Chapter 10: Becoming Who We Are: The Development of Self, Gender, and Morality

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Chapter 10 Becoming Who We Are The Development
of Self, Gender, and Morality
 

• Who Am I? The Development of Self

By Kati Tumaneng (for Drs. Cook and Cook)
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What is the Self?

• Self The characteristics, emotions, and beliefs
  people have about themselves, including an
  understanding that people are unique individuals.
• I-self The conscious awareness that you exist
  as a separate person and that you can affect
  others.
• Me-self What you know about and how you
  describe yourself (also self-concept or
  self-representation).
• Self-representation The ways people describe
  themselves (also me-self).
• Self-evaluations The opinions people have and
  judgments they make about their own
  characteristics.
• Self-esteem The emotions people feel about
  themselves.

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What is the Self?

• Most believe that the I-self and the me-self are
  cognitive constructions that children create as
  their cognitive skills develop.
• Looking-glass self The idea that in social
  interactions the child uses others as a social
  mirror into which the individual gazes in order
  to detect their opinions toward the self
  (Harter, 1999, p. 17).

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Changes in Self-Representation Across Ages

• Self-Representation in Infancy and Childhood
• Newborns have no sense of themselves as separate
  individuals no I-self.
• During first few months, babies move from this
  state of not knowing they are physically or
  emotionally separate from other people and
  objects to an understanding that they are
  individuals with unique physical sensations and
  emotions.

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Changes in Self-Representation Across Ages

• Cross-modal perception helps infants become aware
  of physical self and understand that their
  emotions distinct are from others.
• Personal agency Learn that their actions and
  feelings have an effect on environment.
• Consistent interactions form basis for sense of
  self-efficacy.

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Changes in Self-Representation Across Ages

• Between 1st and 2nd year, the me-self begins to
  emerge.
• Toddlers who recognized that the features in the
  mirror were their own touched their own faces to
  wipe off a spot of rouge rather than the
  reflection in the mirror (Lewis Brooks, 1978).
• Me-self also emerges in childrens language.

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Development of the Me-Self
(Lewis Brooks, 1978, p. 214)
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Changes in Self-Representation Across Ages

• Factors that influence changes in
  self-representation
• Overall cognitive development
• Language (personal narratives)
• Social comparison The process of comparing our
  own qualities and performance to those of our
  peers.

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Changes in Self-Representation Across Ages

• Adolescence and the Search for Identity
• Eriksons theory of psychosocial development
  Adolescents increasing cognitive abilities
  enable them to think about abstract qualities of
  the self, to compare their real selves to their
  ideal selves, and to think about other
  possible selves (Erikson, 1968).
• Social demands increase.
• If dont resolve the crisis of identity, their
  unclear sense of self will make it more difficult
  to deal with the crises that will arise during
  the adulthood years.

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Changes in Self-Representation Across Ages

• Adolescence and the Search for Identity (cont.)
• James Marcia (1966)elaborated Eriksons theory
  with 2 components crisis and commitment
• Identity statuses
• Identity achievement
• Identity foreclosure
• Identity diffusion
• Identity moratorium

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The Four Identity Statuses of James Marcia
(Marcia, 1966)
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Changes in Self-Representation Across Ages

• Adolescence and the Search for Identity (cont.)
• Some adolescents have additional task of
  developing ethnic or racial identity
• Phinneys 3 stages (1990)

Developing identity http//teacher.scholastic.co
m/products/ect/identity.htm
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Phinneys Three-Stage Model of Ethnic Identity
Development
(Phinney, 1989)
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Changes in Self-Representation Across Ages

• Adolescence and the Search for Identity (cont.)
• Identity is multifaceted an adolescent may reach
  commitment in some facets well before others.
• Culture plays an important role.
• Relationships with parents affect how adolescents
  deal with issues of identity.

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Evaluating the Self

• Begin to evaluate their performance on individual
  tasks during toddler years age 7 form an overall
  opinion of themselves (global self-evaluation
  Harter, 1998 Stipek, Recchia, McClintic,
  1992).
• More negative beginning at age 11 or 12.
• Gradually increases during later adolescence.

