week 2 - self, other, and inter-subjectivity

Question 1

what is the self?

Answer 1

• where an individual becomes the object of its own conscious reflections
• the self is a social construct, formed through its interactions with other individuals and groups within the social world, which also contains cultural rules and norms

Question 2

How do we understand the self?

Answer 2

• to understand the self, we need self-awareness
• this is the understanding that we are a separate entity from other people and objects in the world

Question 3

Who first explored self-awareness?

Answer 3

• Darwin (1872) explored self-awareness in orangutans
• orangutans did not exhibit awareness that the mirror image was themselves

Question 4

Darwin’s study of orangutans led to the development of what test?

Answer 4

Mirror self-recognition test (Gallup, 1968)

• a mark is placed on an animals forehead, and then the animal is placed in front of a mirror.
  self-awareness is assumed if the animal touches the mark on its own forehead
• chimpanzees touched the mark, showing self-awareness
• only a test of physical awareness not psychological sense of self

Question 5

What is self-concept?

Answer 5

• The personal summary of who we are, including our positive and negative qualities, relationships to others, group memberships, and beliefs
• thus, our sense of self is inherently socially derived - it comes from our interactions with others

Question 6

Where does self-knowledge come from?

Answer 6

Introspection: the process by which one observes and examines one’s internal states (mental and emotional) for behaving a certain way

Question 7

Why is introspection less popular in social psychology?

Answer 7

• Because of the potential for inaccurate reflections as people are not conscious of their reasons for doing things
• Because of the potential to **repress* unwanted thoughts and experiences
• Because of the potential to overestimate their positive aspects

Question 8

What was Wilson & Nisbett (1978)s study on introspection and inaccurate reflections?

Answer 8

• female shoppers asked to rate quality of nylon stockings displayed on a rack
• all stockings actually the same, however some shoppers claimed to have picked based on softness and workmanship
• in truth, tended to pick the one they saw last
• Therefore, people can make up reasons on the spot without realising so

Question 9

What was Macrae et al’s (1994) study on introspection and repression of experiences?

Answer 9

• asked participants to avoid stereotypical thinking when writing about ‘skinheads’
• yet when expecting to meet such an individual, participants in the suppression condition sat significantly further away from the ‘skinhead’

we therefore have very limited self-insight about those aspects of ourselves we wish were not true about us

Question 10

What is an example of introspection and overestimating positive aspects?

Answer 10

• most people think they are better than average on attractiveness, personality traits, skill, competence etc
• this can be good in terms of coping mechanisms however can get in the way when a more accurate view would be helpful (e.g. learning, choosing a job)

Question 11

Why should we not fully discount introspection?

Answer 11

• because of paradigmatic forces
• social psychologists may have differing aims for research, from measuring stable constructs (e.g. IQ) to developing rich meanings (e.g. qualitative interview)
• introspection, although hard to make robust, is an alternative way to understand the self compared with triangulating multiple abstract measures

Question 12

What is the dynamic self?

Answer 12

• the self that is expressed is highly variable and socially contextualised
• you develop a sense of who you are through your interactions with others (e.g. how they react and respond to you, your values, and the meanings you ascribe to these reactions)
• we do not passively absorb social feedback - we actively interpret/create it (e.g. choosing friends, behaviours, clothes)

Question 13

What is active self-construal?

Answer 13

• (Morf & Koole, 2015): a person’s views and knowledge about themself is shaped through an active construal process that plays out in interaction with the social environment
• process is motivated by how one would like to see themself (e.g. want to be seen as smart, funny etc)

Question 14

What are motivation biases in terms of self-construal?

Answer 14

• motivation biases are a key part of self-construal (e.g. does your social media reflect who you are or how you would like to be seen?)

Question 15

What is the self in terms of ‘being’?

Answer 15

• the self goes beyond ‘doing’ as an agent in controlling how we see ourselves
• it can also involve ‘being’, that is describing and understanding our thoughts and feelings
• the ‘self’ therefore has an elaborate knowledge and feeling structure which can both guide and constrain our behaviour

Question 16

What is Bem’s (1972) self-perception theory

Answer 16

• suggests that people can infer states by observing their own behaviour (in the same way they observe others)
• while social psych suggests that attitudes create behaviours, self-perception suggests that behaviours influence/create attitudes (observe other’s behaviours or our own to infer attitudes)

Question 17

What are attributions and how do we explain them?

Answer 17

• attributions: explaining the process of behaviour we observe in others (and ourselves)

we observe two different motivations for behaviour:
- intrinsic motivation (e.g. interest, challenge, enjoyment)
- extrinsic motivation (e.g. praise, esteem, money)

Question 18

What is the danger of justification effect?

Answer 18

where an intrinsic motivation becomes undermined by an external reward
- e.g. being motivated to write an essay because you enjoy it vs receiving praise for the essay from a lecturer

Question 19

What is Festinger’s (1958) social comparison theory?

