Objective Self-awareness Theory Research Articles

My avatar makes me feel good? The effect of avatar personalisation and virtual agent interactions on self-esteem

ABSTRACT The theory of Objective Self-Awareness (OSA) and related studies suggest that embodiment of personalised avatars may induce self-awareness and influence self-esteem. Additionally, the Computers Are Social Actors (CASA) paradigm suggests that humans may mindlessly respond to computers in ways that are similar to human interactions. Based on those assertions, it is plausible that virtual embodiment of a personalised avatar and interactions with a virtual agent can shift self-esteem. However, those effect on self-esteem have not been thoroughly examined in past studies. To address these research gaps, a 2 (avatar personalisation: personalised vs. non-personalised avatar) × 2 (virtual agent interaction valence: positive vs. negative) between-subjects experiment was conducted using a Virtual Reality (VR) simulation (N =171). Findings from the study showed that there was no effect of avatar personalisation and virtual agent interaction valence on state self-esteem change. However, the pairwise comparisons present some preliminary indications that avatar personalisation and positive interactions with a virtual agent may facilitate improvements in state self-esteem altogether. Implications of the study findings are discussed.

Filters uncovered: Investigating the impact of AR face filters and self-view on videoconference fatigue and affect

The rise of videoconferencing amidst the COVID-19 pandemic has brought about a new phenomenon, videoconference fatigue (VF), which refers to the emotional and physical exhaustion felt after videoconference meetings. Features of videoconference platforms, such as the self-view function and small screen size, increases self-awareness and cognitive load, resulting in increased negative affect and VF. However, AR face filters can soften facial expressions to reduce self-awareness and increase positive affect. Drawing from the theory of objective self-awareness, this study thus assesses the influence of AR face filters and self-view on users’ affect and perceived VF, through a 2 × 2 dyadic between-subjects experiment (N = 154). Our findings do not support the theory of objective self-awareness. Using AR face filters led to higher VF, but neither AR face filters nor self-view was significantly associated with affect. An alternative theory such as the expectancy violations theory may explain such results. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.

Objective self-awareness theory and violence: A brain network perspective

Objective self-awareness theory and violence: A brain network perspective

Handmade clothing consumption as a means of self-expression

PurposeThis study examines handmade clothing consumption as a means of self-expression by exploring the interrelationships between consumers' self-expression, brand love and word of mouth.Design/methodology/approachUsing a descriptive research design, data were collected from 295 respondents in South Africa who posted about fashion on social media and who had bought handmade clothing in the 6 months prior to data collection. Structural equation modelling was used to examine the interrelationships between consumers' self-expression, brand love and word of mouth.FindingsBrand love intervenes between consumers' self-brand connections and word of mouth about handmade clothing. More specifically, brand love strengthens positive word of mouth online and mitigates negative word-of-mouth intentions following a handmade clothing product failure scenario.Research limitations/implicationsThe study enlightens scholarly understanding of consumers' self-expression motivations for using ready-made handmade clothing that results in brand love and positive word of mouth.Practical implicationsHandmade clothing marketers who tap into consumers' self-expression and who can establish brand love among consumers can similarly create beneficial consumer–brand relationships.Originality/valueConsumers often use handmade clothing for the purpose of self-expression, which provides subsequent spin-offs for brands in the form of brand love and positive word of mouth. Objective self-awareness theory provides a parsimonious lens to reveal the important role that brand love plays as a mechanism to explain the linkage of consumers' self-brand connections to word of mouth about handmade clothing.

Self-Consciousness and Self-Awareness: Associations between Stable and Transitory Levels of Evidence.

The theory of objective self-awareness predicts the assessment of stable or dispositional self-consciousness and transitory or situational self-awareness. The aim of the present research was to investigate potential associations between patterns of experiential self-description to scores on self-report measures of dispositional self-consciousness. A total of 64 Brazilian volunteers (Mage = 29.7, SD = 8.79, 64.1% female) responded to the Revised Self-Consciousness Scale, the Philadelphia Mindfulness Scale, and the Rumination-Reflection Questionnaire before participating in an experience sampling protocol. The protocol consisted of random daily requests for up to four self-description experiences across seven consecutive days. Participants recorded audio messages on their mobile phones in reply to each request describing their current experience. Reports were analyzed through a reflexive thematic analysis that produced twenty sub-themes accounting for descriptive markers of experience. Based on those descriptive markers, the qualitative data were then transformed into quantitative data for the situational self-awareness indexes. Evidence of association between self-consciousness and self-awareness was stronger for the awareness subscale in a positive correlation with affective situational self-awareness and in a negative correlation with mental representational transitory self-awareness. Although relational evidence has been provided, the data reinforced the theoretical distinction between self-consciousness and self-awareness.

