Difficulty: Intermediate | Prerequisites: Research Methods notes
The "self" has two sides: the I (the agent who acts) and the Me (the object we reflect on). We build self-knowledge through introspection, observing our own behaviour, facial feedback, rewards, and social comparison, but each route has serious limits. We are particularly poor at predicting how future events will make us feel.
The "I" (self as agent)
The self as the doer, the active agent who engages in behaviour. We cannot introspect on most "I" processes; they happen automatically.
The "Me" (self as object)
The self as an object of reflection. This is the part we can think about: our traits, roles, relationships. The term "self-concept" refers to the Me.
Self-concept
The collection of beliefs, attributes, and knowledge a person holds about themselves. Think of it as your mental profile page.
Self content
What attributes, traits, and identities come to mind when you think about yourself.
Self structure
How different aspects of the self are organised and connected. People define themselves through different roles (student, daughter, athlete) and these "working self-concepts" shift depending on the situation.
Looking glass self
The idea that we see ourselves as a reflection of how we believe others see us. We incorporate perceived opinions of others into our self-concept, though we filter these through what already matches our existing self-view.
Introspection
Looking inward to access information about the self. It probably works the same way we infer information about other people, yet we feel we have privileged, accurate access.
Affective forecasting
Predicting how you will feel about a future good or bad event. We tend to overestimate how intensely and for how long we will feel happy or sad. Think of it as being consistently wrong about your own emotional future.
Durability bias
The tendency to overestimate the strength and duration of our emotional reactions to events.
Self-perception theory (Bem)
We infer our own attitudes and feelings by observing our own behaviour, the same way we would infer someone else's. "I am crying, therefore I must be sad." Used mainly when internal cues are weak or ambiguous.
Facial feedback hypothesis
Changes in facial expression can trigger changes in emotional experience. Smiling can make you feel slightly happier; frowning can bring your mood down.
Intrinsic motivation
Doing something because the activity itself is rewarding. Internal drive.
Extrinsic motivation
Doing something for an external reward (money, grades, praise).
Overjustification effect
When you are externally rewarded for something you already enjoy, your intrinsic motivation decreases. The behaviour feels "over justified" and performance tends to drop.
Social comparison theory
We evaluate ourselves by comparing to others, usually people similar to us. Upward comparisons (with those doing better) tend to make us feel worse. Downward comparisons (with those doing worse) tend to make us feel better.
The self has two components. The "I" is the self as agent: the active doer who engages in behaviour. Most "I" processes are automatic and inaccessible to introspection. The "Me" is the self as object: the part we can reflect on, including our traits, roles, and relationships. The term self-concept refers to the Me.
The self serves several functions. It allows us to consider how others view us, it supports reputation management, and it represents a complex form of social cognition (theory of mind). Most of the time we are not actively reflecting on the self, but certain events trigger self-reflection.
Self content is measured by asking people (or their family and friends) to list traits and identities. Self structure is measured by asking people to list their major roles and identities, then examining how those roles connect.
People define themselves through different roles (student vs. daughter vs. athlete). These "working self-concepts" shift with context. Even so, across situations, family, friends, and teachers generally agree on a person's core personality. Having multiple roles can buffer stress: when one role becomes negative, you can draw self-worth from another.
Humans begin to develop a sense of self around 18 to 24 months, as shown by their ability to recognise themselves in a mirror.
We build our self-concept partly from what we believe others think of us. But there is a filter: because we protect our existing self-concept, we selectively encode feedback that matches what we already believe. The result is that our self-view aligns with how we think others see us, not with how they actually see us. We tend to over-weight our own judgements and under-weight what others think.
The self is frequently defined by the relationships we hold with others.
Introspection means looking inward to access information about the self. It can help with self-monitoring, preventing bad decisions, and maintaining motivation. But it has significant limits:
Many basic cognitive processes occur outside of awareness.
We are often unaware of the thought processes behind our decisions.
We fabricate explanations for our behaviour after the fact.
Much of our behaviour is automatic.
The classic demonstration is the Nisbett and Wilson "Telling More Than We Can Know" study (the stocking study), which showed that people confidently gave reasons for preferences that were entirely unrelated to the actual cause. Asking participants to introspect may be asking them to report more than they actually know.
Excessive negative introspection can contribute to depression and anxiety.
Affective forecasting is predicting how a future event will make you feel. Research consistently shows we overestimate both the intensity and duration of our emotional reactions.
Gilbert et al. (2004) found that voters predicted they would be significantly happier if their candidate won, but a month later, supporters of the winning and losing candidates did not differ in happiness.
