Collective Self-Esteem

This week's post is a guided blog from our instructor.

Identifying My Social Group:

One and also the most obvious social group or category that I am apart of is being a woman. Being part of this group helps me identify with other women where I base much of my behaviors and thoughts. Some behaviors that I exhibit that show I am apart of the social category of being a woman is wearing makeup and wearing dresses. Some thoughts or attitudes associated with being a woman are "Being a thin woman is being a beautiful woman" and "Women are the traditional housekeepers".

However, keep in mind that gender is not biology. This means that some of the things associated with being a female should not always be what identifies me as a woman, even though society sometimes tends to lean in this direction. Females have their monthly period, become pregnant, etc. but this does not mean that it is what defines a woman. Being female and being a woman are not the same to me.

Being a women tends to make me see certain people as being either a part of this social category or not being a part of it. Of course, the ingroup would be people who have behaviors and attitutes associated with being a woman and the outgroup would be people who have the behaviors and attitudes associated with being a man. When I identify myself with being a woman, I tend to sometimes have a negative attitude towards the outgroup of men. I believe this can be attributed to a longing to enhance the cohesiveness of my associated group of being a woman. Perhaps this is even due to a willingness to conform.

When I hear about other's belongingness to this group of women I tend to hear a similar pattern of attitudes or thoughts and also see similar behaviors. However, there are some that have different views about what it means to be a woman. As an example, I have provided a video that shares women's views on household work. Some are very similar and some are radically different. Notice the differences and their reasonings behind each view. (Also, notice how their behaviors are different in each case, e.g. what they are wearing, what they look like, etc.).

It is interesting that in this video you can easily see the difference in each woman's behaviors and their thoughts on the subject.

Being a member of the group of women, to me, means that I am treated a certain way by men and society but I am not limited in opportunities. The group of women today is very diverse in attitudes and behaviors. So, I am able to do more things without my self-esteem being compromised as much as it might have been when my Grandma was growing up. Also, just the idea of being a part of a global group such as this makes me feel supported in my decisions, attitudes, and behaviors when I know that there are other people I can identify with.

Over time, my connection towards this group of being a women has, in fact changed. When I was younger I did not have as strong a connection to being a woman as I do now. However, when I went to high school and college I found more people that were part of this group of women that I could identify with and spend time with. It helped me build a stronger connection to this group and helped me with my personal identity. It is difficult for me to explain the source of this change, but I can tell that it happened because I went from being a jean-wearing, tee-shirt-wearing little lady to being a nail-painting, face-painting, dress-wearing woman. Somewhere in the time between high school and college this happened and I know this because my attitudes as well as my noticeable behaviors changed.

My Collective Self-Esteem:

Membership Esteem -- I feel that I am a valuable member of the global group of women and I feel good about the contributions that I make to it. 

Private Esteem -- I evaluate this group positively and I am proud to be a part of this group.

Public Esteem -- I feel that many people evaluate this group positively but some nonmembers do not always respect this group.

Identity Esteem -- This group is an important part of my identity.

Share your comments! I would love to hear from you.

Groups and Facebook: Making Social Interaction Easier

One of the most widely used Internet websites today, Facebook, has had a profound impact on social interaction. Using Facebook has proven to be useful, mainly in facilitating social interaction in many different ways. While there are numerous ways to interact on Facebook, Facebook "groups" are very helpful when it comes to social interaction among individuals.

Being a part of a group on a social networking website can have its perks. First, these Facebook groups can help individuals find other people with common fates, identities, or sets of goals (Markus et al., 333). The fact that this website is used by so many people means that the use of these groups helps people find a lot of people quickly with things they have in common. For example, I am interested in linguistics, a very uncommon interest. However, I am still able to find multiple groups with more than one person a part of these groups who share my interest in linguistics by using Facebook groups.

Second, these individuals in the groups are very likely to have a joint membership in a social category such as sex, race, etc (Markus et al., 294). So, if I were looking to join a group with mostly women this resource would be available with the click of a mouse! It is amazing how Facebook can help us do this so easily.

Next, a Social Psychologist would tell you that a group must have direct interaction with each other over time (Markus et al., 294). Well, Facebook does help individuals with this (whether or not the individuals follow through is what helps determines their level of group membership). Facebook has a feature that helps create events for individuals who want to organize a meet-up. Also, Facebook's new video chat makes it easier to interact with friends and family over the Internet.

