Files
Abstract
Think back to the last person you met or interacted with. What characteristics did you notice about them? In particular, did they seem self-aware, or not? In my dissertation, I explore the role of self-awareness in interpersonal contexts. While much existing research has examined how being self-aware affects one’s own subsequent experiences and behaviors, I examine how people perceive self-awareness in others, and how the perception that another person is self-aware (or not) affects observers’ subsequent judgments of that person. I focus in particular on social self-awareness, which I define as an accurate awareness of what others think of oneself (in contrast to other types of self-awareness, such as an awareness of internal experiences like thoughts or emotions). In Chapter 1, I examine how expressing self-awareness can resolve a common impression management dilemma. Often, people who are judged negatively by others (e.g., as low in competence) face a dilemma: They may want to self-promote (to improve this negative impression), but may simultaneously worry that their claims may not seem believable. I dub this type of situation the credibility dilemma, and find that explicitly expressing self-awareness about one’s perceived shortcoming helps to resolve this dilemma.
In Chapter 2, I provide a more general framework for how perceiving self-awareness in another person affects observers’ subsequent judgments of that person, and in particular, how trustworthy that person seems. I find that although self-awareness can signal positive qualities to others—like in Chapter 1—it does not universally enhance others’ trust. This is because self-awareness also signals greater intentionality behind a target person’s behaviors.
Finally, in Chapter 3, I examine when and why observers are most likely to spontaneously evaluate a target person’s degree of self-awareness in the first place, in the absence of specific cues. I propose that when observers are surprised by a target person’s behavior, or evaluate the target negatively on other attributes or behaviors, the observer undergoes a more thoughtful attribution process in order to make sense of the behavior. In doing so, one explanation that sometimes comes to mind is the person’s degree of self-awareness (e.g., that the person lacks self-awareness or is highly self-aware).
Overall, my findings suggest that self-awareness has important interpersonal consequences, not just intrapersonal consequences. Further, my findings suggest that the effect of self-awareness on interpersonal judgment is nuanced: While self-awareness is often considered a positive and desirable quality in others—and does indeed lead to more positive judgments for those in particular circumstances (e.g., the credibility dilemma)—it does not universally enhance others’ trust. Finally, my findings also suggest that self-awareness is a quality that people spontaneously evaluate in others even in the absence of specific expressions of self-awareness, suggesting that it may be worth considering alongside other commonly-researched traits such as competence and trustworthiness. Taken together, my research highlights the importance of examining self-awareness within the interpersonal domain.