people prefer to compare themselves with others a bit less accomplished than themselves, so comparisons can bolster their self-esteem.

Cynical performances

Conscious attempts to perform in a certain way to make a particular impression. People are more likely to engage in such performances when they find themselves in unfamiliar territory or when they want to convey a specific impression.

By middle-age, people tend to adopt one of two self-narratives.

Contamination stories: The person first experiences good fortune but then experiences tragedy or failure and ends up in a place of bitterness or depression. Redemption stories: People experience obstacles, challenges, sometimes even tragedies, but then turn their lives around and overcome those difficulties to feel successful in their lives. - More common. - People who tell redemption stories report greater life satisfaction and well-being than those who tell contamination stories.

Challenges of high self-complexity

Contributes to stress if the many facets of the self seem to be forced on the person and cause conflicting demands.

Weak external justification

Dissonance will be high if you act in a way that is counter to your attitudes with only weak external justification to do so. On the other hand, if the external justification is very strong, dissonance will be low. External justification doesn't have to come in the form of money; it can also be praise, grades, a promotion, or pressure from loved ones or authority figures. All of these can provide added cognitions that reduce overall dissonance.

How can dissonance be a motivator?

Engaging in counterattitudinal actions under high choice conditions elevates participants' ratings of discomfort, their levels of physiological arousal, and their neurological signs of motivation to exert control. Perceived inconsistency arouses negative affect (dissonance), which then motivates attitude change (dissonance reduction).

Types of self-esteem sources

Extrinsic: Self-esteem is provided by standards dictated by environment and feedback from others. Intrinsic: Self-esteem is connected to feelings of enduring inner qualities. Research has found that participants reminded of extrinsic sources of self-esteem, such as social approval or personal achievements, make more downward social comparisons, are more likely to conform to the opinions of others, and are more likely to engage in self-handicapping than participants led to think about intrinsic qualities of themselves.

Social functions of self-esteem

First, Jerome Barkow (1989) proposed that people desire self-esteem to maximize their social status, just as monkeys try to maximize their position in a dominance hierarchy. Second, according to Mark Leary and colleagues' (1995) sociometer model, a basic function of self-esteem is to indicate to the individual how much he or she is accepted by other people.

Evidence of effort justification from the Cooper (1980) study on psychotherapy outcomes

He gave participants with a severe snake phobia either a real form of therapy or a bogus one involving exercise, and he gave them either a high or low sense of choice. Compared with those who were not given a choice, participants who felt they freely chose the effortful therapy actually showed reduced phobia: They were able to move 10 feet closer to a snake than those who had the therapy without a sense of having chosen to participate in it. And the bogus therapy worked just as well as the real one; the only thing that mattered was the participants' sense of having chosen to go through the effort.

What are the self-presentation strategies?

Honing an image; audience segregation; maintaining face and lying.

Kip Williams's Cyberball Game

In his studies of ostracism, Williams and colleagues (e.g., Zadro et al., 2004) had participants start playing this cyber game of catch with what they believed were two other participants. Soon after, the other two players' avatars stopped throwing the ball to the participant's avatar, thereby creating an intense feeling of being ostracized.

Self-esteem is pursued universally, but the attributes, values, and roles that lead to feelings of worth vary depending on the individual's culture.

In individualistic cultures, self-esteem is derived from proving superior skills and abilities. In collectivistic cultures, self-esteem is derived from sustaining honor, gracefully performing cultural rituals, and group harmony promotion.

High external locus of control

Individuals with a high external locus of control believe their outcomes in life depend primarily on external forces beyond their control. Interestingly, recent studies suggest that people lower in socio-economic status, having fewer material resources, tend to exhibit a more external locus of control.

High internal locus of control

Individuals with a high internal locus of control feel confident that they can achieve desired outcomes. Individuals with an internal locus of control are more effective in a variety of life domains.

Nostalgic memories

It serves a number of positive psychological functions: It generates positive moods, boosts self-esteem, enhances our feelings of being connected to others, and increases a sense of meaning in life. Furthermore, it enables us to feel a greater sense of self-continuity: People who are asked about this report a stronger connection between who they were in the past and who they are now.

Sincere performances

Many of the situations people encounter are so familiar that they are not consciously aware that they're playing a role or following a script. - Well-practiced scripts

When does the overjustification effect occur?

