Self Awareness

1
What?
Why?
Self Awareness
How?
Can we trust it?
2
What is self awareness

• Ability to assess ones personality, behaviors
  skills accurately
• Examples
• Self-subordinate agreement (Church, J of Appl
  Psy, 1997)
• Student-teacher agreement on judgments of
  performance on presentations (Radhakrishnan, in
  progress)
• Own vs. peer presentations
• Practice vs. final presentation
• Accuracy of predicted judgments v. actual
  performance on exams (Radhakrishnan et al., 1996
  2000)

3
What is NOT self awareness

• Self monitoring
• Extent to which you monitor, regulate /or
  control behavior/appearance in social situations
• Low self monitors behave according to their own
  inner states whereas high monitors behave
  according to the social situation
• E.g., I may deceive people by being friendly when
  I really dislike them (see Section A Ch 10 in
  Aamodt Raynes students to complete measure
  for leadership lecture)

4
Self monitoring vs. self awareness

• Knowing oneself accurately (self awareness) is
  different from being able to change, monitor, or
  regulate behaviors in the presence of others
  (self monitoring)
• Self awareness and self monitoring may be related
  to each other

5
What?
Why?
Self Awareness
How?
Validity of Self awareness measures
6
One reason to become self aware

• To improve performance
• High performing managers were more self-aware
  (Church, 97)

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How to become self aware

• Use valid reliable tests (e.g., NEO, IPIP)
• Feedback from friends family
• e.g., Fill out a personality survey with you in
  mind
• Feedback from peers
• e.g., C24 Leadership role play
• Feedback from yourself
• In different kinds of situations (e.g., across
  multiple C24 role plays)
• In new situations (e.g., in unfamiliar roles)

Learning from Inventories, Marcic et al, 310
8
How to become self-aware Some ways of thinking
about yourself
Personality Specific Traits
Knowledge Abilities Skills
Learning Styles Preferences
Values Goals Motives
9
Personality One way of thinking about yourself

• What is Personality?
• Tendency toward thinking, behaving and feeling in
  consistent ways across different types of
  situations across time
• E.g., Goldbergs IPIP (handout) others in Ch 1
  Aamodt Raynes
• Differentiates one person from another
• Describes universal behaviors, thoughts
  feelings
• E.g., The 5 dimensions of personality is one
  grouping of behaviors, thoughts feelings

p.189-190 Aamodt 1-26 Janasz et al
10
The Big Five Personality Dimensions
Based on an analysis of the relation between
trait words used to describe people Openness
artistic, creative, broad interests, cultured,
knowledgeable Conscientiousness careful, fussy,
tidy, hardworking, neat, punctualExtraversion
extraverted, frank, talkative, fun loving,
sociableAgreeableness acquiescent, mild,
gentle, softheartedEmotional Stability Angry,
anxious, worried, guilt- ridden, nervous
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• Relation between Big Five dimensions
• The Big Five are supposed to be uncorrelated with
  each other
• i.e., a score on one dimension does not predict
  scores on another dimension.
• In reality, some weak correlations exists.
• E.g., neuroticism is negatively correlated with
  extraversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness.

12
What is NOT Personality?

• Behavior Actions/reactions
• Can be observed/measured all the time
• E.g., Talkativeness in social situations is
  extraversion vs. talkativeness in non social
  situations is not
• Is influenced by personality other factors
• E.g., Talking in class is determined by
  personality and reinforcement whereas talking
  across different social situations is determined
  by personality

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Why is Personality important?

• Conscientiousness predicts
• Job performance
• Attendance, retention
• Counterproductive behaviors
• Job satisfaction
• Income, occupational status
• Extraversion predicts
• Performance on managerial and sales jobs
• Income, occupational status
• Agreeableness Low neuroticism predicts
• Income, occupational status

Johns Saks (B23 text) 1-26 Janasz et al
14
Possible Exam Questions on Personality

• What are your scores on the Big Five?
• Absolute to highest score you can get
• Relative to other c24 students scores (See C24
  website for your scores)
• Describe a situation in which a personality
  dimension that describes you (e.g., extraversion)
  played a positive role and another situation in
  which the same dimension played a negative role
  in your life.
• Read C24 website for detailed descriptions of 5
  personality dimensions
• What features of your personality profile are
  your strengths and weaknesses as a manager?
• Learn about the job requirements of a manager

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One problem with using only personality to
describe/understand yourself Bandwidth- A factor
that can predict many different behaviors,
feelings, etc. Fidelity A factor that can
predict behaviors with high accuracy Bandwidth
and fidelity are in conflict. Each Big Five
Factor has high bandwidth, but low fidelity A
specific trait has higher fidelity, but lower
bandwidth than a Big Five Factor.
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Example of Bandwidth Fidelity issue
Conscientiousness predicts neatness of dorm room
and grades with moderate accuracy. Messy predicts
neatness of dorm room but not grades. Achievement
motivation predicts grades but not neatness of
dorm room.
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Usefulness of Taxonomies
Neuroticism Anxiety Presentation Anxiety Anxiety
about upcoming Presentation
Animal Mammal Dog German Sheppard
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Therefore we study specific traits

• Examples of Specific Traits
• Self Esteem
• Locus of Control
• Self Monitoring

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What is Self Esteem? Why is it important?

