Self-presentation Tactics Research Articles

The Moderating Role of Self-Presentation Tactics

The present study is concerned with impression formation in a context in which the information about others is limited and at the same time private by its very nature. We examined the accuracy of judges’ ratings of target individuals’ basic personality traits, affective traits, and assertive self-presentation tactics based on the natural stream of thought of the latter. Furthermore, we explored the moderating role of self-presentation in accurate evaluations of others. A group of 86 participants recorded their natural stream of thought, which then served as the basis for the judges’ ratings. The participants also completed self-report measures of basic personality traits, affective traits, and assertive self-presentation tactics. The results partially confirmed that it is possible for judges to form an accurate impression of target individuals’ personalities in a context in which the judges possess a small amount of relatively private information about the target individuals. It was even possible for the judges to detect the target individuals’ self-presentation tactics, particularly self-promotion. In addition, individuals who use self-promotion and exemplification in a private context are often viewed differently than those who do so less often.

A Study of Self-Presentation Tactics, Anxiety, Personality and Socio -Demographic Variables of College Girls

A Study of Self-Presentation Tactics, Anxiety, Personality and Socio -Demographic Variables of College Girls

Engaging in Less Protective Self-Presentation: The Effects of a Friend's Presence on the Socially Anxious

To cope with their fear of negative evaluation, socially anxious people use protective self-presentation strategies. We hypothesized that the presence of a close friend (vs. being alone) would lead socially anxious people to engage in more acquisitive self-presentation tactics. Results supported the hypotheses. With a friend present versus not, socially anxious participants presented themselves more positively to and selected more self-disclosing topics to discuss with a stranger they believed they would meet face-to-face. Friendship strength moderated some of the effects. Results suggest that friends’ support may allow socially anxious people to satisfy safety needs while engaging in less protective self-presentation.

Online Impression Management: Personality Traits and Concerns for Secondary Goals as Predictors of Self-Presentation Tactics on Facebook

This study investigates the utility of personality traits and secondary goals as predictors of self-presentation tactics employed by Facebook users. A structural equation model of self-presentation tactics on Facebook was proposed and tested. Although fit of the initial model was good, the final model, eliminating three paths and adding two others, yielded a significantly better fitting model. Findings show that personality traits predicted concern for secondary goals (N = 477) and that secondary goals predicted the use of various self-presentation tactics used on Facebook. Results indicated that these personality traits and secondary goals are both theoretically and empirically sound components for the conceptualization of online impression management.

Micro-interaction dynamics in group decision making: Face games, interaction order and boundary work

Summary Drawing on Goffman's face theory, this paper documents and interprets the micro interaction dynamics underlying group decision making within a consultancy task force. Our analysis suggests that decision making is an instance of strategic face-to-face behavior where individuals seek to influence each other and reach decisions by means of face-work and self-presentation tactics. Moreover, face-to-face behavior generates an ‘interaction order’ that frames the decision making situation and constrains further interactions among decision makers. We discuss the implications that can be drawn from the observed case by relating our findings to the emergent stream of studies on micro-decision making.

Personality and impression management: Mapping the Multidimensional Personality Questionnaire onto 12 self-presentation tactics

This study examined the relations between Tellegen’s three-factor personality model, using the Multidimensional Personality Questionnaire (MPQ), and 12 self-presentation tactics operationalized in the self-presentation tactics scale (SPT). Differential correlations of the MPQ higher-order domains and primary scales were predicted based on a review of the literature pertaining to each self-presentation tactic and the dimensional classifications of tactics. Joint exploratory factor analysis was used to determine structural relationship among the higher-order MPQ traits and SPT indicators. Results suggest an important role for basic emotional and interpersonal personality traits in the frequency and nature of impression management behaviors, overwhelmingly in the domain of Negative Emotionality. Evidence of construct validity for the SPT and further evidence of the discriminant validity of the MPQ higher-order dimensions and primary scales is also presented.

What you see may not be what you get: Relationships among self-presentation tactics and ratings of interview and job performance.