Answer 19

When people are uncertain of their abilities or opinions (i.e. when objective standards are missing) they then evaluate themselves through comparison with others
- we often need to benchmark ourselves against others even when there is objective information available
- e.g. Klein, 1997: we are happier with a low score that is above average then a high score that is below average

Question 20

What is the main finding of Aaron et al’s (2013) self-expansion model?

Answer 20

people seek to expand their sense of self

Question 21

What are the 2 principles of Aaron et al’s (2013) self-expansion model?

Answer 21

motivation principle: basic human motive to explore, self-improve, broaden perspective

inclusion-of-other-in-self principle: expanding self through relationships, because the other’s resources, perspectives, and identities are experienced as one’s own

Question 22

What is the method of Aaron et al’s (2013) self-expansion model?

Answer 22

• asked 1st and 2nd year undergraduate students (n=329) five times over ten weeks to indicate to indicate if they have fallen in love
• at each testing point participants also had to make an open-ended list of self-descriptive terms (e.g. athletic, outgoing, studious)
• students who had recently fallen in love increased descriptors to include features of their new partner in their own self-concepts

Question 23

What is the ‘other’ in social psychology?

Answer 23

• social psych is full of theories and evidence about how we perceive the role of ‘others’ in our decision making and behaviour
• e.g. conformity, intergroup behaviour, prejudice
• but it is also true that the ‘other’ is an integral part of our self-concept

Question 24

**what is Mead’s (1934) ‘generalised other’ experiment?”

Answer 24

• mead was interested in how children play games
• all games involve ‘position changes’ (taking the role of others)
• to be good at the games you have to understand the role of others
• understanding each individual role is exhausting, children must form a structured and organised idea of a generalised other and how to respond to the challenges it presents
• the generalised other is a guiding concept in knowing what to do yourself in such situations
• children’s game playing is therefore vital in the formation of self concept

Question 25

**What is the Sally-Anne test?**

Answer 25

Baron-Cohen et al., (1985) developed the test to measure a persons ability to understand false beliefs in others - the test involves a story about 2 dolls, sally and anne, and a hidden object - sally puts the object in a basket, then leaves the room - while sally is gone, anne moves the object to a box - the child participant is asked where sally will look for the object when she returns

Question 26

**What is Laing's (1966) interpersonal perception method?**

Answer 26

- social relationships comprise a myriad of simultaneous perspectives - **direct perspectives:** what self and other think about X - **meta perspectives:** each party's estimation of what 'others' think about X mapping these together within a relationship can reveal important constructions related to agreement, disagreement, and perspective-taking

Question 27

**Describe the findings of Heasman & Gillespie's (2018) study on meta-perspectives in autistic individuals**

Answer 27

- study investigated meta-perspectives (how they believe others view them) - Participants with ASD accurately predicted that family members would score them low, even though they disagree with those views - study highlights that we only develop **approximate models** of what we think others are thinking (not a true model), and seek to constantly update this model with new information - the way we view others is affected by **confirmity bias** which is when people see evidence that fits their idea, they stop looking for further evidence

Question 28

**What is Epley et al., (2004)'s theory of anchoring and adjusting?**

Answer 28

we only ever develop an **approximate model** of what we think others are thinking (not a true model), and seek to constantly update this model with new information

Question 29

**What is confirmatory bias?**

Answer 29

when people see evidence that fits their idea, they stop looking for further evidence

Question 30

**What is Komeda's (2015) similarity hypothesis?**

Answer 30

- similarities between **target and perceiver** can facilitate cognitive processing and empathy - autistic individuals are able to remember stories more accurately and have greater empathy for characters who have similar traits to themselves

Question 31

**According to Milton (2012), what is double empathy?**

Answer 31

- "a disjuncture in reciprocity between two differently disposed social actors" - what has been previously understood as a **one-way problem of social interaction** in autism is actually **relational between people of different neurotypes**

Question 32

**What is the double empathy problem? (Crompton et al., 2020)**

Answer 32

autistic and allistic people may struggle to understand each other's thoughts, feelings, behaviours and differences e.g. **autistic individuals may struggle to:** - read between the lines - overcome other peoples' misconceptions about autism - manage sensory distractions **allistic individuals may struggle to:** - form positive first impressions - recognise and understand autism - imagine autistic sensory difficulties

Question 33

**What is intersubjectivity and why is it useful?**

Answer 33

intersubjectivity has been used across many disciplines: - mutual awareness of agreement and disagreement - attribution of intentionality - automatic behaviour orientation (e.g. eye-gaze) **Intersubjectivity is the shared psychological space we create when we communicate** - through dialogue we can **co-create new social realities - instead of analysing individual cognitions, we can analyse how multiple communicate to establish meaning a social psychological view of intersubjectivity is: **"the variety of possible relations between people's perspectives"** (Gillespie & Cornish, 2010)

