I’ve dumped more than my fair share of truly great guys in my short lifetime. My friends would always say, “He worships the ground you walk on AND he’s gorgeous! Why would you do that?!” My response would always be about how I thought that I liked him, but now that I have him hooked I don’t want him.
In reality, however, it was because they (whomever I was dating at the time) didn’t verify my self-concepts (an individual’s overall beliefs about his or her own personal characteristics). This idea that we all want confirmation of our self-concepts from others is called self-verification (Swann, Hixon, & de la Ronde, 1992). Interestingly, we want this confirmation even if it is negative.
To better explain, I’ll tell you about Mickey (because – let’s face it – I just like talking about boys).
Mickey was such a sweetheart. He sang me songs, made me cupcakes, hung onto my every word. He also showered me with praise, insisting that everything I did was perfect. Normally, one would think this was a good thing, that I should want to date someone who thinks very highly of me. The problem was: I don’t think very highly of myself (at least not on certain traits).
When he would praise me for my singing abilities (of which I have absolutely NONE) or insisted that my looks were goddess-like (again, a clear exaggeration), it would contradict my own beliefs about myself.
There are two reasons such discrepancies are unsettling. The first is intrapersonal; it suggests that I don’t know myself. It’s frightening to think that a person could not know something about themselves; if we don’t then we can’t predict or control things about our own lives. The second reason is interpersonal; it suggests that Mickey had completely unrealistic expectations of my abilities, or that he didn’t actually know me.
Not only do we prefer, remember, and spend more time paying attention to others’ perceptions that are consistent with our own, we intentionally choose to interact with people who corroborate our self-concepts (Swann et al., 1992). This has been shown in everyone from roommates to spouses. In my case, it’s boyfriends.
If my own appraisal of myself were higher, Mickey (and several other all too nice guys) might have confirmed rather than contradicted my self-concepts and we might have lasted longer. Nevertheless, it makes more sense why things work so well with the current beau; he doesn’t even try to stifle his laughter when I sing. He’s smart enough to know when to massage my ego and when to tell the truth.
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Swann, W., Hixon, J., & de la Ronde, C. (1992). Embracing the bitter 'truth': Negative self-concepts and marital commitment. Psychological Science, 3, 118-121.
2 comments:
I am totally in the same boat that you are in. However, in my case, my ex-boyfriend (wow I feel like I'm just gossiping now... this is for a class??) DID corroborate my self concepts, but they were incredibly negative self-concepts. Not one of my family members or friends liked this guy --and looking back on it he did treat me really poorly-- but he verified my self-concepts at the time which made our relationship work, however dysfunctional it was. Because I felt badly about myself and my abilities and he concurred with my feelings and was always able to point out my failings (which I definitely ALREADY noticed, I might add) we seemed to work so well because he verified my intrapersonal attributes.
It was only when my self-concepts began to change and grow towards a more positive light (as most girls' self-concepts are bound to do when finally leaving the horrid teen years) that we started to have a great deal of conflict. Because he was no longer verifying the self-concepts that I held we started fighting and I finally ended the relationship.
So (after this very long digression) like you, I too have felt that interesting paradox about negative self concepts.
I like the blog, and coming from a boys point of view, I think learning a girl's self concept is the hardest thing to do. The hardest thing to do is to "figure out" a girl. AND it is frustrating when you are trying to figure out a girl and the girl does not even know who she is. This sounds like most college relationships actually, and definitely was the source of most problems in my past relationships.
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