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Evaluating the Self

• Influences on Self-Evaluation
• Roots in quality of caregiving in infancy secure
  attachment (Bowlby, 1982).
• Comparisons children draw between their real
  selves and their ideal selves.
• Actual discrepancy between the ideal and the real
  in domains that are important to the child
  (Harter, 1999).
• The degree of social support the child receives
  from parents and/or peers (Harter, 1999).
• Perceived physical appearance has highest
  correlation with self-esteem (.65-.82 Harter,
  1998).

NASE http//www.self-esteem-nase.org/
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Evaluating the Self

• Consequences of Positive and Negative
  Self-Evaluations
• Childrens evaluations of their own skills and
  competencies directly affect their choices of
  activities and their persistence on difficult
  challenges.
• There is a strong relationship between
  self-evaluations and depression (.72-.80).

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Evaluating the Self

• Suggestions for parents
• Provide sensitively responsive caregiving.
• Provide positive support and encouragement but
  also honest feedback.
• Help children learn to set realistic and
  achievable short-term goals (Damon, 1995).
• Ethnic minority parents should help children
  develop positive self-evaluations and ethnic
  identities.

Parent info http//www.cyberparent.com/esteem/
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Self-Regulation

• The ability to control our own behavior,
  emotions, or thoughts and change them to meet the
  demands of the situation.
• Includes the ability to inhibit first responses,
  to resist interference from irrelevant
  stimulation, and to persist on relevant tasks
  even when we dont enjoy them.
• Aspects of self-regulation correlate with various
  positive outcomes for children and adolescents.

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Self-Regulation

• When Do Children Develop Self-Regulation Skills?
• Precursors appear early in life.
• Very young babies show primitive control of some
  aspects of behavior and reactions.
• 12-18 months Awareness of social demands in
  their environment.
• 24 months Show aspects of self-control even
  when caregiver is not immediately with them.
• 3-7 years Grow steady in ability to inhibit
  first responses.

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Self-Regulation

• When Do Children Develop Self-Regulation Skills?
  (cont.)
• Older children and adolescents increasingly able
  to self-regulate behavior, emotions, and
  problem-solving strategies.
• Comes from internal and external sources.

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Context and Self-Regulation
(Kochanska, Coy, Murray, 2001)
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Self-Regulation

• What Factors Influence the Development of
  Self-Regulation?
• Aspects of temperament related.
• Maturation of certain areas of the brain,
  especially frontal lobes, enables children to
  resist interference and inhibit responses.
• Environment has strong influence.
• Modeling The process of imitating, practicing,
  and internalizing others behaviors (Schunk
  Zimmerman, 1997). Also, the process of providing
  the example behavior, as in her parents are
  modeling good study skills.
• Parenting style affects how well and how quickly
  self-regulatory skills develop.

Teaching self-regulatory skills
http//www.talaris.org/pdf/spotlight_effort.pdf
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• Graph on Slide 7 from Cook, J. L., Cook, G.
  (2005). Child development Principles and
  perspectives (1st ed.) (p. 372). Boston Allyn
  and Bacon.
• Picture on Slide 7 from Cook, J. L., Cook, G.
  (2005). Child development Principles and
  perspectives (1st ed.) (p. 373). Boston Allyn
  and Bacon.
• Chart on Slide 11 from Cook, J. L., Cook, G.
  (2005). Child development Principles and
  perspectives (1st ed.) (p. 376). Boston Allyn
  and Bacon.
• Chart on Slide 13 from Cook, J. L., Cook, G.
  (2005). Child development Principles and
  perspectives (1st ed.) (p. 377). Boston Allyn
  and Bacon.
• Charts on Slide 22 from Cook, J. L., Cook, G.
  (2005). Child development Principles and
  perspectives (1st ed.) (p. 384). Boston Allyn
  and Bacon.
• All other images retrieved from Microsoft
  PowerPoint Clip Art.