High Public Self-consciousness Research Articles

The individual difference of response to the negative side of self-enhancing presentation

In this study, scales were developed to measure responses to negative aspects of others' and own self-enhancing presentation, and relationships among the scales and self-consciousness were examined. With factor analysis, the scale for responses to others' self-enhancing presentation was divided into three subscales: emotional, critical, and empathic. The scale for those of own self-enhancing presentation was similarly divided into three: disliking, analytical, and accepting. The scales and self-consciousness scale (translated by Sakamoto, 1989) were administered to 373 university and professional school students (204 male and 169 female). The main findings were as follows: 1) Self-disliking and analytical subjects had high public self-consciousness and social anxiety, and tended to show high emotionality toward other's self-enhancing presentation. 2) Self-accepting subjects had high public self-consciousness, and responded empathically, but not emotionally, to other's self-enhancing presentation.

The effect of the observer on causal attribution and task performance

The purpose of the present study was to examine the effect of the observer on causal attribution and task performance of students. The self-consciousness scale (SCS) was administered to 162 undergraduates and seventy-six students were selected as subjects according to their public SCS score (38 from the high-score group and 38 from the low-score group). The 2×2 factorial design (high and low public self-consciousness scores by observed and unobserved situations) was used. The reactions of the students were scored by 1) the degree of causal factors induced by failures in the pre-trial, and 2) the amount of increasing number of ANAGRAM (correct word puzzles) between the pre-trial and the experimental trial. The main findings were as follows: (1) the high public self-consciousness group attributed their failures to more internal and stable dimensions than that of the low-public group. (2) Subjects who was not observed showed a higher level of performance than that of subjects' performance in observed situation. These results suggest the difference of public self-consciousness and the manipulation of observer influenced the causal attribution and task performance respectively.

Individual Differences in Men's Perceptions of and Reactions to Thinning Hair

Data obtained from 91 American male respondents, ranging in age from 23 to 66 years of age, indicated that a personality trait, public self-consciousness, pertaining to habitual attention to and concern for public self-aspects, was related to both perceptions of men with thinning hair and reactions to one's own thinning hair. Men with high public self-consciousness were not only more likely to believe that balding men were less attractive, but were also more likely to believe that balding men were less desirable romantic partners for women. Furthermore, faced with their own hair loss, they expressed greater concern and were more willing to try prescription hair remedies to grow thicker hair than were their low self-consciousness counterparts. Despite the concern that hair loss appears to cause many men, there was no evidence that the onset of hair loss caused changes in level of public self-consciousness.

THE EFFECTS OF THE CONSENSUS FORMING PATTERNS AND PUBLIC SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS IN MEMBERS' JUDGEMENTS

This experiment was conducted to compare the conformity rates in the case of the suddenly formed consensus and in that of the gradually formed consensus in elective task. Moreover, the effects of public self-consciousness scores in conformity were tested. Subjects were 35 (10 males and 25 females) college students. The results were as follows. The conformity rates under the suddenly formed consensus condition were higher than that under the gradually formed consensus condition. However, follow ing the experiment, no difference was found between the suddenly formed consensus condition and the gradually formed consensus condition with regard to the amount of private acceptance. And High public self-consciousness scorers conformed more than low scorers.

An Analysis of the Self-Handicapping Scale

The two studies reported in this article examined the psychometric properties of the Self-Handicapping Scale (SHS), an individual difference measure of the tendency to engage in behaviors that strategically protect self-esteem. 'In the first study, initial analyses indicated that the SHS possessed one major factor and several trivial factors. As a result, an abbreviated form of the scale was created; this short form possesses internal consistency higher than that found in the original scale. Correlational analyses with both versions indicated that high self-handicapping was related reliably to high public self-consciousness, high social anxiety, high other-directedness, high depression, and low self-esteem. These relations were stronger when the short form was used, suggesting its psychometric as well as practical utility. In a second study, the validity of the short form was examined by administering it to a sample of students along with a questionnaire that requested information concerning extenuating c...

Factors affecting entrapment in escalating conflicts: The importance of timing

Entrapping conflicts are those in which individuals continue to invest their resources—even in seemingly losing propositions-in large part to justify previous unfilled expenditures. It has been demonstrated that individuals define their motivation for investing very differently at the various stages of an entrapping conflict. One implication of this motivational dynamic is that various factors may differentially affect degree of entrapment (i.e., amount invested), depending upon the point in time at which they are introduced. The present studies were designed to test this notion. All subjects were given an initial monetary stake and had the opportunity to win more by taking part in an entrapping investment situation. In Experiment 1, half the subjects were provided with a payoff chart that made salient the costs associated with investing (Highcost salience condition) whereas half were not (Low-cost salience condition). Moreover, for half of the subjects the payoff chart was introduced before they were asked to invest (Early condition) whereas for the other half it was introduced after they had invested a considerable portion of their resources (Late condition). Entrapment was lower in the High salience-Early than in the Low salience-Early condition. However, there was no difference between groups in the Late condition. In Experiment 2, the perceived presence of an audience interacted with personality variables related to face-saving to effect entrapment. When the audience was described as “experts in decision making,” subjects high in public self-consciousness (or social anxiety) became less entrapped than those low on these dimensions. When the audience consisted of individuals who “wished simply to observe the experimental procedure,” however, high public self-consciousness (or social anxiety) individuals were significantly more entrapped than lows. Moreover, these interaction effects occurred when the audience was introduced late, but not early, into the entrapment situation. Taken together, these (and other) findings suggest that economic factors are more influential determinants of behavior in the earlier stages of an entrapping conflict, whereas face-saving variables are more potent in the later phases. Alternative explanations are discussed.

Self-consciousness, evaluation of physical characteristics, and physical attractiveness

Results from an investigation of the relationship between habitual awareness of oneself as a social object (Public self-consciousness) and speed of processing information about the overt self are reported. Since high public self-consciousness subjects report themselves to be concerned about their physical appearance, they were expected to have more readily retrievable evaluative judgments concerning their physical characteristics. Consistent with this prediction, high compared to low public consciousness subjects required significantly less time to report their evaluations of eleven of their physical features. In a second study, high public self-consciousness was shown to be positively related to judged physical attractiveness in two geographically diverse samples. The quicker evaluations of the high public self-consciousness group were discussed in terms of information processing model recently described by Markus (1977).