Is “Zoom Fatigue” Real? Video Conferencing Boosts Productivity but Worsens Well-Being

Video conferencing has become a predominant mode of workplace meetings, especially during the ongoing COVID-19 outbreak. In this research, we integrate objective self-awareness theory with the interface design of video conferencing tools to explain the mixed implications of video conferencing for employees. We hypothesize that time spent on video conferencing is positively related to state self-consciousness (i.e., being conscious about one’s self as the object of awareness). State self-consciousness, in turn, is positively related to work productivity but at the same time negatively related to well-being. We further hypothesize that introverted employees are more affected by participation in video conferencing than their extroverted counterparts. In a study employing experience sampling methodology among 144 United Kingdom-based employees who were working remotely on account of the mandatory closure of the workplace, we found evidence for the hypotheses. Specifically, time spent on video conferencing on a workday increased state self-consciousness on that day, which, in turn, increased work productivity. The negative relationship between state self-consciousness and the moderating effect of extraversion received marginal support. A supplementary experimental study further tested the tenet of objective self-awareness theory. We discuss the implications of our findings for how organizations can manage video conferencing as they move to remote work at unprecedented rates.

Skype or Skip? Causes and Consequences of Intimate Self-Disclosure in Computer-Mediated Doctor-Patient Communication

ABSTRACT Advances in computer-mediated communication have created both opportunities and challenges for online doctor-patient communication. Based on the privacy calculus and objective self-awareness theory, we examined the causes and consequences of intimate self-disclosure in video consultations. We performed a 2 (verbal intimacy) × 2 (physical intimacy) online experiment among a large representative sample of the Dutch population (N = 2,251). Structural equation modeling confirmed expected relationships between benefits, privacy concerns, communication barriers, trust, and self-disclosure. Generally, when people were more willing to self-disclose, they reported more positive (e.g., relief) and less negative (i.e., stress) emotions. However, when it involved revealing physically intimate information (e.g., showing an intimate vs. non-intimate body part), people were less likely to self-disclose and reported more negative emotions as a result. Our findings suggest that people weigh benefits, costs, and trust in their decision to self-disclose and consider the potential negative intrapersonal effects of intimate self-disclosure.

Wearing an Anti-COVID Face Mask Predisposes to Spontaneity and Ideas’ Expression in Social Interactions: Findings from a Pilot Experiment

Can wearing an anti-COVID face mask bring any positive effects on social interactions? Based on objective self-awareness theory (OSA), our pilot experiment tested whether wearing an anti-COVID-19 face mask—a facial covering that should reduce self-focused attention—can predispose people to spontaneity in social interactions. Upon randomization (N = 91), participants were asked to either wear or not wear a mask while completing an online survey that assessed their willingness to be spontaneous in various imagined social situations (e.g., willingness to express ideas in public). As expected, participants who completed the survey while wearing a face mask reported higher levels of anticipated spontaneity, declaring they would have been more willing to express their ideas in the proposed interactions than those who did not wear a mask. Results support the hypothesis that anti-COVID face masks reduce objective self-awareness by drawing others’ focus away from the person’s face. This effect seems to eventually encourage people’s propensity to spontaneity and ideas’ expression in social interactions. Implications concerning both positive and negative potential consequences of this effect, as well as possible directions for deepening the study of social effects of anti-COVID measures and further testing the theory of objective self-awareness, are discussed.

Reflecting Yourself? The Influence of Mirrors and Avatars on Dishonest Behavior in Virtual Reality

Objective self-awareness theory (Duval & Wicklund, 1972) predicts that individuals behave morally compliant and honest under increased self-awareness. We argue that this proposition requires a critical reflection in the context of Virtual Reality (VR). The present thesis investigates self-awareness and dishonesty in VR and is among the first to provide such an exploratory reflection. In an experiment, we tested the effects of the two factors (1) mirror presence and (2) avatar choice on dishonesty in a highly-immersive VR setting. Participants played a mind game in VR that incentivized dishonest reporting without any fear of detection. We let participants choose between two human and one fictitious avatar. We also varied the presence of a mirror across participants. Our results show that participants took significantly more time to lie when facing a mirror or wearing a human avatar, indicating a higher state of self-awareness. However, this effect did not significantly influence the resulting level of dishonesty. We discuss a number of factors that could explain this finding and highlight the relevance of further research in the economics domain.

