Formal operations, the imaginary audience and the personal fable

One hundred twenty-nine 6th, 8th, 10th/11th, and 12th graders were administered Enright, Lapsley, and Shukla's Adolescent Egocentrism Scale (AES) and How Is Your Logic?, a Piagetian-based, group-administered, written test of cognitive development. A series of ANOVAs on four scales of the AES (imaginary audience, personal fable, self-in-general, nonsocial) provided partial support for Inhelder and Piaget's, and Elkind's views that adolescent egocentrism is a function of beginning formal operations. Discussion focused on the difficulty of assessing the true thoughts/feelings of persons who are worried how they will appear to others.     

The social reality of the imaginary audience: a grounded theory approach

Traditional approaches to understanding the imaginary audience are challenged in this study. Three hundred sixty-one British schoolchildren (aged 14 and 15 years) were asked to express their worries and concerns, using grounded theory methodology. Qualitative responses were collated and coded according to emerging categories, with "what other people think" identified as the central concern. In particular, the findings are used to critique Elkind's (1967) theory of adolescent egocentrism. Data presented in this study suggest that adolescents worry about what other people think because there are real personal and social consequences. Such concerns are seen as being based in social reality and are not imaginary as Elkind suggested. In conclusion, new methodologies which place young people at the center of the analysis are advocated.     

Revisiting the imaginary audience and personal fable constructs of adolescent egocentrism: a conceptual review

Adolescents are thought to believe that others are always watching and evaluating them, and that they are special and unique, labeled the imaginary audience and the personal fable, respectively. These two constructs have been fixtures in textbooks on adolescent development, and have been offered as explanations for self-consciousness and risk-taking. However, their characterization of adolescent social cognition as biased has not been supported empirically, the measures used to assess them lack construct validity, and alternative explanations for both ideation patterns have not been explored. Despite these issues, the imaginary audience and personal fable constructs continue to be considered prototypical representations of social cognitive processes during adolescence. This paper (1) reviews theoretical models of the imaginary audience and the personal fable, and the empirical data pertaining to each model, (2) highlights problems surrounding the two most commonly used measures, and (3) outlines directions for future research, so that a better understanding of the imaginary audience and personal fable, and their roles in adolescent development, may be achieved.     

Relationships among attributes, physical fitness, and self-concept development of elementary school children.

The purpose of the investigation was to examine the relationships among children's selected attributes, health-related physical fitness; and self-concept development. Subjects were 97 elementary school children in Grades 1 through 6. Correlations were examined for significance and effect size among the attributes of age, weight, body mass index, four scores from the Health Related Physical Fitness Test, and the total score from the Martinek-Zaichkowsky Self-concept Scale for Children. A max R2 forward stepwise multiple regression analysis was performed to assess which attribute and physical fitness variables were the best predictors of self-concept scores. Analysis indicated that the one-variable model of weight was the best predictor of self-concept.     

Shyness and Relationship Satisfaction: Evaluating the Associations Between Shyness,Self-Esteem,and Relationship Satisfaction in Couples

In the present study we explored the relationship between personality characteristics and relationship satisfaction in couples. Using a sample of 14,807 couples from the RELATE dataset, a model was tested examining the direct and indirect (via self-esteem) associations between personality traits (i.e., shyness) and relationship satisfaction. Furthermore, the model assessed shyness, self-esteem, and relationship satisfaction for both partners in the relationship. The results indicated that higher levels of shyness were associated with lower self-esteem in individuals, as well as lower relationship satisfaction. Implications of results and the use of partner ratings of personality indicators are discussed.     

Self-esteem, academic self-concept, and achievement: how the learning environment moderates the dynamics of self-concept

The authors examine the directionality of effects between global self-esteem, domain-specific academic self-concepts, and academic achievement. Special emphasis is placed on learning environments as potential moderators of the direction of these effects. According to the meritocracy principle presented here, so-called bottom-up effects (i.e., self-esteem is influenced by academic self-concept) are more pronounced in meritocratic learning environments than in ego-protective learning environments. This hypothesis was examined using a three-wave cross-lagged panel design with a large sample of 7th graders from East and West Germany, a total of 5,648 students who were tested shortly after German reunification. Reciprocal effects were found between self-esteem, academic self-concept, and academic achievement. In conformance with the meritocracy principle, support for bottom-up effects was stronger in the meritocratic learning environment.     

