Building on previous research showing that self-affirmation can buffer stress, we tested whether an experimental manipulation of self-affirmation improves problem-solving performance in chronically stressed participants. Notably, we also did not observe a significant self-affirmation condition time interaction (F(2, 67)=.43 p=.65, 2=.01) or a condition time chronic stress interaction (F(2, 67)=1.15 p=.32, 2=.03) (Figure 2), indicating that there were no differential effects of self-affirmation (or the self-affirmation chronic stress interaction) on heart rate. (adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({}); The self-affirmation theory posits that people have a fundamental motivation to maintain self-integrity, a perception of themselves as good, virtuous, and able to predict and control important outcomes. When one's integrity is threatened, self-affirmations can minimize the implications of the threat for the self, even when those affirmations are in a domain other than the self-threat (Sherman & Cohen, 2006). broad scope, and wide readership a perfect fit for your research every time. Self-integrity is a sense of global efficacy, an . '1rzo{J GBLQ;L5ex0#DhSx!XY#!6=Q g==POom;Ky>iuWu:2tY F1'V+Y}@? KhH2Z0$~U`:kZb]m,=o~UCj,M. The psychology of change: self-affirmation and social psychological intervention People have a basic need to maintain the integrity of the self, a global sense of personal adequacy. I give myself permission to do what is right for me. x2j "6g7U{;"$cdZ99@PpKq}h1m'Wa'2XVm8]Z Yk They take excessive credit for success while denying responsibility for failure. Events that threaten self-integrity arouse stress and self-protective defenses that can hamper performance and growth. It holds that individuals are motivated to maintain self-integrity: a sense that one is a person of worth, morally adequate and effective at making changes in one's life. These heart rate and mean arterial blood pressure results are in accord with our previous work showing that self-affirmation does not appreciably alter heart rate or blood pressure responses to acute stress-challenge tasks [9]. 38 . (1998). These findings have important implications for self-affirmation research and educational interventions. Instead, our data indicate that participants across conditions were similarly engaged in the problem-solving task. 261-302). In her article on the stereotype inoculation model, Nilanjana Dasgupta (this issue) makes a powerful case that numbers shape the psychology of women and minorities in fields related to science, A persistent puzzle emerges from a review of the psychological research literature on how people defend the self from potentially threatening information and events: People can be adamantly, Smith, J. Allegra (B. Sherman, D. K., & Cohen, G. L. (2006). 8600 Rockville Pike Although self-affirmation condition participants wrote somewhat longer essays on average (M=68.79 words, SD=25.9) than did control condition participants (M=60.34, SD=26.9), this difference was not statistically significant (F(1,72)=1.63, p=.21). Research suggesting that certain illusions may be adaptive for mental health and well-being is reviewed, examining evidence that a set of interrelated positive illusionsnamely, unrealistically positive self-evaluations, exaggerated perceptions of control or mastery, and unrealistic optimismcan serve a wide variety of cognitive, affective, and social functions. In the Trier Social Stress task, participants are asked to give a short speech in front of a panel of judges who do not give any comments or positive feedback to the participant. Enhancing a brief writing intervention to combat stereotype threat among middle-school students. Panel A depicts the results for participants low in chronic stress, and Panel B depicts the results for participants high in chronic stress, as determined by median split. 0000004722 00000 n Research has not yet identified the underlying mechanisms of how self-affirmation buffers against stress and reduces defensiveness. Unauthorized use of these marks is strictly prohibited. Thus, when people are given an opportunity to affirm their self-integrity in an alternative domain, the rationalization effect disappears. Site Information Terms of Use Privacy User Login David Creswell and colleagues had participants complete a self-affirmation procedure before engaging in the stressful experience of public speaking and mental arithmetic in front of a hostile audience. [4] There are six different value domains on the Allport-Vernon-Lindzey Values scale: religion, theoretical, aesthetic, political, social, and economic. People led to commit an action espousing a position with which they disagree (for example, students who write in favor of tuition increases) subsequently come to agree with the position when they believe that their actions were freely chosen. The psychology of self-affirmation: Sustaining the integrity of the self. [| Lg Ep5Fbn2U**EAl]@ \`)%bH~N$|$RjSR*Dm51POgF/No\Qd pmw@2}\ endstream endobj 238 0 obj 1118 endobj 215 0 obj << /Type /Page /Parent 206 0 R /Resources 216 0 R /Contents 226 0 R /MediaBox [ 0 0 527 743 ] /CropBox [ 0 0 527 743 ] /Rotate 0 >> endobj 216 0 obj << /ProcSet [ /PDF /Text ] /Font << /F1 222 0 R /F2 218 0 R /F3 219 0 R /F4 227 0 R /F5 231 0 R >> /ExtGState << /GS1 233 0 R >> >> endobj 217 0 obj << /Filter /FlateDecode /Length 223 >> stream Following the self-affirmation writing task, as a manipulation check, participants were asked to respond to two items assessing how important the value they wrote about was, using a 6-point response scale (1=Strongly Disagree to 6=Strongly Agree). We conducted six studies ( N = 9,110) to explore how shame influences financial hardship by increasing financial disengagement. Reducing the racial achievement gap: a social-psychological intervention. Pers Soc Psychol Rev. Items were, This value has influenced my life and This value is an important part of who I am (study =.96). Threats against a person's self-integrity are events or messages that imply an individual is not good or adequate in a personally relevant domain. William M. P. Klein, (1968). Semantic Scholar's . In virtually all cultures and historical periods, there are socially shared conceptions of what it means to be a person of self-integrity. For each RAT item, participants saw three words on a computer screen (e.g., flake, mobile, cone) and were asked to generate a fourth word (e.g., snow) that when combined with each of the three stimulus words results in a common word pair used in everyday English language (e.g., snowflake, snow mobile, snow cone). Loch et al. [3] For example, in the experiment detailed above in which coffee drinkers read an article about caffeine consumption and increased risk of breast cancer, self-affirmation only reduced defensiveness in individuals who were heavy coffee drinkers and not in occasional coffee drinkers. Advances in experimental social psychology, 38, pp. The psychology of self-defense: Self-affirmation theory. The results were discussed in terms of their support for a resources theory of individual differences in resilience to self-image threats--an extension of self-affirmation theory, their implications for self-esteem functioning, and the continuing debate over self-enhancement versus self-consistency motivation. Several prominent self-theories in social psychology emphasize either the self-as-object or the self-as-subject. Another limitation of our study is that we measured chronic stress using a self-report measure, and this measure was collected at the end of our study session (although there were no experimental (self-affirmation manipulation) effects on chronic stress scores). 0000014002 00000 n Thus we did not find supporting evidence for positive affect as a mediator for the self-affirmation main effect or the chronic stress self-affirmation interaction on problem-solving performance. The research presented has . Outline the benefits of having high self-esteem. SQc7?8GY>2&oZ#jtV=nw_,RU4 ZUhV;,Jn$Ne=)V"HvDEI4JsqR4CG&XUItzm7*sTm&+QEyU%-4T>v0U5>mdcm" kI"VD2:q/ puc The social psychologist Claude Steele first proposed the theory of self-affirmation. The postulate that people are motivated to maintain self-integrity rests at the center of self-affirmation theory (Steele 1988; see also Sherman & Cohen 2006). Discover a faster, simpler path to publishing in a high-quality journal. Importantly, the changes in heart rate and blood pressure reaffirm that the RAT task was stressful for participants. PLoS ONE, 8(5), e62593, James, G. D., Crews, D. E., & Pearson, J. Do people tell you that you lack confidence? Steele purported that the self is made up of different domains: roles, values, and belief systems. San Diego: Academic. There was a significant improvement in serum phosphate levels for the affirmed patients compared to the group of non-affirmed patients, suggesting better adherence to phosphate binders. They may attempt to reduce this discomfort by directly resolving the . When we do this, it helps us realize that our self-worth is not contingent on whatever negative feedback we just got (Sherman & Cohen, 2006). Although the affirmed state stemming from a self-affirmation may appear relatively brief, the changes in attributions and information processing it prompts can become self-reinforcing or self-sustaining over time. The PubMed wordmark and PubMed logo are registered trademarks of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). Affirmation of personal values buffers neuroendocrine and psychological stress responses. [3] This change in perspective shifts attention away from the threat in one domain of the self toward a larger context of who they are. We thus selected 30 challenging RAT items ranging in difficulty from moderately to extremely difficult (the items are available in Table S1). Each of us faces numerous threats to our self-worth (insults, criticism, etc.). (1997). Feeling chronically stressed produces similar performance impairments. J Couns Psychol. doi: 10.1146/annurev-psych-010213-115137. The cessation of rumination through self-affirmation. New York: Psychology Press, Sherman, D. A., Nelson, L. D., & Steele, C. M. (2000). Personal, behavioral, and environmental risk and protective factors for adolescent overweight. 