Соотношение понятий «self-awareness», «self-consciousness», «самосознание» и «самопознание»

The article presents a comparative description of the concepts «self-awareness», «self-consciousness», «samosoznaniye» and «samopoznaniye» in English and Russian psychological literature. Reflected the results of scientific papers on various components of "I", compared the approaches to study these phenomena, given the characteristic of methods of their empirical study. As the basic approaches to understanding the studied phenomenon’s we took works of Silvia P. J., Duval T. S. (A theory of objective self-awareness), Fenigstein A., Scheier M. F., Buss A. H. (Public and private self-consciousness: Assessment and theory), Rubinshteyn S.L. (Being and consciousness), Stolin V.V. (Self-awareness of personality), Сhesnokova I.I. (The problem of self-awareness in psychology). Established differences in understanding of these phenomena, which are considered to be contiguous. The author makes an attempt to interpret foreign terms and offers their translation. This work will be one of the steps towards the unification of psychological terms and theories.

Can Customizing an Avatar Motivate Exercise Intentions and Health Behaviors Among Those with Low Health Ideals?

Studies have shown that self-resembling avatars in health games and other applications can heighten exercise intentions, but objective self-awareness (OSA) theory suggests that this effect is likely to be true only for those who believe in the ideal of a healthy self. How can avatars be used to motivate those who do not hold this ideal and may not be motivated by avatars to pursue healthy activities? One possibility is to afford individuals the ability to customize their avatar, so they are not only more self-aware but also feel in control of their persona, both of which are necessary conditions for behavior change according to OSA. In order to test this prediction, participants in an online virtual environment created an avatar of the same sex or opposite sex by choosing among a small or large number of possible traits, then completed a series of items measuring self-awareness, sense of control, health-focused behavior, and ideal internalization. Results show that customizing a same-sex avatar can overcome differences in health intentions and behaviors between individuals with high and low levels of prior health-ideal internalization.

The great escape: The role of self-esteem and self-related cognition in terror management

Integrating terror management theory and objective self-awareness theory, we propose the existential escape hypothesis, which states that people with low self-esteem should be especially prone to escaping self-awareness as a distal response to thoughts of death. This is because they lack the means to bolster the self as a defense, and the propensity to bolster the self reduces the motivation to escape from self-awareness. Five studies supported this hypothesis. Individuals low, but not high, in self-esteem scored lower on a measure of private self-awareness (Study 1), showed less implicit self-activation (Studies 2 & 3), were more likely to choose to write about others than themselves (Study 4), and consumed more alcohol in a field study at a nightclub (Study 5) in response to mortality reminders. Implications for terror management theory (highlighting an additional route to defend against mortality awareness), self-regulation, physical health and well-being are discussed.

The mirror effect: Self-awareness alone increases suicide thought accessibility

According to objective self-awareness theory, when individuals are in a state of self-awareness, they tend to compare themselves to their standards. Self-to-standard comparison often yields unfavorable results and can be assimilated to a failure, activating an escape motivation. Building on recent research on the link between failure and suicide thought accessibility, the present experiment tested the hypothesis that mirror exposure alone provokes an increase in suicide thought accessibility. Participants were exposed to their mirror reflection (or not) while completing a lexical decision task with suicide-related words. Self-to-standard discrepancy salience was manipulated by asking participants to list actual and ideal traits before versus after the lexical decision task. As predicted, mirror-exposed participants recognized suicide-related words quicker than those unexposed to their mirror image. Self-to-standard discrepancy salience did not moderate this effect. Discussion focuses on the role of the motivation to escape self-awareness in the availability of suicide-related ideas.

Turning Our Attention to Stigma: An Objective Self-Awareness Analysis of Stigma and Its Consequences

Scholars have long debated stigma's effects on the psychological functioning of its targets, with some concluding that stigma does not harm self-esteem (Crocker & Major, 1989), and others taking the opposite stance. We propose a resolution to this debate by applying the theory of objective self-awareness (Duval & Wicklund, 1972) to the literature on the psychological consequences of stigma. We argue that public stigma has negative consequences when its targets focus objectively on their stigmatized status. Explicitly applying objective self-awareness theory to the stigma literature casts new light on past findings and suggests directions for future research.

Self-awareness Without Awareness? Implicit Self-focused Attention and Behavioral Self-regulation

Objective self-awareness theory contends that focusing attention on the self initiates an automatic comparison of self to standards. To gain evidence for automatic self–standard comparison processes, two experiments manipulated attention to self with subliminal first-name priming. People completed a computer-based parity task after being instructed that the standard was to be fast or to be accurate. Subliminal first-name priming increased behavioral adherence to the explicit standard. When told to be fast, self-focused people made more mistakes and had faster response times; when told to be accurate, self-focused people made fewer mistakes. A manipulation of conscious self-awareness (via a mirror) had the same self-regulatory effects. The findings suggest that comparing self to standards can occur automatically and that it is attention to self, not awareness of the self per se, that evokes self-evaluation.

