Helen C. Boucher

The relational self revealed: integrative conceptualization and implications for interpersonal life.

The authors offer a new, integrative conceptualization of the relational self based on a synthesis of recent approaches to the self and significant others. This conceptualization provides a sharper and fuller definition of the relational self than does any existing approach alone and a common framework to interpret findings from separate literatures. The authors then present 5 propositions and evidence to support the thesis that relational selves exert a pervasive influence on interpersonal life. Specifically, relational selves (a) shape a wide range of psychological processes and outcomes, (b) exert their influence automatically, (c) serve basic orientation and meaning functions, (d) provide continuity and context-specific variability in personality, and (e) carry implications for psychological well-being. Discussion focuses on remaining issues and implications for future research.

The Dialectical Self-Concept: Contradiction, Change, and Holism in East Asian Cultures

Naïve dialecticism refers to a set of East Asian lay beliefs characterized by tolerance for contradiction, the expectation of change, and cognitive holism. In five studies, the authors examined the cognitive mechanisms that give rise to global self-concept inconsistency among dialectical cultures. Contradictory self-knowledge was more readily available (Study 1) and simultaneously accessible (Study 2) among East Asians (Japanese and Chinese) than among Euro-Americans. East Asians also exhibited greater change and holism in the spontaneous self-concept (Study 1) and inconsistency in their implicit self-beliefs (Study 3). Cultural differences in self-concept inconsistency were obtained when controlling for alternative explanatory variables, including self-criticism (Study 4) and self-concept certainty (Studies 2 and 3) and were fully mediated by a direct measure of dialecticism (Study 5). Naïve dialecticism provides a comprehensive theoretical framework for understanding these cultural differences and the contradictory, changeable, and holistic nature of the East Asian self-concept.

Culture and Implicit Self-Esteem Chinese Are “Good” and “Bad” at the Same Time

One explanation for the lower self-esteem of East Asians is that they have dialectical, or inconsistent, self-esteem in that they endorse both the positively and the negatively keyed items of the Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale, relative to Euro-Americans. The following research extended this effect to implicit self-esteem. In two studies, Chinese, Euro-Americans (Studies 1 and 2), and Chinese Americans (Study 2) completed explicit and implicit measures of self-esteem. On both types of measures, Chinese scored most highly on various indices of dialectical self-esteem. In Study 2, the explicit self-esteem of Chinese Americans was similar to that of Chinese, but their implicit self-esteem was identical to that of Euro-Americans. In the discussion, we focus on how East Asians come to possess inconsistent self-esteem and pose questions for future research.

The Dialectical Self-Concept II Cross-Role and Within-Role Consistency, Well-Being, Self-Certainty, and Authenticity

Although there is growing evidence that dialectical thinkers express more inconsistency within the global self-concept, whether this holds true for inconsistency across roles and within specific roles has received little attention. I examine whether dialectical thinking is associated with less cross-role and within-role consistency and whether dialecticism moderates the relationship between self-consistency and subjective well-being, self-concept certainty, and felt authenticity. Participants completed measures of the above outcomes, a measure of dialectical thinking, and a self-description measure for both the global self-concept and within two roles (e.g., friend), from which I derived both cross-role and within-role consistency scores. Dialectical thinking predicted lower scores on both types of consistency, and in general dialecticism moderated the relationship between self-concept consistency and both subjective well-being and self-concept certainty. Dialecticism also moderated the relationship between cross-role consistency and authenticity, and the relationship between authenticity and subjective well-being. I conclude by discussing directions for future research.

The Relational Self

This chapter describes emerging theory and evidence on the relational self from the personality and social psychology literatures. Broadly speaking, the relational self refers to aspects of the self associated with one’s relationships with significant others (e.g., romantic partners, parents, friends). In this chapter, we review multiple theoretical perspectives on the relational self, starting with our recent integrative conceptualization of the relational self (Chen, Boucher, & Tapias, 2006). According to our model, the relational self (1) is self-knowledge that is linked in memory to knowledge about significant others; (2) exists at multiple levels of specificity; (3) is capable of being contextually or chronically activated; and (4) is comprised of self-conceptions and a constellation of other self-aspects (e.g., motives, self-regulatory strategies) that characterize the self when relating to significant others. After describing each of these facets of our model, we review theory and research on the social-cognitive phenomenon of transference in detail, as this body of work served as the primary foundation for our broader model. From there, we describe several other theoretical perspectives on the self and significant others (i.e., relational schemas, attachment theory, inclusion of other in the self, relational-interdependent self-construal), and compare and contrast each of these with the transference perspective on the relational self and, in turn, our broader conceptualization. Finally, we discuss relations between the relational self and other aspects of identity (e.g., cultural identity, gender identity), as well as some important directions for future research.