Occurs only if the external incentive viewed as reason for behavior.

Brehm's (1956) free choice paradigm

Participants in the high dissonance condition are asked to make a difficult choice between two similarly attractive options. Participants in the low dissonance condition make an easy choice between one attractive and one unattractive option. After making their choices, participants in the high dissonance condition increase their liking for what they chose and decrease their liking for what they didn't choose, a spreading of alternatives.

Evidence of effort justification from the Aronson and Mills (1959) study on fraternity initiation processes

Participants who had to go through nothing or only a mild initiation were not impressed with the discussion and also were not highly committed to the group. In contrast, the severe initiation group, who had to go through a lot to get accepted, justified their effort by rating the discussion and their commitment to the group much more positively. Participants expressed particularly high liking for a group if they had to go through a severe initiation to join the group. According to cognitive dissonance theory, they did this to justify the effort of having gone through the severe initiation.

Cognitive dissonance theory

People so dislike inconsistencies in their beliefs, attitudes, and behaviors that they will bias their attitude and beliefs to deny the inconsistency (Festinger, 1957). - Inconsistencies between two cognitions can create psychological tension (i.e., cognitive dissonance).

The better than average effect

People think their shortcomings are pretty common but their strengths are rather unique. - When people perform poorly on some task, they tend to overestimate how many other people also would perform poorly. This allows people to think they are better than average even on dimensions in which they don't excel. In contrast, when people perform very well on a task, they tend to underestimate how many other people also would perform well.

Self-handicapping

Placing obstacles in the way of one's own success to protect self-esteem from a possible future failure. - That way, even though you're doing something to hinder (handicap) your own performance, you can attribute your failure to the excuse and not your own abilities. - Men are more likely to do this than women, suggesting that women place relatively higher value on effort.

Carl Rogers (1961)

Posited that people are naturally motivated to expand and enrich themselves, but that conformity to society's expectations often derails this process.

Foster a positive mood

Positive emotions such as happiness and excitement can stimulate creative thought, in part because they tell the person that things are safe in the world and it's okay to explore novel experiences. One way that positive mood stimulates growth is by making it more likely that the person will think in new ways and find creative solutions to problems.

Erikson (1959/1963)

Proposed that a person progresses through eight stages of growth.

Abraham Maslow (1970)

Proposed that all humans are fundamentally motivated toward self-actualization, or being all they can be, particularly if they have satisfied more immediately pressing needs such as food, shelter, and a secure sense of personal value.

Otto Rank's (1932/1989)

Proposed that inside each person is a life force that urges them to break away from others and establish the self as a unique individual who determines their own actions.

Self-verification

Seeking out other people and social situations that support the way one views oneself in order to sustain a consistent and clear self-concept. - People have a propensity to seek out others who corroborate their self-image, even when that means affiliating with people who don't think all that highly of them. - Those with low self-esteem might avoid people who would actually help bolster and reinforce a more positive self-view.

Low self-monitors

Seem to march to the beat of their own drum, ignoring other people's expectations and doing what feels true to them. - Are more consistent at self-presentations, so their behavior stems not so much from what the situation might demand but from their own inner states and desired self-image.

Pursue goals that support core needs

Some goals strengthen a meaningful relationship or exercise a talent, helping to satisfy personal core needs. Other goals, such as striving to be popular, do so less well. Indeed, people who pursue materialistic goals of fame and fortune tend to have lower levels of life satisfaction, creativity, and self-actualization than those who pursue more intrinsic goals such as good social relationships and personal growth.

Expand your mind: Expand your world

Sometimes simply exposing the self to unfamiliar environments can help a person to view the world more creatively and openly. People gain in creativity when they juxtapose and integrate seemingly incompatible aspects of different cultures.

Self-esteem stability

Self-esteem stability has a number of consequences even when people are equally high in overall levels of self-esteem. People whose self-esteem is more unstable tend to be sensitive to potential threats to their self-esteem.

High self-monitors

Social chameleons who adjust their appearance and behavior to fit with the norms and expectations in a given situation. - Are better at cynical performances. They are able to change their expression, vocal tone, and mannerisms strategically to convey a certain character

Spotlight effect

The belief that others are more focused on us than they actually are. So, when we are very self-conscious of some aspect of self, we are prone to this. But when we are not self-conscious about some unusual aspect of self, the opposite may occur.