38, pp. Get the help you need from a therapist near youa FREE service from Psychology Today. A major insight of this theory involves the notion that although people try to maintain specific self-images (such as being a good student or being a good family member), that is not their primary motivation. In times of conflict, here's how to not add fuel to the fire. First, we tested whether chronic stress is related to poorer problem-solving performance. Belief systems include the ideologies to which a person ascribes, such as religious or political beliefs. Second, we tested whether self-affirmation improves problem-solving. Similarly, the self-affirmation condition time (F(2, 64)=.13, p=.88, 2=.004) and condition time chronic stress (F(2, 64)=1.53 p=.23, 2=.05) interactions were not significant (Figure 3). The Psychology of Self-Defense: Self-Affirmation Theory by David Sherman & Geoffrey Cohen. And why do they persist in maladaptive behavior even when persuasive information or personal experience recommends, Journal of personality and social psychology. In this paper, we update the field on research conducted using self-affirmation theory as a framework. However, if their needs for self-integrity are met in another domain, they have less need to resort to negative stereotypes. People with social isolation schema may have grown up feeling like they dont belong, and like theres something wrong with them. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript. They know that "busyness" is very different from progress. Wrote the paper: JDC JMD WMPK PRH JML. Evidence That Self-Affirmation Improves Phosphate Control in Hemodialysis Patients: A Pilot Cluster Randomized Controlled Trial. All predictor variables were mean-centered prior to being entered in multiple regression equations. Self-Affirmation Theory The social psychologist Claude Steele proposed self-affirmation theory in 1988. Psychology Today 2023 Sussex Publishers, LLC. John M. Levine, Affiliation: There is thus some fungibility in the sources of self-integrity. The present research examines how a motivational process triggered by a, View 6 excerpts, cites background and methods. 445 0 obj <> endobj When our self-esteem is threatened, we. A great deal of money could be earned and fame accrued. Previous research had demonstrated that African Americans experience threat and its concomitant stress, in situations in which they know that they or fellow group members could be judged in light of a negative racial stereotype. 523 0 obj <>stream Bookshelf There was also no interaction between self-affirmation condition and chronic stress level on number of words written (F(1,72)=1.30, p=.26). However, participants who completed the two values essays did not show an increase in catecholamine levels from baseline to their midterm.[12]. 0000014641 00000 n Sherman, D. K., & Cohen, G. L. (2006). Simpson " trial of the century " in the mid-1990s captured the attention of the American populace more than any other public spectacle since the kidnaping of the Lindberg baby in. Science. Self-affirmation theory contends that if individuals reflect on values that are personally relevant to them, they are less likely to experience distress and react defensively when confronted with information that contradicts or threatens their sense of self. In virtually all cultures and historical periods, there are socially shared conceptions of what it means to be a person of self-integrity. This study found that self-affirmed participants from individualist cultures saw reductions in cognitive dissonance, whereas self-affirmed participants from collectivist cultures did not experience a reduction in cognitive dissonance. 0000013317 00000 n The psychology of self-affirmation: Sustaining the integrity of the self . An absolute gem that seems not to be much talked about, self-affirmation theory gives us both practical approaches to dealing with problems, and a fresh and surprising theoretical viewpoint on various issues in cognitive science. Self-affirmation theory posits that the goal of the self is to protect ones self-image when threatened and that one way to do this is through affirmation of valued sources of self-worth [6], [7]. [3] To date, increasing positive emotions and self-esteem have been investigated as mechanisms of self-affirmation, but the findings are mixed. Investigating attitudes cross-culturally: A case of cognitive dissonance among East Asians and North Americans. 