The image candidates portray in the interview, via appearance, impression management, and verbal and nonverbal behavior, has been hypothesized to influence interviewer ratings. Through the lenses of social influence and interdependence theories, this meta-analysis investigated (a) the magnitude of the relationship between these 3 self-presentation tactics and interviewer ratings, (b) whether these tactics also are correlated with later job performance, and (c) whether important theoretical moderators (e.g., the level of interview structure, the rating source, the use of field or experimental designs) affect these relationships. Results reveal that what you see in the interview may not be what you get on the job and that the unstructured interview is particularly impacted by these self-presentation tactics. Additionally and surprisingly, moderator analyses of these relationships found that the type of research design (experimental vs. field) does not moderate these findings.

Self-presentational features in childhood social anxiety

Theoretical and clinical models of social anxiety highlight links with self-presentational concerns and behavior, but little is known about these features in early development. In the present investigation, a nonclinical sample of 196 children aged 8–9 years completed self-report measures of social anxiety, depressive symptoms, and usage of self-presentational tactics, as well as a self-description task measuring the capacity to differentiate between audiences known to have different preferences. After controlling for concurrent depressive symptoms, social anxiety was associated with increased usage of self-presentational tactics, but also with poorer scores on the audience differentiation task. A follow-up assessment of groups identified as highly socially anxious or non-socially anxious showed that these patterns were durable over 12 months. Directions for future research on the social developmental trajectory of children with social anxiety are suggested.

Lying to Get a Date: The Effect of Facial Physical Attractiveness on the Willingness to Deceive Prospective Dating Partners

This research explored the extent to which people use deception to initiate a date with opposite-sex prospects who varied in facial physical attractiveness. Participants reviewed profiles of prospective dates varying in facial attractiveness, described their own personal characteristics to the prospective dates (study 1), and rated their willingness to lie to make themselves appear to be more desirable to each prospect (study 2). Both men and women deceptively altered their self-presented expressivity and love attitudes to more attractive prospects (study 1), and reported being more willing to lie about their personal appearance, personality traits, income, past relationship outcomes, career skills and intelligence to prospective dates who were higher in facial physical attractiveness, compared with prospective dates who were lower in facial physical attractiveness (study 2). No sex-differences in the willingness to use deceptive self-presentational tactics were found. A strong positive correlation was found between people’s willingness to lie about a specific personal dimension and the extent to which physically attractive individuals differed from other people on that dimension. Thus, it appears that people endeavor to lie to physically attractive people in ways that maximize their similarity with the attractive target.

Development of a self-presentation tactics scale

Previous personality measures examining individuals' propensity to engage in self-presentation (e.g. self-monitoring, social desirability) often dealt only with positive forms of self-presentation and have not measured individuals' proclivity to use specific self-presentation tactics. In order to overcome these problems, 4 studies were carried out to (a) develop a self-presentation tactics scale (SPT) measuring individual differences in proclivity for using 12 self-presentation tactics, (b) examine the dimensions of self-presentation and (c) to examine gender differences in self-presentation behavior. The results of the 4 studies indicate that the SPT is internally consistent, consistent across time and that the SPT shows adequate discriminant validity. Confirmatory factor analyses demonstrate that self-presentation consists of two distinct components: defensive and assertive tactics, and that these two general types of tactics are significantly correlated. Additionally, males are more likely than females to use assertive self-presentation tactics. The potential utility of the self-presentation tactics scale for future research on self-presentational behavior is discussed.

Grade-Level Differences in the Social Value of Effort: Implications for Self-Presentation Tactics of Early Adolescents

Differences in fourth, sixth, and eighth grade (10-, 12-, and 14-year-old) students' willingness to portray themselves as diligent to their popular peers and teachers and their perceptions of the social value of effort and ability ascriptions were examined. The results revealed that the fourth- and sixth-grade students desired to portray themselves as effortful to teachers and peers, whereas the eighth graders were more reluctant to convey to their popular peers than teachers that they study hard. Consistent with these findings, the fourth graders perceived high effort to increase teacher approval as well as popularity among peers, whereas the eighth graders viewed diligence as facilitating teacher approval but low effort expenditure as improving peer popularity. Reasons for youngsters' changing notions of the social value of achievement ascriptions and their self-presentation tactics in school are discussed.