Locus of control

The extent to which a person believes that either internal or external factors determine life outcomes.

Self-complexity

The extent to which an individual's self-concept consists of many different aspects including (but not limited to) social roles, relationships, and activities.

Flow

The feeling of being completely absorbed in an activity that is appropriately challenging to one's skills. - When the challenge level of a task, situation, or role matches well with the person's skills and abilities, they experience an enjoyable and absorbed feeling. - When the challenge is too high, we experience anxiety, and when the challenge is too low, we experience boredom.

Sociometer model

The idea that a basic function of self-esteem is to indicate to the individual how much they are accepted by other people. When people appear to be motivated to maintain self-esteem, they actually are motivated to feel a sense of belongingness with others.

Self-evaluation maintenance model

The idea that people adjust their perceived similarity to successful others to minimize threatening comparisons and maximize self-esteem-supporting identifications. - When another person outperforms you in a domain (or type of activity) that is important to your self-esteem, perceiving the other person as dissimilar makes comparison less appropriate. But when the domain is not relevant to your self-esteem, comparison is not threatening, so you can BIRG by seeing yourself as similar to the successful other. - A key variable that determines whether people identify with or distance themselves from a successful other is whether comparison is or is not relevant.

Self-determination theory

The idea that people function best when they feel that their actions stem from their own desires rather than from external forces. - People are naturally powered by curiosity to explore their environment, master new challenges, and to integrate these experiences with a core sense of who they are. However, the social world often tries to control us from doing so. - Extrinsic motivation vs intrinsic motivation.

Self-affirmation theory

The idea that people respond less defensively to threats to one aspect of themselves if they think about another valued aspect of themselves.

Anxiety-buffer

The idea that self-esteem allows people to face threats with their anxiety minimized. - According to terror management theory, this is precisely the function of self-esteem: To help the individual feel like an enduringly significant being who will continue in some way beyond death. - Self-esteem accomplishes this anxiety-buffering by increasing activation of the parasympathetic nervous system, which helps to calm people and control their anxiety. - When participants experienced a threat to their self-esteem, thoughts of death became more accessible to consciousness.

Theory of symbolic self-completion

The idea that when people perceive that a self-defining aspect is threatened, they feel incomplete, and then try to compensate by acquiring and displaying symbols that support their desired self-definition. - In contrast, people who are secure in their identity are more open to acknowledging their limitations and do not need to boast of their intentions or display symbols of their worth. - These symbols might give you a premature sense of having achieved your desired identity. As a result, you may neglect to take concrete steps toward fully achieving your identity goal.

Self-esteem

The level of positive feeling you have about yourself, the extent to which you value yourself. - Can be viewed as a trait (a general attitude toward the self ranging from very positive to very negative) or as a state (a feeling about the self that can temporarily increase or decrease in positivity in response to changing circumstances, achievements, and setbacks).

Foreseeable aversive consequences

The more aversive the foreseeable consequences of an action are, the more important the inconsistent cognitions are, and thus, the more dissonance.

Benefit of high self-complexity

The person can cope with difficulties in one area of life by drawing strength from others.

Mindfulness

The state of being and acting fully in the current moment. - Comes from Buddhism and Stoicism. - We open ourselves up to consider the world and ourselves in new, more multidimensional ways.

Differences between the status-maximizing perspective and the sociometer model

The status-maximizing perspective emphasizes the desire to stand out and be better than others, whereas the sociometer model emphasizes fitting in with and gaining the acceptance of others. The status-maximizing perspective can help explain why people often sacrifice being liked in order to be successful and gain status, whereas the sociometer model can help explain why people sometimes sacrifice status and material gain in order to fit in with the group.

Overjustification effect

The tendency for salient rewards or threats to lead people to attribute the reason, or justification, for engaging in an activity to an external factor, which thereby undermines their intrinsic motivation for and enjoyment of the activity. - When external factors lead people to attribute the reason, or justification, for their action to an external incentive (such as money, candy, or affection), their intrinsic motivation and enjoyment of the task are diminished.

Illusion of transparency

The tendency to overestimate another's ability to know our internal thoughts and feelings. People are often better than they think they are at hiding their internal feelings.

When are people most likely to self-handicap?