10 Empowering Self-Affirmations for the Family Caregiver. Events that threaten self-integrity arouse stress and self-protective defenses that can hamper performance and growth. Consistent with hypotheses, we observed a significant main effect of chronic stress on RAT performance (=.45, t(72)=2.75, p=.008), such that participants with higher stress in the last month had lower problem-solving performance. Participants who completed the values list had significantly lower stress response than individuals in the control condition, as indicated by a lower cortisol response in affirmed participants compared to participants who did not complete the self-affirmation condition. The authors argue that individuals regulate perceptions of their relationships in a self-protective way, finding virtue in their partners only when they feel confident that their partners also see, Fig. All of these "rationalizations" actually help us continue to feel good about ourselves, so they are generally good for our well-being. Catecholamine levels are thought to be high when individuals are experiencing higher stress. Given that self-affirmation increased state positive affect, we conducted mediation analyses (following procedure described in [31]) testing whether state positive affect mediated the impact of self-affirmation on problem-solving. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 77(1), 111, Raghunathan, R., & Trope, Y. 0000002796 00000 n In addition, people are more open to threatening courses of actionfor example, compromising with an adversary in a divisive social-political disputewhen self-affirmed. Claude Steele originally popularized self-affirmation theory in the late 1980s,[1][2] and it remains a well-studied theory in social psychological research.[3][4]. One primary aim of my research is the development of theory-driven, rigorously tested intervention strategies that further our understanding of the processes underpinning social problems and that offer solutions to alleviate them. And, we tend to be overly optimistic about our chances of success, our knowledge, and our competence (Sherman & Cohen, 2006). Although participants showed an overall significant heart rate increase from baseline (M=68.50, SE=1.03) to the RAT problem solving period (M=76.44, SE=1.31) (paired-samples t(69)=9.26, p=<.001), there were no significant main effect or interactive effects of conditions on heart rate change. Collectively, this work suggests that if self-affirmation can reduce stress, it may also promote problem-solving performance under high stress conditions, although no previous studies have tested the effects of self-affirmation manipulations on actual problem-solving performance [12][16]. Advances in Experimental Social Psychology. The sample thus consisted of 73 students (34 females; 39 males) who ranged in age from 18 to 34, with an average age of 21 (SD=2.4). As expected, self-affirmation and control participants wrote about different values during the writing activity (2(10)=33.7, p<.001; see Table 4), such that participants in the control condition wrote about a ninth-ranked value that was different from the first-ranked value in the self-affirmation condition. Researchers propose that this is because we have a psychological protection systema system that involves a variety of automatic, defensive mental strategies that protect our self-esteem from plummeting in the face of threats (Sherman & Cohen, 2006). Researchers have found that previously engaging in child-health-promoting. For some, this has been a positive experience in which the values, customs and institutions they believe in are the, A theorybased intervention known as selfaffirmation provides people with the opportunity to affirm a sense of selfintegrity, a global image of moral and adaptive adequacy, at moments of, Current Directions in Psychological Science, The question of the antecedents of prejudicial responses has a long history that includes contributions of historical, structural, cultural, and psychological factors. Semantic Scholar is a free, AI-powered research tool for scientific literature, based at the Allen Institute for AI. I deserve time for myself and can attend to my own emotional, physical, and spiritual needs without guilt or apology. In laboratory experiments, psychologists induce self-affirmation in participants in order to investigate the influence of self-affirmation on individuals' well-being. 