Task 1- question 2 exam paper

Self concept can be defined as the idea we have of ourselves as individuals. Explore one of the following statements about self-concept, using examples from your studies and experiences.

• Our self concept relies heavily on the feedback we receive from others.

Feedback can often affect someone's way of thinking about their-self, it can boost self esteem, or knock it. If someone speaks badly of you, you would assume it could have an affect on the way you think about yourself and your confidence- especially if you already thought bad of yourself and someone confirmed it. Rogers spoke about our ideal-self (the person we would like to be) and our self-image (how we see ourselves) if someone confirms our self image is far from our ideal self it may mean our gap between self image and ideal self is very big, making our self esteem very low. For example if you would like to think that you are smart, and you get a result back which in reality is not so good, it confirms the reality, therefore lowering that persons self esteem.

If my friends give me good feedback and confirm my self concept or give me complements, it boosts my self esteem, and allows me to higher my expectations and feel better about myself, but if they dismiss me or give me negative feedback my self esteem would lower, I would feel less confident in myself and overall not feel myself. Because of this I would usually keep quiet and let people not see my 'Hidden self' and try to downplay my 'Open self' (Johari Window) because generally I have a very loud, bubbly personality and it does not always work in my favour. This would also happen if someone was to say a face threatening act to me (Ervin Goffman). Ervin Goffman speaks about how we have 2 faces, a positive and negative face and when people are intentionally trying to offend they may say something more bluntly- 'I don't like you'. This will knock your self esteem and may then change your self concept.