Who shapes the self of independents and interdependents? Explicit and implicit measures of the self's relatedness to family, friends and partner

Abstract

We suggest that social relationships shape the self in different ways, depending on whether persons define themselves as independent or interdependent. While the self of independents is most strongly associated with mental representations of others to whom they are related because of their own deliberate action (e.g. friends), the self of interdependents is most strongly connected with representations of others with whom they share allocated group memberships (e.g. family members). We took both explicit (Study 1) and implicit measures (Studies 2, 3 and 4) on how strongly independent and interdependent selves are associated with self-chosen versus allocated close others. In Studies 3 and 4, we additionally primed the independent or interdependent self. Both explicit and implicit measures indicated that mental representations of family members were more strongly associated with the interdependent self than with the independent self, while romantic partners and friends were connected with both the independent and interdependent self.self-construal (interdependents) and people with independent self-construal (independents) on how strongly they feel related to their close others (

Predicting Commitment in New Relationships: Interactive Effects of Relational Self-construal and Power

“…In our sample, the roommates did not know each other before living together and were not allowed to choose each other. In this case, the type of relationship in our sample was not voluntary (or acquired, in the terms of Pohlmann & Hannover, 2006), but it was also not allocated like a family relationship.…”

“…Recent research on how different types of relationships shape the self, however, sheds light on why this unexpected relationship may have occurred in our sample. Pohlmann and Hannover (2006) examined perceptions of relationships among individuals with independent and interdependent self-construals. They found that independents perceived the self to be most closely connected to individuals that they had freely chosen to be connected to, such as friends.…”

Being uncertain about what? Procedural fairness effects as a function of general uncertainty and belongingness uncertainty

“…Belongingness can be achieved by strengthening bonds with familiar others (e.g., family members) or by forming bonds with strangers (Baumeister & Leary, 1995;Pöhlmann & Hannover, 2006). We wondered which form of belongingness uncertainty drove these finding, and we conducted Experiment 2 to find out.…”

“…Importantly, these needs can be satisfied not only through affiliation with familiar others (e.g., family members, friends) but also through affiliation with strangers (e.g., interacting with a fan at a sporting event, starting a conversation with a pub patron) (Baumeister & Leary, 1995;Pöhlmann & Hannover, 2006 The main objective of Experiment 2 was to clarify the concept of belongingness uncertainty and its link with the enacted organizational procedures. We induced general uncertainty, as in Experiment 1, for the purpose of replication, and we also induced family-belongingness uncertainty and stranger-belongingness uncertainty.…”

Professional caregivers’ perceptions on the prerequisites for and consequences of people with mild dementia using a digital photo diary

“…Edlund [31] and Nordenfelt [32]. Social interaction is the base for developing one's sense of self and self-consciousness, and the social context can be interpreted as something that offers the opportunity to shape one's identity and awareness [34,35]. For people suffering from dementia, their perceptions of their own life, telling their life story, was interpreted as a vital aspect of their sense of identity [36,37].…”