Culture and Individuation: The Role of Norms and Self-Construals

ABSTRACT Despite mounting evidence that members of Asian cultures are less likely to engage in behavior that makes them appear distinctive (i.e., individuating behavior) than members of prototypical Western culture, the direct mechanisms through which this effect occurs have not been explored. In the present research, we examined the role of judgments of social appropriateness for both acceptance of and comfort engaging in individuating behavior, and the role of the divergent self-construals thought to characterize these cultural groups (i.e., Asian and Euro-Americans). Results indicated that ethnicity moderated the relationship between judgments of social appropriateness and acceptance of individuating behavior, and self-construals mediated the relationship between ethnicity and both acceptance of and comfort engaging in individuating behavior. Limitations and implications are discussed.

The Construct of Individuation: More Complex in Collectivist than in Individualist Cultures

The authors outline a strategy for introducing a Western psychological construct into a different culture. A series of three studies tested how the construct of individuation functions in a collectivist culture. It was hypothesized that the original one-factor model of individuation would not be sufficient to capture the meaning of individuating behaviors in a collectivist culture. Rather, a culture-specific model with two factors, namely, Taking the Lead and Seeking Attention, was expected. In Study 1, the two-factor model showed a better fit than the original one-factor model in a Chinese sample. In Study 2, replicating the original one-factor model in an individualistic culture eliminated an explanation for the obtained two-factor model based on a methodological artifact. In Study 3, the authors examined the nomological network of the two types of individuation and determined whether the imported construct of individuation changes meanings in the new culture.

Language and the Bicultural Dialectical Self

We examined the effect of language priming on naïve dialecticism, with special attention paid to effects on dialectical beliefs about the self. European Americans responding in English and bilingual Chinese responding in either Chinese or English completed several measures designed to tap dialectical thinking and dialectical self-perceptions, including tolerance of contradiction, change in thoughts and behavior over time and context, holistic beliefs, and self-concept inconsistency. As expected, those answering in Chinese reported greater dialecticism on most of these measures, relative to those responding in English. European American responses were highly similar to those of bilinguals responding in English. We discuss advantages of language priming and offer directions for future research.

The Relational-Interdependent Self-Construal and Positive Illusions in Friendship

Three studies investigated whether the tendency to define the self in terms of close relationships moderates positive illusions in friendship (i.e., operationalized as the better-than-average effect). High scorers on the Relational-Interdependent Self-Construal (RISC) Scale were more likely to enhance a close/best friend over an acquaintance (Study 1), were more likely to exploit attribute ambiguity to favor their friends (Study 2), and were more likely to enhance their friends on communal over agentic attributes (Study 3) than low-RISCs. High-RISCs reported satisfying friendships and perceived their friendships to be better than average, compared to moderate- and low-RISCs. Also, friend enhancement on communal over agentic attributes predicted friendship satisfaction and friendship enhancement, but only for high-RISCs. These effects remained when controlling for personal self-esteem. We conclude by discussing directions for future research.

Fluid compensation following threats to self-concept clarity

Abstract We examined defensive responses to self-clarity threats, finding that self-uncertain participants gave larger rewards to a social hero, but larger punishments to a social transgressor, than self-certain participants (Study 1). To examine whether there are individual differences in defensiveness to meaning threats, we included moderators, showing that high self-esteem individuals (HSE) thinking about self-inconsistencies gave more polarized evaluations of someone criticizing vs. complimenting their ingroup than self-consistent HSEs (Study 2). We found similar responses to a relational self-clarity threat, among individuals for whom relationships are self-defining (Study 3). Results held controlling for the impact of the self-clarity manipulations on self-esteem. This research is compatible with the meaning maintenance model, which stipulates that various meaning threats elicit fluid compensatory efforts designed to restore general feelings of meaningfulness. We discuss limitations and future directions.