Grade-Level Differences in the Social Value of Effort: Implications for Self-Presentation Tactics of Early Adolescents

Grade-Level Differences in the Social Value of Effort: Implications for Self-Presentation Tactics of Early Adolescents

Self-Presentational Tactics Used in a German Election Campaign

Self-presentation, a rather ubiquitous and everyday phenomenon, is analyzed in a context in which it is very prominent: political campaign communication. In order to be successful in modern election campaigns politicians have to be experts in self-presentation. A classification of self-presentational tactics, differentiating offensive, defensive and assertive self-presentation is suggested. These categories of self-presentation are applied to describe public self-presentations of the two top candidates in the German parliamentary election campaign of 1986, one of whom, Helmut Kohl, was also a candidate in the 1990 campaign and is almost certainly going to be one in 1994. Conditions for the use of specific tactics are specified. Finally, patterns of self-presentation, consisting of a bundle of tactics, are identified. The self-presentational tactics found here and their combination patterns can be used to analyze political campaign behavior in other situations. Many of the tactics can be generalized to describe everyday self-presentation, too.

Individual Differences in Self-Presentation Styles

Abstract Two studies examined individual differences in self-presentation style. In Study 1, American students provided ratings of actual self and presented self on personality traits of varying levels of social desirability. Three major groups were identified: consistents, flexible-impression managers, and rigid-impression managers. Differences in self-evaluations among these groups were found, with consistents rating themselves most favorably. In Study 2, the effect of experimental manipulation on consistency and favorability of self-ratings of subjects with different self-presentation styles was examined. Results demonstrated that individuals' behavior corresponded to their self-reported style. Differential tactics of self-presentation were also evident between individuals with different styles. These tactics involved the tendency either to attribute positive characteristics to the self or to deny negative characteristics.

Effect of Self-Presentation on Perceptions and Recognition in an Organization

ABSTRACT We examined the role of gender in the efficacy of two acquisitive self-presentational tactics: modesty and disclosing obstacles. American undergraduate psychology students were asked to read a presentation given by a fictitious male or female project manager who had made a significant discovery and to evaluate one of two self-presentational tactics used by the managers. Results showed that the tactics used affected the credit given to the manager, the perceived difficulty of what he or she did, and the suggested recognition for the manager. Both recognition and perceived difficulty were affected by the sex of the managers and of the subjects.

An Individual Differences Measure of Attributive and Repudiative Tactics of Favorable Self-Presentation

Using a new measure of the tendency to present oneself in an unrealistically positive way, the Self-Presentation Scale (SPS), the present study examined the validity of two different tactics for presenting a favorable self-image. Confirmatory factor analyses indicated that individual differences in the use of an attributive tactic, the tendency to attribute positive characteristics to the self, were correlated with, but distinct from, individual differences in the use of a repudiative tactic, which is the tendency to deny the presence of negative characteristics of the self. Scores on both tactics were highly correlated with the Marlowe-Crowne Social Desirability Scale, and both tactic subscales were positively correlated with self-reported self-esteem and negatively correlated with depression. However, only the repudiative tactic scores were found to be associated with self-consciousness and social anxiety scores, and only the attributive tactic scores were correlated with self-report measures of self-monitoring skills. The advantages of the SPS over other measures of favorable self-presentation (or socially desirable responding) are discussed.

Repairing a Spoiled Identity: An Application of Attribution Theory

Abstract This exploratory study applies attribution concepts in the investigation of self-presentational tactics. We contend that self-attributions following failure are used by an actor not only to restore self-esteem but to mitigate negative social consequences for the self. Data for this study derive from a role-playing experiment in which subjects were asked to explain a failing academic performance. Weiner's control dimension and Kelley's covariation model are used to codify subjects' explanations of their performance. As predicted, individuals overwhelmingly attributed failure to uncontrollable causes. Further, the vast majority of the information provided by subjects about their performance consisted of claims of high distinctiveness which, according to Kelley, lead to external causal attributions. Effects of sex of actor and of influence target are investigated, and some suggestive patterns emerge. Based on this study, we suggest that the conceptual framework of attribution theory can benefit rese...