Identity Change in Newly Married Couples: Effects Of Positive And Negative Feedback

Abstract

Previous research has examined individuals' relative preference for consistent and enhancing feedback by examining reactions to negative and positive feedback. Recent research shows that, in general, individuals prefer feedback that is consistent with self-views, even if feedback is negative. It is unclear, however, whether negative and positive feedback equally affect actual changes in individuals' self-views. Using insights from Identity Control Theory (Burke 1991(Burke , 1996 and a sample of newly married couples, we examine whether positive and negative feedback are equally influential in affecting change in individuals' self-views. We also examine possible change in spouses' views. Results show that when there is a discrepancy between individuals' self-views and their spouses' views, both change in ways to become more consistent with the views of the other. Moreover, individuals and spouses are as likely to adopt negative views as they are to adopt positive views, supporting self-consistency theories.

Emotions and the Self: Depression and Identity Change

“…In the research presented here, we offer one possible way to incorporate emotions as an input, or source of information, into the IT model of the self. Consistent with previous research (Cast and Cantwell ), a discrepancy between an individual's identities and his or her spouse's views leads to change in identity. In addition, we find that positive and negative feedback equally influence identity change, further supporting self‐consistency motivations (see also Burke and Harrod ; Cast and Cantwell ) rather than self‐enhancement motives (e.g., Tesser ).…”

“…Indeed, research finds that identity standards change in response to the views of others, becoming more consistent with others' views (Cast et al. ; Cast ; Cast and Cantwell ). Thus, consistent with other research, we hypothesize that:…”

“…In this article, we examine the relationship between an emotion (depression) and an individual's identity (person identity) among a longitudinal sample of newly married couples. Previous research with these data have examined cognitive sources of identity change (e.g., reflected appraisals) (Cast and Cantwell ). In addition to these established relationships, we also include an investigation of emotional sources of identity change by examining the effects of a common emotion (depression) on identity change.…”

The Development of Identity Theory

“…When behavior meanings do not match identity standard meanings, reflected appraisals (the meanings that others are attributing to the self in the situation) may either exceed or fall short of one's identity standard meanings. Research has studied whether identity change is more likely to occur when reflected appraisals meanings are higher or lower than identity standard meanings (Cast & Cantwell, 2007). They found that when the reflected appraisals do not match the identity standard, peoples' identities slowly change in the direction of the discrepant reflected appraisals, but individuals also successfully acted to change the reflected appraisals over time.…”

The Role of Significant Others in Shaping Fathers’ Identities and Behavior

“…This results in positive emotions and self-perceptions and may enhance a man's commitment to the identity (Collett et al 2015). Any perceived mismatch, on the other hand, indicates self-discrepancy, generates negative emotion, and will either prompt increased efforts at involvement or lead a father to alter or abandon the identity either cognitively or behaviorally (Burke and Harrod 2005;Cast and Cantwell 2007).…”