Question 34

**What are some important theoretical considerations when discussing intersubjectivity?**

Answer 34

- intersubjectivity is shaped by social situations, groups, norms, cultures, and imaginations - intersubjectivity differs from coordination, because coordination focuses on consensus, whereas intersubjectivity focuses on **how people create shared understanding** (Heasman & Gillespie, 2019)

Question 35

**What is conversation analysis?**

Answer 35

CA is a method for gathering data involving **naturalistic interactions** and systematically analysing its **structural organisation**

Question 36

**Why is Conversation Analysis naturalistic, and what does naturalistic mean?**

Answer 36

- meaning is constructed through interactions with others, the environment and context - **minute details** can be extremely important depending on the context (e.g. a judge pausing when delivering a verdict)

Question 37

**Why does Conversation Analysis analyse the structural organisation of interactions?**

Answer 37

- there are so many implicit rules that enable communication to take place - understanding the **structure** of dialogue can tell us how **psychologically relevant** meaning is **shared and understood**

Question 38

**What can be studied using Conversation Analysis?**

Answer 38

**power:** - who is speaking, how long, how often - e.g. interruptions, corrections **co-constructed meaning:** - how is shared meaning constructed? - how are people and activities organised? **norms:** - social norms - what is said or not allowed to be said - cultural norms **institutions:** - used extensively in healthcare settings - e.g. patient physician interactions

Question 39

**When do we use conversation analysis (CA)?**

Answer 39

- useful for empirical research on interaction in **naturalistic settings** where established theories may be lacking or under revision - this is because CA looks for detailed qualitative evidence of how participants work to **organise their interactions sequentially** in each specific situation - popular in **healthcare** settings as it can investigate interactions to make **changes to institutional practice** - particularly conducive to methods such as **participant observation/ethnography and focus groups**

Question 40

**What does Conversation Analysis document?**

Answer 40

we use transcription conventions to tell us: - who is speaking - the order in which things are said - potentially relevant nonverbal features (e.g. pauses) - the way things are said (e.g. rising intonation, emphasis, speed)

Question 41

**What features should you look out for when using Conversation Analysis?**

Answer 41

- turn taking organisation - the adjacency pair - repairs and third-turn sequences - gaps and lapses

Question 42

**What are turn-constructional units?**

Answer 42

**TCU:** pieces of a conversation that comprise an entire turn - the end of a TCU results in a **transition relevant place (TRP)** where we may go to another speaker, or the same speaker may continue - CA organises dialogue in terms of TCU's, and it is the sequential ordering of TCUs that allow it to analyse how meaning is created

Question 43

**What are adjacency pairs in terms of conversation analysis?**

Answer 43

The cooperative aspects of language mean that many statements we make are intimately linked together. For example: - greeting-greeting response ("hi" -> "oh, hi!") - question-answer ("are you okay?" -> "yes") - compliment-acceptance - beckon response ("waiter" -> "yes, sir?") **these are the linguistic building blocks of interaction and coordination**

Question 44

**What are repairs in terms of Conversation Analysis?**

Answer 44

- the mechanism through which a speaker recognises a misalignment of perspective and attempts to correct it - the foundation of meaning-making in dialogue - usually occurs within structured units of 3 turns repairs begin with a **trouble source** (e.g. person makes a statement that is misunderstood), followed by a **question or demonstration** (e.g. other person does not understand and requests a repair OR demonstrated misunderstanding), followed by **other-initiated OR self-initiated repair** (e.g. person repairs in response to the other's request OR person repairs due to failed understanding from the other)

Question 45

**How does intersubjectivity link to neurodivergence?**

Answer 45

norms **guide us** in interactions as to what to say and how. e.g. Grice's (1989) co-operative principles: - **quality:** what you say should be true - **quantity:** contribution should be as informative as required - **relation:** contribution is relevant to what has been said - **manner:** contribution is clear and easy to understand violating these norms can create fundamental communicative barriers, however... - what abt cultural differences? - what about those with communicative differences (e.g. ASD) **neurodiversity:** people who have different social abilities are not "deficient" - rather they are a natural part of human variation - **neurodivergence** related to individual variation in cognitive profile - understanding how neurodivergent people interact with each other could reveal new and creative forms of interaction potential

Question 46

**what is neurodivergence?**

Answer 46

individual variations in cognitive profiles

Question 47

**What is Heasman & Gillespie's (2019) study of neurodivergence and interaction?**

Answer 47

- interested in understanding **naturally occuring** interactions between autistic people - studied video-gaming at a charity supporting autistic adults - used CA to map out dyadic dialogue between 2 players - scored each 'turn' in a conversation according to three common properties of intersubjectivity **coherence:** how much did the turn relate to the previous turn? **affect:** how positive/negative was the turn emotionally? **symmetry:** how was a turn said in comparison to the previous turn? (e.g. volume, length) - No one type of coordination prevailed-they could all vary independently of each other