PSY415 Psychology of the Self

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PSY415Psychology of the Self

• Week 1
• Introduction

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Who am I?

• Imagine you want someone to know who you are
  really like. You can tell this person 20 things
  about yourself. These can include anything that
  helps the person know what you are really like.
  What would you tell them? (Brown, 1998, p. 20)
• What did you ask yourself in your mind and/or
  considered in writing these statements?

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The I and ME

• I see the BOARD vs. I see ME
• The self as I is the agent of action, the subject
• It is not only the mental processes involved in
  knowing or our affection toward ourselves, but
  the awareness of this process of knowing and
  feeling
• ME is the object of ones attention or knowledge
  of himself / herself

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What Psychologists Mean by Self

• ME is also subjective
• It refers to peoples ideas, beliefs, thoughts
  about themselves about
• WHO THEY ARE
• WHAT THEY ARE LIKE
• These ideas or beliefs are called self-referent
  thoughts

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What Psychologists Mean by Self

• There are two aspects of the ME
• The way we think about ourselves is the cognitive
  component of the self, which is called the
  self-concept
• The way we feel about ourselves is the affective
  component of the self, which is called the
  self-esteem
• The self is both the I and the ME

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Self-Concept vs. Self-Esteem

• Self-concept is the totality of the individuals
  thoughts and feelings with reference to himself
  as an object, which eventually explains himself,
  and the world at large, to himself.(Rosenberg,
  1979, p. ix Steele, 1988, p. 262)
• Self-esteem ... is a positive or negative
  attitude toward a particular object, namely, the
  self.(Rosenberg, 1965, p. 30)

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What is the Self?

• There is no consensus on a conceptual definition
• Baumeister (1998) highlights three roots of
  selfhood
• Reflexive Consciousness
• Interpersonal Aspect
• Executive Function

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Reflexive Consciousness

• It is the subjective experience of conscious
  attention turning back toward its own source and
  gradually constructing a concept of oneself
  (Baumeister, 1998, p. 680)
• The self has unity and temporal continuity

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Interpersonal Aspect

• The self is not only constructed subjectively,
  but it is affected by the social context as well
• Self is vital for making interpersonal
  relationships and interactions possible
  (Baumeister, 1998, p. 680)

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Executive Function

• The self is the agent of all actions and the
  decision-maker (Baumeister, 1998)
• Original meaning of the self, as first appeared
  as a noun in the 14th century English, is
  sinner (Danziger, 1997)
• What do you think about why it meant so?
• Volution, Agency, Responsibility
• It is the essential source of motivation to
  activate or inhibit actions

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Self-Psychology and Personality The Difference

• Self-psychology is concerned with subjective
  experience, whereas personality psychology is
  more concerned with the objective experience
• I think I am an extraverted person
• vs.
• My BFI score indicates that I am extraverted
• Asch (1952)
• Ego is the representation of the organism
• Self is the awareness of ego

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Self-Psychology and Personality The Similarities

• What we really are influences how we think about
  ourselves not always!
• Self-aggrandization
• What we really are influences how we feel about
  ourselves
• Temperament
• Self is one aspect of personality
• cf. individual differences
• Self-report is often used to measure personality
• Rosenberg (1965) Self-Esteem Scale

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Self-Psychology and Phenomenology

• Not the objective but the subjective reality
  determines our consciousness at a given moment
• Wertheimers (1912) Apparent Movement Experiment
• Lewin (1951) argued that objective world is
  important to the extent that it affects our
  subjective perceptions
• Our thoughts and feelings about ourselves are
  subjective as well the self as perceived

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The Study of Self in American Psychology

• The Behaviorist Movement
• Psychology is an experimental branch of natural
  science which aims at predicting and controlling
  behavior by carefully observing phenomena
  objectively
• Positivism and mechanism led the rejection of
  self as a legitimate subject matter of psychology

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The Study of Self in American Psychology

• The Decline of Behaviorism
• Cooley (1902) The Looking-Glass Self
• Others serve as mirrors from which we see
  ourselves reflected perspective taking
• Mead (1934) Symbolic Interactionism
• It is the socialization process in which the self
  develops perspective-taking
• Maslow (1954) Self-Actualization
• There is an inborn striving in humans for growth,
  which lead to realize the potential
• Personality Theorists The Concept of Ego

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The Study of Self in American Psychology

• The Cognitive Revolution
• Behavior reeks of purpose. (Tolman, 1932, p.
  12)
• Whereas behaviorism emphasized the past history
  of reinforcement as a determinant of behavior,
  cognitivism emphasized future planning, choice,
  and expectations
• Self became a legitimate subject matter

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Is there a Self?

• Hilgard (1949) proposed that all (defense)
  mechanisms imply self-reference (p. 375)
• Defense mechanisms are defenses against anxiety
  guilt feelings self as an agent of good or bad
  choices
• Defense mechanisms are self-deceptive
  bolstering self-esteem as through self-deception
• Self can be investigated in awareness
  introspectively
• Self can be investigated as an external object
  Inferred Self
• a pattern of existing habits and attitudes
  (p. 378)

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The Functions of the I

• Our awareness of ourselves is functional in
• distinguishing ourselves from others
• motivating behavior, exerting control over
  environment and other people
• providing us with a sense of continuity and unity

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The Functions of the ME

• Our thoughts about ourselves has
• a cognitive function and influence the way we
  perceive and process information
• a self-regulatory function and guide our
  behaviors
• a motivational function and helps us to direct
  our behaviors to achieve certain ends