Self-focus and social evaluative threat increase salivary cortisol responses to acute stress in men

This experiment tested the hypothesis that self-focused attention might increase cortisol release. Social self-preservation theory suggests that social evaluation and associated feelings of shame are associated with cortisol reactivity, whereas one implication of objective self-awareness theory is that self-critical awareness and associated feelings of anxiety might be associated with increases in cortisol. 120 participants completed a public speech task either in front of an evaluative panel (social threat), in a non-evaluative setting while watching themselves in real-time on a television (self-focus), or in the mere presence of a non-evaluative person (control). Cortisol increased comparably among men in the social threat and self-focus conditions, but not among men in the control condition. There were no effects for women. Shame was correlated with increased cortisol in the social threat condition, whereas anxiety was correlated with increased cortisol in the self-focus condition. One broad implication of this work is that negative evaluation may increase cortisol regardless of whether this source comes from oneself or others.

Through with the looking glass: Escape responses to implicit mirror exposure

Based on the assumption that confrontation with one's physical reflection can be aversive, we explored the appeal of possible "escape routes" when incidentally exposed to one's mirror image. Compared to their no-exposure peers, individuals who felt less chronically "trapped" in their bodies showed increased interest in flow experiences and decreased interest in experiences involving low-level thinking or a subjective sense of meaning when exposed to their reflection. Mirror exposure also increased overall interest in "pure consciousness events," wherein the transcendence of space and time figures centrally. The aversive effects of even implicit confrontation with one's reflection therefore seem more diverse than anticipated based on existing frameworks such as Objective Self-Awareness theory, so additional theoretical development seems warranted.

Promoting Exercise Self-Efficacy With an Exergame

A new generation of exercise video games (exergames) shows promise as a tool to motivate and engage users in physical activity. However, little research has been conducted to examine whether exergames work equally well across diverse populations and contexts. Therefore, in the present study, the authors investigated the effects of an individual psychological difference factor and a specific contextual factor on the exercise experience using an exergame. They used the objective self-awareness theory as the theoretical underpinning. In a 2 (seeing the image of self on screen: seeing oneself vs. not seeing oneself) × 2 (body image dissatisfaction: low vs. high) between-subjects design experiment, the authors found significant interaction effects showing that the feature of seeing the image of self on screen provided by the exergame works positively for individuals with low body image dissatisfaction, yet works negatively for individuals with high body image dissatisfaction. The finding of the present study has significant implications for health professionals and individuals who use the new generation of exergames for physical activities.

The Dual Self: First and third person categorisations of the self and the role of objective self-awareness

The classic duality of self-subject and self-object is related to the linguistic duality of self as a pronoun of the first and the third person. The latter duality is related to alternative ways of categorising people either as self versus other (SO categorisation) or as objects conceived in the third person (3P categorisation). Research is reviewed showing that these categorisations underlie personalised and depersonalised representations, respectively. Nevertheless, depersonalising 3P categorisation has been found more prominent in self-other comparisons than in comparisons between hypothetical others. In search for an explanation Duval and Wicklund's theory of subjective and objective self-awareness as well as causal attribution theory are discussed. In an experiment it is shown that conditions associated with objective self-awareness (e.g., presence of a mirror, instructions stimulating self-evaluation) increase 3P categorisation in self-other comparisons. The results add to our understanding of the role of objective self-awareness in self-other comparisons and in causal attributions from actors' and observers' perspectives.

Exercising with others exacerbates the negative effects of mirrored environments on sedentary women's feeling states

The unique and interactive effects of mirrored exercise environments and the presence of co-exercisers on sedentary women's exercise-induced feeling states (FS) were examined. Participants (n = 92; mean age = 20.2) performed 20 min of moderate intensity exercise in one of four environments: (a) alone/mirrored, (b) not alone/mirrored, (c) alone/unmirrored, or (d) not alone/unmirrored. FS were measured pre-, mid-, and 5 min post-exercise. Self-consciousness, perceived social evaluation and social comparisons were also assessed post-exercise. Multilevel modeling procedures indicated that women in the not alone/mirrored environment experienced smaller increases in post-exercise revitalization than the other conditions (p < 0.05), and were the only condition to experience increased physical exhaustion (p < 0.05). Women in the not alone/mirrored condition also reported greater self-consciousness and more social comparisons than those in alone/mirrored condition (ps < 0.01). Findings are consistent with Objective Self-Awareness Theory, and suggest that mirrored, group exercise environments are not conducive to psychological well-being among women unaccustomed to exercise.