Facebook's features like search tools, being cost-free, its worldwide usage, event planners, and many more allow individuals to interact in groups very easily. It is amazing how technology is shaping our world today! Some people have even started grouping social interaction into a new category: Internet and technology. This is because as our resources and technology grow, so do ways in which we are able to interact with others. Something to consider: What will we think of next and how will it affect human social interaction? Comment below, subscribe, get on Facebook.

Also, enjoy this amusing video about Facebook:

Sources:
Kassin, Fein, and Markus. Social Psychology. 8th ed. 2008. Belmont: Wadsworth, 2011. Print.

Conformity

This week's post is a guided blog initiated by our instructor. It is about the chapter in our text relating to the subject of conformity in Social Psychology. Using our text, I will describe this subject below.

Conformity, compliance, and obedience together are all social influences that cause social pressure on the people they are directed towards. However, they each differ in one or more ways. Let's look at each separately.

According to the Markus, Fein, and Kassin, "conformity is the tendency for people to change their behavior to be consistent with group norms" (288). Also, compliance causes "changes in behavior that are elicited by direct requests" (268). Finally, obedience is "when the request is a command and the requester is a figure of authority" (289).

The best way to see the difference between these three social influences is by how they are measured. Conformity is measured by looking group norms, compliance by looking at direct requests, and obedience by an authority figure's influence.

However, conformity is not just limited to measuring behavior as compliance and behavior are. Conformity goes much deeper than that. Measuring conformity can give us an insight into the changes in perceptions and opinions as well as behavior, which means that we assume the internal (private conformity) changes go along with the external (public conformity), behavioral changes of conformity.

There are five distinct ways to measure the levels of conformity of an individual in social situations. The five social contexts Social Psychologists use to measure conformity are:

1. Group size
2. Awareness of norms
3. Having an ally
4. Age
5. Gender

First, when it comes to conformity it is difficult to ignore the pressure from others. Therefore, group size has an influence that is significant, but only to a point. You may have guessed that the bigger the group the more influence that group has on conformity of individuals. This is true, but there are certain scenarios where the validity of this statement can come into question. When there are individuals who are not willing to conform to the social pressures of the majority it can cause others to question the majority. This situation is what causes Social Psychologists to be careful in measuring conformity when it comes to the social pressures of group sizes.

Second, when an individual is aware of social norms, that individual is more likely to conform to the social pressures of those norms. Expectations are set by these norms and breaking the social norms have consequences.

Third, having an ally in dissent or someone else to share opinions or behaviors when a social situation arises can help measure conformity. It's like saying, "If my friends are smoking, then I can too". As individuals, we are more likely to do or think things that others are because it reduces the pressure of the situation.

Fourth, age can influence conformity whether it is similar or different than the individual(s) being pressured. You may have already heard the popular term "peer pressure". If people of similar age are causing the social pressure to conform, then the influence can be higher.

Fifth, gender groups can also influence the decisions, opinions, and behaviors you have when it comes to conformity. As a woman or man, consider what you would or would not do in certain social situations. How would you react to different social contexts? Women are more likely to conform to behaviors when it comes to style and fashion than men because of the social norms in Western society. Men are more likely to conform to sports than women, again because of these social norms. Yet, gender is not biology; meaning if you are a woman or man your conformity does not always depend on the social norm, but it is greatly influenced by it.

When it comes to conformity, it also depends on the type of society or setting of the social pressures. There are two distinct types of cultures today: individualistic and collectivistic. Individualistic culture tends to have influences of conformity that arise from the self. Collectivistic culture tends to have the greatest influences of conformity that arise from groups with a common goal.

Finally, the impact that social pressures of conformity have on people depend on three things summarized in the "Social Impact Theory". These three things are:

• strength of sources
• immediacy of sources
• number of sources

The strength of a source impacts the pressure of conformity because people with greater social influence like authority figures or people perceived to be credible in any way can increase the likelihood of someone conforming because of how these sources use their strengths.

The immediacy of sources is how close these sources are to the people being pressured by conformity. Their immediacy can make the pressure greater for the people targeted.

The number of sources is similar to what I discussed earlier about group size. The bigger the better, unless there are dissenters of course.

There is a lot of things that I wish I could have discussed in this post. I did not want to go off into tangents, though. So, if you want to discuss anything I didn't talk about but that is related to the subject of conformity, please comment below and I would be happy to discuss it with you.

Sources:

Fein, Kassin, and Markus. Social Psychology. 8th ed. 2011. Belmont: Wadsworth, 2008. Print.