Demand characteristics and self-report measures of imaginary audience sensitivity: implications for interpreting age differences in adolescent egocentrism.

Self-consciousness during early adolescence has been explained as an outcome of adolescent egocentrism, in which adolescents create an imaginary audience (IA) of attentive, critical peers. The possibility that such self-consciousness might result from contact with peers who are more attentive and critical than those encountered during childhood or adulthood has not been considered. Study 1 tested whether young adults, who are not theoretically susceptible to IA, could be made to receive high scores on IA and self-consciousness measures by having them complete a procedure in 1 of 3 laboratory conditions-a critical audience, a noncritical audience, or no audience. However, participants in the critical-audience condition received significantly lower IA and self-consciousness scores than participants in the no-audience condition did. Study 2 tested whether the directions given to Study 1 participants might have been responsible for the unexpected findings. Results indicated that participants instructed to give mature-sounding responses received lower IA/self-consciousness scores than did those asked to report their honest opinions. Together, the results of Studies 1 and 2 indicated that survey measures of IA are subject to demand characteristics and highlighted the need to interpret with caution age differences in IA as traditionally assessed.     

Shyness: conceptualization and measurement

The concept of shyness and its measurement were investigated in a series of studies (total N = 1,687). Data collection and analysis proceeded in three phases: the revision and continued development of a measure of shyness, the Social Reticence Scale; a psychometric comparison among five measures of shyness; and an examination of the factor structure underlying the construct of shyness. Phase 1 assessed the reliability and validity of the Social Reticence Scale, including ratings of videotaped monologues and ratings by significant others. Phase 2 compared the five shyness measures with one another on indices of internal consistency and with other relevant measures of emotionality, personality, relationships, and behavior. Items from the five shyness measures were combined in a factor analysis in Phase 3, and the resulting factors were correlated with the self-report and rating data obtained in Phase 2. Overall, the results from these studies confirmed that the shyness measures were valid, reliable, and empirically distinct from measures of related constructs. Behavioral validity was observed for several of the shyness scales. Additional analyses suggested that three interpretable factors underlie responses to the shyness scales but provided little support for drawing conceptual distinctions among types of shyness. Discussion focuses on the implications of these data for the measurement and conceptualization of shyness.     

On the Nature of Embarrassabllity: Shyness, Social Evaluation, and Social Skill

In this study, the correlates of embarrassability, or chronic susceptibility to embarrassment, were examined. Competing theoretical models suggest either that embarrassable people should be especially concerned about others' evaluations of them or that they should lack social skills. Further, shyness and embarrassment are typically considered to be closely related states. To test these propositions, 310 participants provided extensive self-reports of social skill, fear of negative evaluation, self-esteem, self-consciousness, and negative affectivity. Regression and factor analyses indicated that, compared to those of low embarrassability, highly embarrassable people are particularly concerned with the normative appropriateness of behavior and are more motivated to avoid rejection from others. In contrast, shyness was best predicted by low social self-confidence and low social skill. The data best support a social-evaluation model of embarrassment and argue that embarrassability is linked to the appropriateness of social behavior, and shyness to its effectiveness.     

Shyness, Internet use, and personality.

To investigate the association between shyness and Internet usage, 88 undergraduate students completed the Revised Cheek and Buss Shyness Scale, the Online Cognition Scale, a computer/Internet familiarity scale, the Eysenck Personality Questionnaire Revised (short version) and the Abbreviated Duke Social Support Index. Significant correlations were found between shyness, Internet use, and personality traits. A stepwise regression analysis indicated that shyness was predicted by introversion, neuroticism, and problematic Internet usage as assessed by the Online Cognition Scale.     