The durability bias explains this pattern: we overestimate how long feelings will last. Two reasons: the bias may function as a coping mechanism, and we underestimate the influence of other ongoing events on our feelings and moods.
Self-perception theory (Bem): We observe our own behaviour and infer our attitudes from it, the same way we would with a stranger. "I'm crying, so I must be sad." This process kicks in mainly when internal cues are ambiguous; if the situational cause of a behaviour is obvious, we do not bother inferring an internal state.
Facial feedback: Changing your facial expression can trigger changes in emotion and even changes in racial bias, according to some research.
Observing rewards (intrinsic vs. extrinsic motivation): People act for both intrinsic (internal enjoyment) and extrinsic (external reward) reasons. The overjustification effect occurs when adding an external reward for an already enjoyable activity undermines intrinsic motivation and decreases performance.
Social comparison: We compare ourselves to others, usually automatically. Social comparison theory holds that upward comparisons (with those doing better) make us feel worse, while downward comparisons (with those doing worse) make us feel better. We tend to compare with people who are similar to us. We also compare to past selves ("I'm much happier than I was last year").
Students often think introspection gives us direct, accurate access to our mental processes. It does not. We have no more privileged access to why we do things than an outside observer would.
Students confuse the overjustification effect with simple bribery. The overjustification effect specifically applies when someone is already intrinsically motivated and an external reward is added. It does not apply to activities you dislike.
Students assume the looking glass self means we see ourselves as others actually see us. The key point is that we see ourselves as we think others see us, which is filtered through our existing self-concept.
Students think affective forecasting errors mean we are wrong about the direction of our emotions. We usually get the direction right (good events feel good), but we overestimate the intensity and duration.
⚠️ Know the difference between the "I" and the "Me." The self-concept refers to the Me.
⚠️ Be able to explain the Nisbett and Wilson stocking study and what it demonstrates about introspection.
⚠️ Affective forecasting and the durability bias are classic exam topics. Know the Gilbert et al. election study.
⚠️ Understand the overjustification effect and be ready to give an example of how adding a reward to an enjoyed activity backfires.
⚠️ Be able to distinguish self-perception theory from introspection. Self-perception theory involves inferring attitudes from behaviour; introspection involves looking inward at feelings directly.
True or False: The "I" is the part of the self we can consciously reflect on.
False. That is the "Me." The "I" is the self as agent, mostly inaccessible to introspection.
Fill in the blank: The tendency to overestimate how long our emotional reactions will last is called the ______ bias.
Durability bias.
True or False: Self-perception theory says we always infer our attitudes from our behaviour.
False. We do this mainly when internal cues are weak or ambiguous.
Fill in the blank: Rewarding someone for an activity they already enjoy can cause the ______ effect.
Overjustification effect.
True or False: The looking glass self means we see ourselves exactly as others see us.
False. We see ourselves as we think others see us, filtered by our existing self-concept.
Q: What is the difference between self content and self structure?
A: Self content is what comes to mind when you think about yourself (traits, attributes, identities). Self structure is how those aspects are organised and connected, including how different roles relate to each other.
Q: Explain the looking glass self and one key limitation of it.
A: The looking glass self is the idea that we build our self-concept from what we believe others think of us. A key limitation is that we filter this perceived feedback: we selectively encode what matches our existing self-concept and dismiss what does not. So our self-view tracks our perception of others' views, not their actual views.
Q: Describe the Nisbett and Wilson stocking study and what it demonstrated.
A: Participants were asked to choose their preferred pair of stockings from a set. They gave elaborate reasons for their choice, but the stockings were identical. This demonstrated that people confabulate reasons for their preferences and that introspection does not give reliable access to the true causes of our behaviour.
Q: A child is enthusiastic about drawing. Her parents start giving her a gold star for every drawing. What does social psychology predict will happen to her motivation, and why?
A: The overjustification effect predicts her intrinsic motivation will decrease. By adding an extrinsic reward to an already enjoyable activity, the behaviour becomes "over justified" by external factors, and the internal enjoyment weakens.
Q: How does the durability bias relate to affective forecasting?
A: The durability bias is one reason affective forecasts are inaccurate. People overestimate how long their emotional reactions will last because they fail to account for other events and coping mechanisms that will influence their mood over time.
The self links directly to Person Perception (we perceive ourselves using some of the same mechanisms we use to perceive others) and to Prejudice (self-esteem maintenance can drive in-group favouritism). Social comparison theory reappears in the Self-Esteem material (Part 2) and in Basking in Reflected Glory.
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