Who Are We
Who are you? Who you are is not just what you did; it is also what you are going to do, what you thought about doing and why you do. Do you really know yourself? What we know about our self effect our behaviors, actions, reactions and how we see others and perceive their action. We are constantly changing because of what happens around us and to us but we always have an idea of who we are.
Self concept is the compilation of things you know about yourself which includes our opinions and beliefs. Self-concept is what we know about our culture, religion, social standing, political position, where we live and what we like. Self schemas are how you organize what you know about yourself. Self schemas help us process and organize all of the information in our self concept. It helps us evaluate what we know about our self and how we present our self to others.
Being aware of who you are has two sides: private self-awareness and public self-awareness. Your private self awareness are your thoughts, feelings and wants; your public self-awareness is what you present yourself as to others. Your awareness of your self concept and self schemas are how you evaluate yourself. Your self-esteem is your overall evaluation of these qualities or how you emotionally feel about or value yourself (Feenstra, 2013). We present ourselves to others in ways that endorse an image we want others to have of us because how others sees us affects our self esteem.
Our self esteem determines our attitudes. Attitudes are evaluations based on our reactions in terms of how we feel and what we think. Explicit attitudes are the attitudes we present that rely on our knowledge and beliefs. Implicit attitudes are the attitudes that we don’t know we have; they are our unconscious reaction to things. Our attitudes towards people and things define our behaviors but predicting behavior based on attitude alone is uncertain.
The theory of planned behavior is a prediction of someone’s intent and actual behavior. It combines several factors to provide for better prediction (Feenstra, 2013). The theory of planned behavior relies on the person’s attitude towards that specific behavior, subjective norms related to that behavior and what the perceived behavior is suppose to be. Subjective norms are what we believe other people in our environment perceive the behavior. The Perceived behavior control is your belief that you can engage in the behavior (Feenstra, 2013).
To be accepted by other students, a new student who is white will behave in a similar form as his peers towards a student who is being bullied because he is black and is considered to be in a lower social class. The new student, applying the theory of planned behavior would take into consideration how he feels about behaving like a bully and evaluate that the subjective norms of his classmates is to bully the student. The new student will perceived that the bullying behavior towards the individual is something he can participate in. He evaluated that he can participate in the bullying, that it is accepted and is expected by his peers and because he doesn’t feel remorse for the bullying behavior. The bullying of the black student is due to perceived prejudice, stereotypes and discrimination.
Prejudice is a preformed and unsubstantiated judgment or opinion about an individual or a group (Funk & Wagnalls New World Encyclopedia, 2014). Prejudice is our emotional response to others. Our ingroup are the people who we identify ourselves with. People in our ingroup can be people we are categorized with or are part of our social circle. We favor ingroup members over people outside of our group. Outgroup are the people who do not belong in our ingroup. Ingroup is what we know about ourselves and we judge others based on what we know about ourselves. Our emotional responses to others and our beliefs are what make us prejudice towards others.
Prejudice is something that is part of our society, even today. Recent news have shown wide spread protests due to police brutality towards black men. Recent deaths of black men at the hands of white police officers have our country divided. Many people who protests against police brutality argue that white police officers target and react to black criminals in a more severe reaction due to their prejudice, discrimination and stereotyping of black men. But are the officers really reacting to and handling black criminals in a more vicious form due to their perceived prejudice and stereotypes?
Stereotypes are beliefs about the characteristics of particular groups or members of those groups (Feenstra, 2013). When we judge an outgroup, we stereotype them into general and impersonal categories. Categorizing an outgroup saves us cognitive energy, which makes it easier for us to process more information. We know more about our ingroup because we identify with them because we have more information about them. We see our ingroup as similar to us. We have more information on our ingroup which allows us to see the differences between members of our ingroup. We show favoritism towards our ingroup when we categorize them because we see them as more unique than those that are in our outgroup. We see members of the outgroup as all similar because we don’t know them. If we look at the ingroup of race, white people would be an ingroup and black people would be another ingroup. White officers can see white criminals as an ingroup and black criminals as an outgroup. It is possible that white officers will more likely show consideration and less force on a white criminal due to their same race, thank a white officer would to a black criminal. Stereotyping stops people from seeing beyond someone’s appearance which lead to discrimination.
Discrimination is the negative behavior towards an individual or a group based on our own feelings and beliefs about that individual or group. Discrimination has been part of human history from the very beginning. It occurs when one group or individual believes that they are superior to another. We are more likely to accept and excuse faults from members of our ingroup because we believe we understand them. We are more likely to judge more harshly towards people who are outgroup because we do not know them. We discriminate against people and cultures we don’t know or understand because they are different and we believe that we are superior over them.
Prejudice, Stereotyping and discrimination can lead to aggressive behaviors. Research in the area of human aggression has resulted in the emergence of two major subtypes: an impulsive type that is also sometimes referred to as affective or reactive and a second type that is variably characterized as premeditated, predatory, proactive or instrumental (Helfritz-Sinville, Stanford, 2015). But what is aggression?
