LESSON 4: THE SELF FROM THE PERSPECTIVE OF

PSYCHOLOGY
 Psychology is the field of the social sciences
that deals with the description, explanation,
prediction and control of behaviour.
 Evolving into a science only in the late 19th
century from the discipline of philosophy,
the field assumed the existence of the states
of consciousness in human beings.
 Connected to the study of human behaviour
is the concept of the self.
WILLIAM JAMES
 THE ‘ME’ AND THE ‘I’
 William James concluded that thoughts have
five characteristics:
 1. All human thoughts are owned by some
personal self.
 2. All thoughts are constantly changing or are
never static.
 3. There is a continuity of thoughts as its focus
shifts from one object to another.
 4. Thoughts deal with objects that are different
from and independent of consciousness itself.
 5. Consciousness can focus on particular objects
and not others.
 Thoughts are associated with the existence of
the self.
 James further believed that the self is make up
of two parts: the ME self and the I self.
 The ME self can be considered as a separate
object or individual that the person refers to
when discussing or describing their personal
experiences.
 For example: the gifts were sent to ME.
 The I self is the self that knows and recognizes
who they are and what they have done.
 For example: I borrowed the book from the
library.
 James called the ME self as the empirical ME
and the I self the Pure Ego or the thinking self.
 The ME self is further divided three
components namely: the material self, the
social self and the spiritual self.
 1. The Material Self
 Consists of the things or objects that belong
to the person or entities that a person
belongs to.
 Example is the person’s body.
 The body is the core of the material self and
everything that is attached or associated to it
identifies the person.
  For instance, you can identify the person by
the style of clothes he wears, the type of
books he reads.
 The more attached and identified the person
is to his material things, the more he will be
affected if any of them changes.
 2. The Social Self
 Refers to who the person is in a particular
social situation.
 Changes in behaviour usually result from the
different social situations the person fins
himself in.
 For example, the person changes how he
presents himself when he is at home.
  The person chooses the self that would
smoothly adapt to the social situation in
order for him to fit in.
 3 The Spiritual Self
 Refers to the self that is more concrete or
permanent when compared to the material
and social selves.
 This self is the most subjective and intimate
part of the self.
 It includes aspects like the individual’s
personality, values, and morals that are
usually stable and constant.
 The spiritual self is always engaging in the
process of introspection (self-observation).
 If there is conflict in the spiritual self then it
will be very difficult for the person to have
peace of mind.
GLOBAL AND DIFFERENTIATED SELF MODELS
 The global self represent the overall value that a
person places upon himself.
 This affects how he views and feels about
himself.
 The groups of people that he interact with
every day of his strongly influence him.
 These people are who he turns to when he
needs advice, someone to talk to or just to be
with.
 His global self is the product of all experiences
that he had in the society which accounts for
the kind of person he presently is.
Murray Bowen
 In his observations of the family (particularly
his own) he came up with the concept of a
differentiated self.
 In his theory, he observe that there are two
forces affecting the person; the first is
togetherness and the second is individuality.
 A balance should be maintained between these
two forces for: too much togetherness creates
friction and conflict and prevents the development
of the person’s sense of self; to much individuality
on the other hand results in distant and estrange
feelings towards family and other people.
 A differentiated self, though still affected by
the presence of others, has the ability to
separate feelings and thoughts.
 The person recognizes that he has his own
personality and therefore endowed with
unique characteristics not found in other
members of the group.
 Being able to free himself from the
influence of others allows him to define
himself.
 The differentiated self enables the person to
develop and sustain his unique identity,
make his own choices and accept
responsibility for his behaviour and still be
able to stay emotionally connected with his
family and friends.
REAL AND IDEAL SELF-CONCEPT
 Carl Rogers stated that the term self-concept is
used to refer to how a person thinks about or
perceives himself.
 There are two types of self-concept: the real
self-concept and the ideal self-concept.
 The real self-concept
 Refers to all information and perception the
person has about himself.
 This is who he actually is and answers the
question, “Who am I?”
 The ideal self-concept
 Is the model version the person has of
himself.
 This idealized view was borne out of his
experiences, standards and demands of
society and the heroes and models which he
chooses to imitate.
 In short, the ideal self is what the person
aims for himself to be.
 It answers the question of who he wants to
become or “Who do I want to be?”
 Rogers stated that there should be
congruence (sameness, equality) between
the real self and the ideal self in order for the
person to be happy and satisfied with his life.
 If the real self is very different from the ideal
self then the person will experience
dissatisfaction and may see himself as a failure
or a loser.
MULTIPLE AND UNIFIED SELVES
 The Multiple Selves Theory suggests that there
exists in the individual different aspects of the
self.
 It makes sense that the self is a whole made up
of parts.
 These parts of the self may manifest themselves
when situations call for it.
 A psychologically healthy individual, however,
is a person who is able to make sense of the
something confusing and conflicting aspects of
themselves and integrate them into a single,
unified self.
 A unified being is essentially connected to
consciousness, awareness and agency.
 To be considered a well-adjusted person,
success and failures should be accepted and
understood.
TRUE AND FALSE SELVES

