This research aimed to examine whether and why children hold favorable self-conceptions (total N = 882 Dutch children, ages 8-12). Surveys (Studies 1-2) showed that children report strongly favorable self-conceptions. For example, when describing themselves on an open-ended measure, children mainly provided positive self-conceptions-about four times more than neutral self-conceptions, and about 11 times more than negative self-conceptions. Experiments (Studies 3-4) demonstrated that children report favorable self-conceptions, in part, to live up to social norms idealizing such self-conceptions, and to avoid seeing or presenting themselves negatively. These findings advance understanding of the developing self-concept and its valence: In middle and late childhood, children's self-conceptions are robustly favorable and influenced by both external (social norms) and internal (self-motives) forces.
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This research aimed to examine whether and why children hold favorable self-conceptions (total N = 882 Dutch children, ages 8-12). Surveys (Studies 1-2) showed that children report strongly favorable self-conceptions. For example, when describing themselves on an open-ended measure, children mainly provided positive self-conceptions-about four times more than neutral self-conceptions, and about 11 times more than negative self-conceptions.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFSelf-verification and contextualized self-views.
Pers Soc Psychol Bull
July 2006
Department of Psychology, University of California, Berkeley, CA 94720-1650, USA.
Whereas most self-verification research has focused on people's desire to verify their global self-conceptions, the present studies examined self-verification with regard to contextualized selfviews-views of the self in particular situations and relationships. It was hypothesized that individuals whose core self-conceptions include contextualized self-views should seek to verify these self-views. In Study 1, the more individuals defined the self in dialectical terms, the more their judgments were biased in favor of verifying over nonverifying feedback about a negative, situation-specific self-view.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThree studies show that different forms of self-activation have differential influences on the processing of social comparison information. Activating neutral self-conceptions results in defensive processing of threatening social comparison information (Study 1). Participants maintain favorable self-evaluations in the face of upward comparison and rate the upward target of comparison negatively.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe fleeting gleam of praise: cognitive processes underlying behavioral reactions to self-relevant feedback.
J Pers Soc Psychol
July 1990
Department of Psychology, University of Texas, Austin 78712.
We propose that a preference for favorable social feedback (i.e., self-enhancement) requires only that feedback be characterized as favorable or unfavorable but that a preference for self-confirming feedback (i.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFAgreeable fancy or disagreeable truth? Reconciling self-enhancement and self-verification.
J Pers Soc Psychol
November 1989
Department of Psychology, University of Texas, Austin 78712.
Three studies asked why people sometimes seek positive feedback (self-enhance) and sometimes seek subjectively accurate feedback (self-verify). Consistent with self-enhancement theory, people with low self-esteem as well as those with high self-esteem indicated that they preferred feedback pertaining to their positive rather than negative self-views. Consistent with self-verification theory, the very people who sought favorable feedback pertaining to their positive self-conceptions sought unfavorable feedback pertaining to their negative self-views, regardless of their level of global self-esteem.
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