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Understanding The Self

The self is a complex cognitive construct with various definitions. It includes one's sense of personal identity (the "I") and self-awareness of personal characteristics (the "me"). The self develops through social interaction and consists of one's self-concept, identity, and self-schemas which organize self-knowledge and can change over time. Self-awareness involves awareness of one's private self and public presentation, and comparisons between one's actual, ideal, and ought selves, which can impact self-esteem.

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1K views

Understanding The Self

The self is a complex cognitive construct with various definitions. It includes one's sense of personal identity (the "I") and self-awareness of personal characteristics (the "me"). The self develops through social interaction and consists of one's self-concept, identity, and self-schemas which organize self-knowledge and can change over time. Self-awareness involves awareness of one's private self and public presentation, and comparisons between one's actual, ideal, and ought selves, which can impact self-esteem.

Uploaded by

ryan
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We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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LESSON 3

THE SELF AS
COGNITIVE
CONSTRUCT
UNDERSTANDING THE SELF
SELF (I VS. ME)
There are various definitions of the “self” and other similar or interchangeable
concepts in psychology. Simply put, “self” is the sense of personal identity and of who
we are as individuals (Jhangiani and Tarry 2014)
• William James was one of the earliest psychologists to study the self and
conceptualized the self as having two aspects:
 “I” – thinking, acting and feeling self
 “Me” – physical characteristics as well as psychological capabilities that makes you who you are

• Carl Rogers
 “I” – the one who acts and decides
 “Me” – what you think or feel about yourself as an object
• Identity- composed of personal characteristics, social roles, and responsibilities, as
well as affiliations that define who one is.
• Self-concept- it is what basically comes to your mind when you are asked about who
you are
Self, identity, and self-concept are not fixed in one time frame nor are they ever-
changing at every moment.
• Self-schema- organized system or collection of knowledge about who we are. It may
also include your interests, work, course, age, name, and physical characteristics,
among others. As you grow and adapt to the changes around you, they also change.
But they are not passive receivers, they actively shape and affect how you see, think,
and feel about things.
According to G.H. Mead, the self is created and developed through human interaction.
There are times, however, when we are aware of our self-concepts; this is also called
self-awareness. Carver and Scheier identified two types pf self that we can be aware of:
1. The private self- your internal standards and private thoughts and feelings, it is
isolated from the external world.
2. The public self- your public image commonly geared toward having a good
presentation of yourself to others.
Self-awareness also presents us with at least three other self-schema:
1. The actual self- who you are at the moment.
2. The ideal self- who you like to be
3. The ought self- who you think you should be
Self-awareness may be positive or negative depending on the
circumstances and our next course of action. It can keep you from doing
something dangerous. In other instances, self-awareness can be too much
that we are concerned bout being observed and criticized by others, also
known as self-consciousness.
At other times, especially with large crowds, we may experience
deindividuation or “the loss of individual self-awareness and individual
accountability in groups”
Our group identity and self-awareness also has a great impact on our self-
esteem, one of the common concepts associated with the “self”. It is
defined as our own positive or negative perception or evaluation of
ourselves.
One of the ways in which our social relationship affects our self-esteem is
through social comparison. According to the social comparison theory, we
learn about ourselves, the appropriateness of our behaviors, as well as our
social status by comparing aspects of ourselves with other people.
The Downward Social Comparison is the more common type of comparing
with ourselves with others. We create a positive self-concept by comparing
ourselves with those who are worse off than us.
The Upward Social Comparison- comparing ourselves with those who are
better off than us. While it can be a form of motivation for some, a lot of
those who do this actually felt lower self-esteem as they highlight more of
their weakness or inequities.
Social comparison also entails what is called self-evaluation
maintenance theory, which states that we can feel threatened
when someone out-performs us, especially when that person is
close to us.
However, in the attempt to increase or maintain self-esteem,
some people become narcissistic.
Narcissism is a trait characterized by overly high self-esteem, self-
admiration, and self centeredness.

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