They are especially focused on the implications of their performance for self-esteem rather than on getting the rewards associated with success. - It also stems from uncertainty about one's competence. People who have experienced success in the past but are uncertain about whether they can succeed in the future are the most likely to use this mechanism to maintain and defend their self-esteem.

Individuals with high self-concept clarity may be happier and better equipped to cope with life's challenges. Why?

They are less sensitive to the feedback they receive from others, such as insults or nasty looks on the street. In contrast, individuals with low self-concept clarity tend to look to other people's feedback to understand who they are. Their attitudes toward themselves are therefore more likely to fluctuate, depending on whether they perceive that others view them positively or negatively. - People high in social status have greater self-concept clarity than those low in social status, perhaps because they are less dependent on the social context around them

Davis and Jones (1960)

They induced participants to help the experimenter by insulting another person, and either gave participants a sense of choice in doing so (high choice condition) or did not (low choice condition). In addition, half of the participants thought they would be able to talk to the person later and explain that they didn't really mean what they said and were just helping the experimenter (low commitment—the behavior could be taken back). The other half thought they would not be able to explain themselves later to the other person (high commitment to the behavior). The high choice, high commitment condition: The participants rated the person they insulted negatively. They did this to reduce dissonance. This did not occur in the low choice condition, and it also didn't occur in the high choice condition if the insult could be taken back.

People who are self-determined

They perform better and more creatively, are happier, and experience more satisfaction than those who experience controlled forms of regulation. They may also live longer.

When people are excluded, what happens from a neuroscience perspective?

They show activation in the anterior cingulate cortex (Eisenberger et al., 2003). This brain region is generally responsible for detecting when a given situation isn't meeting our goals. It also is activated when people experience physical pain.

Self-serving attributions

To make external attributions for bad things that one does, but internal attributions for good things one does. In other words, to take credit for successes and blame the situation for failures. This bias can help support mental health. - It seems to work well for preserving self-esteem and are common among well-adjusted people. Individuals suffering from depression tend to view themselves as equally responsible for their successes and their failures, however. However, this bias may interfere with an accurate understanding of poor outcomes.

Minimal deterrence

Use of the minimal level of external justification necessary to deter unwanted behavior. - When it comes to disciplining children, use just enough inducement or threat of punishment to prevent the behavior, while allowing the child to feel that they freely chose not to do that behavior. - Doing this to stop a child from engaging in a behavior will make it most likely that the child will internalize that they don't want to engage in that behavior anyway.

Dramaturgical perspective

Using the theater as a metaphor, the idea that people, like actors, perform according to a script. If we all know the script and play our parts well, then like a successful play, our social interactions flow smoothly and seem meaningful, and each actor benefits. The purpose of performing and self-presentation help to accomplish goals that are important in a particular social situation.

Possible selves

Vivid images of what the self might become in the future. They give a face to a person's goals, aspirations, fears, and insecurities. - Part of one's self-narrative. - Can be positive or negative. - Can motivate and guide behavior. That's because thinking about a possible self can make us aware of the actions we need to take now in order to become that person in the future.

Festinger and Carlsmith (1959) on the induced compliance paradigm.

When participants told another person that they liked a boring task, those who received $1.00 later reported liking the task more than those who received $20.00 and those who did not say they liked the task. Lacking sufficient justification for lying, participants in the $1.00 condition reduced dissonance by bringing their attitude in line with their behavior.

Effort justification

When people choose a course of action that involves unpleasant effort, suffering, and pain, they experience dissonance because of the costs of that choice. Because they usually can't go back and change their behavior, they reduce dissonance by convincing themselves that what they suffered for is actually quite valuable.

Feel challenged rather than threatened

When people conclude that their resources are inadequate, they feel threatened, but when they view their resources as meeting or surpassing the demands, they feel challenged. This feeling of challenge provides an opportunity for growth. - Interpret stressful situations as opportunities for growth.

Commitment

When people's freely chosen behavior conflicts with their attitudes, the more committed they are to the action, the more dissonance they experience. If the action can be taken back or changed easily, that reduces the extent to which the action is dissonant with one's attitude. - If you're having a rough day and happen to treat someone badly and can't take it back, you might reduce your dissonance by deciding the person deserves the insult.

When do people primarily feel dissonance?

When the inconsistent cognitions are salient or highly accessible to consciousness. The level of dissonance that is aroused when inconsistent cognitions are salient or accessible depends on a number of factors.