• View of oneself positively approval of oneself,
  judging oneself as significant, capable, worthy,
  believe that one has desirable traits
• I am a good person
• I do most things well Example Items from Aamodt
  Raynes Ch 12 Proj A (p. 389-390)
• Validity (aka importance of self esteem)
• Predicts job performance motivation

291-292 Aamodt
20
What is not Self esteem

• Emotional Stability
• Self esteem is a better predictor of job
  performance (.26) than emotional stability (.19)
• Emotional stability comprises of things other
  than self esteem that do not influence job
  performance
• Self esteem emotional stability are related but
  not the same
• Self Efficacy
• Capability to successfully perform a specific
  task
• E.g., Handout items on presentation efficacy
• Is a part but not all of self esteem

291-292 Aamodt
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What is Locus of Control? Why is it important?

• General belief about control over reinforcement
  environment
• If you work hard you will be successful (Example
  Items from AR Ch 9 Proj B (p. 297))
• Validity
• Related to job satisfaction
• Predicts career advancement
• Related to effective leadership behaviors
• Leadership performance
• Effective Performance in stressful situations

Whetten Cameron p. 76-77
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What is not Locus of Control

• Self Esteem
• Those who judge themselves as capable,
  significant worthy also see themselves as
  controlling their environments
• Meta-analytic r.52 (Judge et al, 02)

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Specific Traits Self Monitoring

• Self monitoring
• Extent to which you monitor, regulate /or
  control behavior/appearance in social situations
• Validity
• Predicts preferences for role-playing type jobs
  like sales, law, public relations, politics etc.
• Predicts career success
• Leadership behaviors in highly verbal contexts

1-26 Janasz et al
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Other Tendencies you need to know for C24

• Type A personality
• Items in AR Ch 2 Proj A p.47-48
• Predicts anxiety, poor relationships, heart
  disease (Human et al, 1999, JME)
• Optimism
• Items in AR Ch 2 Proj B p.49-50
• Lifestyle Questionnaire
• Items in AR Ch 2 Proj C p.51-52
• All predict susceptibility coping with stress

475, 476, 484, Aamodt
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Ways to Describe Oneself
Personality Specific Traits
Knowledge Abilities Skills
Learning Styles Preferences
Values Goals Motives
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Preferences

• Interest Inventories
• Compare similarity of interests to those in a
  particular field
• Items in AR Ch 4 Proj A p. 109
• Validity
• Match between interests of employees and those
  of the job predicts higher satisfaction and
  performance

190 Aamodt
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Goals, Motives Values

• Goals
• Immediate causes of behavior
• Concrete, specific ideal states
• Motivations
• Abstract, global influences
• Strivings driving multiple behaviors
• Values
• Abstract guiding principles of behavior
• Ultimate motives

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Motives

• Intrinsic vs. Extrinsic Motivation
• Intrinsic
• Enjoy performing task itself, challenge of task
  performance
• Extrinsic
• Enjoy consequence of task performance (e.g.,
  obtain reward or avoid punishment)
• Items in AR Ch 12 Proj B p. 391-2
• Validity
• Jury is out
• i.e., Not clear if rewards reduce intrinsic
  motivation or just increase extrinsic motivation
  (topics of several student papers)

p. 293 Aamodt
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Why become self aware

• To improve performance
• High performing managers were more self-aware
  (Church, 97)
• To manage yourself
• Set appropriate goals, choose appropriate
  careers, manage stress
• To understand differences between you and others
  
• Understand why others react to you the way they
  do
• Adapt your communication to others needs
• Develop interpersonal skills
• To accept your tendencies of behaving, thinking
  feeling

Human et al 1999 J of Mgt Education article,
1-26 Janasz et al
30
Potential Exam Question

• Why would your scores differ from your
  expectations of your score (i.e., why may the
  scores on an assessment be invalid for you)?

Learning from Inventories, Marcic et al, 310
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Additional citations not on reserve

• Aamodt, M. (2004). Applied Industrial
  Organizational Psychology (4th Ed). Wadsworth
  Thomson Learning Belmont, CA ISBN 0534596932
• Whetten, D. Cameron, K. (2002). Developing
  Management Skills (5th Ed.) Prentice Hall Upper
  Saddle, NJ