213 0 obj << /Linearized 1 /O 215 /H [ 949 1237 ] /L 505870 /E 21823 /N 60 /T 501491 >> endobj xref 213 26 0000000016 00000 n Participants who did not complete the self-affirmation condition demonstrated increased catecholamine response from baseline to their midterm exam. [1] Roles include responsibilities a person has, such as being a parent, friend, student, or professional. Self-affirmation effects on heart rate during the baseline, RAT performance, and recovery periods. Rumination is when people cannot stop fixating on a particular thought. Epub 2011 Nov 14. The psychology of self-defense: Self-affirmation theory. Social-psychological research, A key question about achievement motivation is how to maintain it over time and in the face of stress and adversity. High levels of acute and chronic stress are known to impair problem-solving and creativity on a broad range of tasks. #1 Ranked Value selected by participants according to self-affirmation condition and chronic stress level (as determined by median split). yZzxcg3gsT"#-US5$~(9*,H,M-F/&~AnQ"W ARnv$t1;;P=7e*b@S{aSjqQAY5dM3M9y2CL#+j,UntSxp ~' TA9MPWaIWu^~}N/4mJi[=Q9'o}m>`]C9f This research illuminates both the motivational processes underlying self-integrity maintenance and the implications of such processes for many domains of psychology. One of the most important implications of contemporary research on self-affirmation theory involves its demonstration that seemingly small interventions can have large effects, if they are attuned to psychological processes of self-integrity maintenance. Then, say it to yourself using these guidelines: Finding ways to maintain our self-worth is a worthwhile endeavor. Our experimental manipulation of self-affirmation was dummy coded (self-affirmation=1, control=0). Metacognition allows you to connect the dots, see the big picture, self-evaluate and self-monitor. Psychological vulnerability and stress: the effects of self-affirmation on sympathetic nervous system responses to naturalistic stressors. The results demonstrate that self-evaluation significantly captures self-sentiment change between self-affirmation and self-uncertainty whereas the traditional self-integrity scale did. Culture, dissonance, and self-affirmation. 183-242). Dispositional, unrealistic, and comparative optimism: Differential relations with the knowledge and processing of risk information and beliefs about personal risk. We can "self-affirm"or protect our sense of selfby engaging in activities that remind us of who we are. Benefits from self-affirmation are thought to primarily occur when the perceived threat is in an area of importance to the individual. Advances in experimental social psychology, 38, 183-242. 2010. Poor phosphate control in this population can be dangerous and life-threatening. In one study investigating the effects of self-affirmation on stress response, undergraduate participants completed the Trier social stress test, a standardized laboratory paradigm used to induce stress in participants. Adapted from an article published by The Berkeley Well-Being Institute. It is thought that answering questions about a value domain that they find important will make that value more salient to them, resulting in self-affirmation. Conceived and designed the experiments: JDC JMD WMPK PRH JML. Self-affirmation was used successfully to mitigate the psychological threat associated with being the target of a negative stereotype in school. Advances in Experimental Social Psychology. National Library of Medicine In social, 1 to many Americans reevaluating the kind of country they thought they lived in. The present study provides the first evidence that self-affirmation can protect against the deleterious effects of stress on problem-solving performance. Prejudice as self-image maintenance: Affirming the self through derogating others. Advances in Experimental Social Psychology. The psychology of self-affirmation: Sustaining the integrity of the self. 0000013411 00000 n [3] One study investigated the effects of self-affirmation on reducing cognitive dissonance. Disclaimer. Self-affirmations can come from many sources. There are four main principles of self-affirmation theory. Steele, CM (1988) The psychology of self-affirmation: . Despite this evidence, we know little about protective factors for mitigating the deleterious effects of stress on problem-solving. Do messages about health risks threaten the self? Self-affirmation reduces biased processing of health-risk information. Why do people resist evidence that challenges the validity of longheld beliefs? PLOS ONE promises fair, rigorous peer review, Status competition and performance in work groups Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization (2000) Self-affirmation theory posits that the goal of the self is to protect one's self-image when threatened and that one way to do this is through affirmation of valued . [3] For example, self-integrity can take the form of being independent, intelligent, a helpful member of a society, part of a family, and/or part of a group. Steele, C. M. (1988). Department of Psychology, University of Sheffield, Sheffield, United Kingdom, Affiliation: Self-affirmations can also help to reduce physiological and psychological stress responses. New York: Norton. . Low and high stress groups (as measured by the Perceived Stress Scale) were determined by median split for visual presentation. Yet the other 70% of the time, this player would have failed. official website and that any information you provide is encrypted J Pers Soc Psychol. The interventions bring about a more expansive view of the self and its resources, weakening the