Aggression is intentionally doing something to harm another person who does not want to be harmed. Aggressive behavior is manifested in a variety of human cultures (Feenstra, 2013). There are different kinds of aggression. When an aggression is done to make something happen, it is called an instrumental aggression; a person who intentionally indirectly harms another person is called a hostile aggression; and a person who intently physically harms another person is called violent. All cultures have aggression and this suggest that aggression can be influenced by the social environment.
Aggression is an inborn tendency that appears in most cultures and is either increased or decreased by the norms of that culture (Feenstra, 2013). Our environment and ingroup influence our behavior. In our social or cultural group, we have accepted behaviors and opinions that make us be a part of that group. There are people in our group that influence us to think a certain way and see things in the same way they do. Whether it is a political party, a social group or a religion, we are persuaded by our group to behave a certain way. If you are persuaded by an individual it is because that individual is an authority figure or someone who is seen as a leader. Individuals who are persuaded by individuals are followers. Many people are naturally followers/obedient because they are taught that obedience is good at a young age. Obedience allows rules and laws to be fallowed. Leaders create the rules and laws. Followers are followers because it is easier than being a leader. An individual who is persuaded by a group is called conformity. There are several persuasion techniques that leaders used to make a group believe and accept certain behaviors and opinions.
So what makes us follow or listen to persuaders? Persuaders have to be convincing. We are more likely to be persuaded by someone who looks credible and someone who is likeable and attractive to us. We then listen to what they are saying; what their message is. We response to messages that instigate fear and guilt and messages that appeals to our rational thoughts. Persuaders also need to know their audience. They have to make sure that they understand and can connect to the audience’s views, culture and ingroup preferences. The techniques or delivery of the message is also very important. The way you deliver a message makes the statement to the audience. Some of the techniques persuaders use are foot-in-the-door, door-in-the-face and the lowball technique. The foot-in-the-door technique begins with a small request, and then moves to a larger request (Freenstra, 2013). This technique involves persuading a person to accept an idea by requesting a small part of the “picture” or getting them to try something at probably no cost to that person and then giving them the larger picture once they’ve acknowledge the idea. The door in the face technique is the opposite of foot in the door. The door in the face technique begins with a large request. When the message recipient says no to the first request, the persuader follows with a second, more reasonable request, the actual target of the communication (Freenstra, 2013). It basically makes you want something that you know you can’t afford and then offers you a more affordable option that makes you believe that it is within your reach. This works for people who are manipulated by feelings. By being uncomfortable with the large request, the person is willing to make amends with the smaller request. The low ball technique is a technique where the persuader starts with a hook to get your attention.
Once we belong in an ingroup, what makes us stay? Our connection and feelings towards each other in our ingroup is what makes us stay and favor our group. Some ingroup may just be temporary social form, that is a an ingroup that has a connection that is based on similarities. Other ingroup form a more secure and deep bond. Emotional bonds such as love and attraction creates ingroup bonds that make us selective and fiercely protective or devoted to our ingroup.
So what is love? Love is complicated yet simple. Attraction plays an important role in love. Attraction is a feeling that makes us want to connect with another person and there are several factors that attract us to someone. Repeated exposure is important to forming a connection. We are more likely to befriend a person we see and interact with often than a stranger we’ve only just met. When we have frequent interaction with an individual we learn more about them and in many cases develop similarities that strengthens our connection. It is the reason why people are closer to their family than they are with their neighbors. When you create a social bond with someone you create a social circle that creates bias and favoritism. We are attracted to people who are physically attractive to us. First impressions are important and in many cases we will judge a person by their physical appearance. We are drawn to those who are more physically attractive because we want to make sure that we have the best. We are also attracted to people who are similar to us. The more similarity we have with someone, the more of a connection we will have with them.
Our prejudice and stereotypes come not only from the way we take in and process information but also from the world around us (Feenstra, 2013). Humans are born to connect with each other. We are born to socialize with each other in order to reproduce and repopulate. We form bonds with ingroup to feel connected. Without bonds and connection, we develop negative behaviors. Our environment and culture influences our characteristics. Our behavior, attitude, aggression, prejudice and self concept are all effected by our environment.
Reference
Feenstra, J. (2013). Social Psychology (2nd ed.) Bridgepoint Education, Inc.
Helfritz-Sinville, L., Stanford, M. (2015). Looking for Trouble? Processing of Physical and Social Threat Words in Impulsive and Premeditated Aggression. Psychological Record Jun2015, Vol. 65 Issue 2, p301-314. Retrieved from http://eds.b.ebscohost.com.proxy-library.ashford.edu/eds/Citations/FullTextLinkClick?sid=f d877753-b00a-4cc3-931f-89eb3f5cdb6f@sessionmgr113&vid=0&id=pdfFullText
Prejudice. Funk & Wagnalls New World Encyclopedia, 2014, 1p. World Book, Inc., Chicago. Retrieved from http://eds.b.ebscohost.com.proxy-library.ashford.edu/eds/detail/detail?sid= 47426ca3-c6f6-410a-ac4f-32715b0da781%40sessionmgr114&vid=1&hid= 111&bdata=JnNpdGU9ZWRzLWxpdmU%3d#db=funk&AN=PR128200