 D.W. Winnicott looked into the significance

of play in child development.
 It is also through play where he observed
children/people as having true and false
selves.
 The true self individuals is one in which the
self is seen as creative, spontaneously
experiencing each day of their lives,
appreciating being alive, real, integrated
and connected to the whole of existence.
 The true self is the individual who recognizes
his strengths and accepts his limitations,
enjoys winning and success and learns from
mistakes and failures.
 Never afraid to try all over again.
 A false self may be manifested as a form of
defense.
 It lacks spontaneity, is dead and empty.
 It is a mask that hides the true person for fear
of the pain of rejection and failure.
 False selves usually surface when the person is
forced to comply with existing social norms
and standards.
 True and false selves are present in all
individuals.
 For the two to exist in a healthy individual,
they should be functional for the advantage
of both the person himself and his society.
THE SELF AS PROACTIVE AN AGENTIC
 Albert Bandura is the proponent of the
personality theory known as The Social
Cognitive theory.
 In his theory, the person is seen as proactive
and agentic which means that he has the
capacity exercise control over his life.
 The human agency according to him is the
essence of being human.
 In his Triadic Reciprocal Causation Paradigm,
he explains further how human beings are
affected by the interaction among
environmental events, behavior and personal
factors.
 In his theory, the basic principle involved in
human learning is learning through
observation.
 A large portion of human behaviour
resulted from modelling in which the
behaviour of the model is consciously
acquired for in the mind of the person; this
process will help him achieve his goals.
 Human nature as described by Bandura is
plastic and flexible.
 The Social Cognitive Theory suggested that
human beings are proactive, self-regulating
self-reflective and self-organizing.
 People have the ability to influence their
own behaviour which may lead to desired
outcomes.
 This human agency involves the active
process of exploration and manipulation in
order to influence the environment and
achieve desired consequences.
FEATURES OF HUMAN AGENCY
 In the Social Cognitive Theory, Bandura
discusses the four features of human agency:
 1. Intentionality refers to the actions
performed by the person intentionally or
with full awareness of his behavior.
 This feature involves planning awareness of
the possible consequences of actions.
 2. Forethought refers to the person’s
anticipation of likely outcomes of his
behavior.
 This allows him to select from a repertoire
of behaviors and determine which one will
most likely lead to a possible outcome.
 3. Self-reactiveness refers to the process in
which the person is motivated and regulates
his behaviour as he observes his progress in
achieving his goals.
 4. Self-reflectiveness refers to the person
looking inward and evaluating his
motivations, values, life goals and other
people’s effect on him.
 An important aspect is self-efficacy which
is the person’s belief that he is capable of
behaviour that will produce the desired
positive results.
 SELF-REGULATION
 The person engages in self-regulated
behaviour when he reactively attempts to
minimize the discrepancies between what he
has already accomplished and what he still
wants to achieve.
 After seeing that he is at the right track in
achieving his goal, he will also proactively set
new and higher goals for himself.
 Self-regulation allows the person to set goals
that are better and higher than the former,
challenging his capabilities and making him
a wiser and self-actualized individual.