implications of a threat for personal integrity. Examination of how video games can also increase players' willingness to internalize important but threatening self-information suggests that while players who value video game success as part of their identity may reap benefits from video game play after a self-threat, those who do not value such success may experience more harmful effects. As described above, age was included as a covariate in all analyses (except the preliminary chi-square analyses described below). (2006). In sum, there was no evidence that self-affirmation condition or chronic stress level affected participants selection of their top-ranked value. The study tracked the students' grades for three years. A one-way ANCOVA confirmed that the self-affirmation group (M=22.97, SD=1.38) rated the value as significantly more important than did the control group (M=15.13, SD=3.69), F(1, 71)=142.6, p<.001, 2=.671, indicating success of the value-affirmation manipulation. Despite many studies showing that acute and chronic stressors can impair problem-solving [1], [2], [4], we know little about stress management and coping approaches for buffering stress during problem-solving [36]. It is important to note that the task used in the present study (RAT) is a common measure of creativity performance and insight [18], [33], and hence our study suggests that self-affirmation may increase creativity and insight in stressed individuals [16], [34]. THE PSYCHOLOGY OF SELFDEFENSE: SELFAFFIRMATION THEORY David K. Sherman GeoVrey L. Cohen I. Corrections, Expressions of Concern, and Retractions. The results were discussed in terms of their support for a resources theory of individual differences in resilience to self-image threats--an extension of self-affirmation theory, their implications for self-esteem functioning, and the continuing debate over self-enhancement versus self-consistency motivation. People have been shown to be more open to persuasive information, and less biased in their evaluations of political information and health risk warnings if they are first permitted to self-affirm in an unrelated domain, for instance, by reflecting on an important personal value. Findings suggest that self-affirmation buffered against the negative effects of stress on problem-solving performance. ), Advances in experimental social psychology (Vol. Like Steinbeck, we have wondered why some people are more resilient to the vicissitudes of life than others, that is, why their sense of worth and the psychological states that vary with it (e.g., OVERVIEW The O.J. The psychology of selfdefense: Selfaffirmation theory. A great deal of money could be earned and fame accrued. Self-affirmed participants had lost more weight, had lower body mass index, and smaller waist circumference than non-affirmed women. Ethnicity (Caucasian vs. all others) and gender (male vs. female) did not moderate any of the primary study results (see Tables 1 and 2). In M. P. Zanna (Ed.) Adapted with permission. We provide an overview of self-afrmation theory and review research in three areas where the theory has yielded impactful self-afrmation interventions: education, health, and interpersonal and intergroup relationships. Participants also reported how much chronic stress they endured over the past month. This site needs JavaScript to work properly. In the present study, we test whether a brief self-affirmation can buffer the negative impacts of chronic stress on problem-solving. Cohen, G. L., Garcia, J., Purdie-Vaughns, V., Apfel, N., & Brzustoski, P. (2009). 2013. Thus, our findings identify a potential mechanism by which a self-affirmation intervention at the beginning of a school term can improve at-risk students academic achievement, reducing achievement disparities between African Americans and European Americans and between women and men in science [12][15]. As noted earlier, previous research suggests that heart rate is a useful indirect marker for task engagement [24], [25]. 2012 Mar;102(3):479-96. doi: 10.1037/a0026312. [4] In order to do this, participants rank a list of values from most important to least important to them. [3] That is, if someone perceives threat to one domain, he or she can accommodate this threat by upholding a value in another domain. FOIA All participants collected urine samples for 24 hours two weeks prior to their midterm (baseline) as well as for the 24 hours prior to their midterm examination so levels their catecholamine levels could be measured. [2] Promoting one's values can affirm the individual and reduce the perceived threat. Eighty undergraduates indicated their perceived chronic stress over the previous month and were randomly assigned to either a self-affirmation or control condition. [24][25] In contrast, several studies fail to detect any effect of self-affirmation on mood, suggesting self-affirmation does not operate via increases in positive mood.
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