Shyness,self-preoccupation and the stroop color and world test

Forty college women who had been pre-tested on a measure of shyness, took the Stroop Color and World Test twice and completed a post-session questionnaire concerning their reactions to taking the test. Shy Ss had significantly lower Color-Word scores on the second Stroop test administration, indicating cognitive interference and distractibility. Shyness was also significantly correlated with self-reports of worry and test-irrelevant thinking as reactions to taking the Stroop test. These results are discussed from the perspective of cognitive approaches to shyness.     

Keeping it in‐house: how audience affects responses to group criticism

It is often assumed that group‐directed criticism is best kept ‘in‐house’, but the effects of audience on responses to criticism have not been directly examined. Consistent with predictions, ingroup members who criticized the group to an outgroup audience were seen to be making a less appropriate choice of audience (Experiments 2 and 3), aroused more negative feelings (Experiment 1), were downgraded more strongly on personality traits (Experiment 2), and were seen to be doing more damage to the group (Experiment 2) than were ingroup members who kept their criticisms in‐house. Experiment 3 showed that, whereas moderate identifiers agreed with the comments less and showed weaker friendly intentions toward the critic when an outgroup audience as compared to an ingroup audience was chosen, high identifiers agreed with the criticisms just as strongly—and showed more friendly intentions toward the critic—when they were made to an outgroup as compared to an ingroup audience. Results are discussed in light of the broader literature on identity threat. Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Imagination and the imaginary

This paper argues that real imagination depends on the capacity to acknowledge the absence of what is imagined from the world of material actuality. This leads on to a view of symbol formation as the operation of the transcendent function between the opposites of presence and absence. 'The imaginary' is contrasted with this as a defensive misuse of imagination that attempts to deny 'negation' where negation is defined as all those aspects of the world that constitute a check to the omnipotence of fantasy--e.g., absence, loss, difference, otherness etc. Parallels are drawn with theoretical antecedents in analytical psychology and psychoanalysis, with particular attention to papers published in the Journal of Analytical Psychology (JAP) in the 1960s on the relation between active imagination, transference and ego development. A clinical example is given to show the use of the imaginary as a means of warding off the unbearable pain of Oedipal disappointment.     

Reciprocal effects between academic self-concept, self-esteem, achievement, and attainment over seven adolescent years: unidimensional and multidimensional perspectives of self-concept

In their influential review, Baumeister, Campbell, Krueger, and Vohs (2003) concluded that self-esteem--the global component of self-concept--has no effect on subsequent academic performance. In contrast, Marsh and Craven's (2006) review of reciprocal effects models from an explicitly multidimensional perspective demonstrated that academic self-concept and achievement are both a cause and an effect of each other. Ironically, both reviews cited classic Youth in Transition studies in support of their respective claims. In definitive tests of these counter claims, the authors reanalyze these data-including self-esteem (emphasized by Baumeister et al.), academic self-concept (emphasized by Marsh & Craven), and postsecondary educational attainment-using stronger statistical methods based on five waves of data (grade 10 through 5 years after graduation; N=2,213). Integrating apparently discrepant findings under a common theoretical framework based on a multidimensional perspective, academic self-concept had consistent reciprocal effects with both achievement and educational attainment, whereas self-esteem had almost none.     

Psychosocial development, self-concept, and gender

Undergraduate students (N = 88; 51 males and 37 females) completed the Tennessee Self-Concept Scale (TSCS; Fitts, 1965) and the identity versus identity diffusion and intimacy versus isolation scales from Constantinople's (1969) Inventory of Psychosocial Development (IPD). Strong positive correlations were found between ego identity and all aspects of self-concept for both males and females. Different results emerged for the intimacy versus isolation crisis, however. For males, all aspects of self-concept were related to a sense of intimacy, but for females intimacy was related only to the behavioral and interpersonal aspects of self-concept. The implications of these findings are discussed and the contingency of intimacy upon ego identity is questioned with regard to females.