The main problem of this study was the exploration of the relationship between self concept and educational aspirations. Related problems were the investigation of the relationships of self concept and educational aspirations to (1) race, (2) sex, (3) socio-economic level, (4) religious background, (5) family size, (6) grade average, (7) grade level, and (8) parent’s educational level completed. The self was measured by the Tennessee Self Concept Scale. Five-hundred and seventy-eight students participated from the Muncie School system and the Mount Pleasant Township School System. The ten variables listed above were used in this study with the variable self concept broken down into the following four sub-variables, (1) family self, (2) social self, (3) total variability, (4) total row variability.

This thesis was an investigation of self concept differences and similarities between non-delinquent and delinquent adolescents. Self concept was measured by the utilization of the Tennessee Self Concept Scale, which was developed by William H. Fitts, Ph. D.The investigation was comprised of tasting 30 male, non-delinquent and 30 delinquent male adolescents. Each subject was individually administered the Tennessee Self Concept Scale.It was determined by statistical analysis that non-delinquent adolescents possessed a significantly more adequate self concept than their delinquent counterparts. It was felt that this study’s results would be helpful in providing insight into working with delinquent adolescents.

The purpose of this study was to construct and gather data on an "Observation of Group Self-Concept Schedule" and a parallel "How I Am A t School Self-Report," in an attempt to produce valid and reliable scales of measurement of group self-concept. The significance of the study was founded in the lack of instruments assessing group self-concept.Group self-concept was defined as: A social structure exhibited by interactions which indicate values, attitudes and beliefs that determine the self-perception of a group, wherein individuals mirror the composite group perceptions demonstrated through group behavior. It is an attribute that is capable of change.The related literature supported the term group self-concept through references to the organization and structure of the self, as well as in the recommendations for analyzing the data in terms of group assessments. The conclusions of several studies on self-concept indicated a need for parallel instruments to gather data on the complex structure of the self.The construction of both the observation and self-report instruments was based on criteria that promoted descriptive rather than judgmental items. The process of instrument development included close examination of students in an operational setting and review of literature relevant to self-concept, instrument design in the affective domain and analytical procedures for reliability and validity estimates. The instruments were exposed to field-testing and constructive criticism for in-depth clarification and refinement. Observers and instrument administrators were trained until the researcher was comfortable with their skills in the data collection procedure.The sample included fourth, fifth and sixth grade pupils who were involved in the Westinghouse *PLAN which included computer assisted instruction, open-education and team-teaching.The data collection process included five pairs of trained observers rating each pupil group in each grade level, wherein pairs of observers rated a group simultaneously for twenty minutes. Twenty-five per cent of the ratings of pairs of raters obtained a correlation coefficient of .80 or greater and seventy-four per cent of the ratings of the pairs of raters obtained a correlation coefficient of .50 or greater.Statistical analysis of the data produced a reliability coefficient of .84 (L.05) for test-retest procedures using a three week interim. A stability coefficient of .72 (<.05) was obtained overa ten month period.A panel of Educational Psychology Faculty assessed the content validity of both instruments and agreed that both contained a pool of items which related to individual indicators of public self-concept.The analysis of the data attempting to interpret the construct validity was an intellectual and analytical number of students to factor analyze the data. Oblique and orthogonal simple structure rotations produced factors that could be interpreted.A correlation coefficient of .55 was obtained between the observation schedule and the self-report.The problems of negligible variation and weak items as revealed through statistical analysis were pursued. The revised instruments contain expanded response systems and syntactically refined items in an attempt to resolve the aforementioned problems.It is recommended that if similar studies are carried out that there be a balance maintained between intellectual and statistical approaches in constructing the instruments and analyzing the data.The primary stage of this study has produced guidelines and has supplied implications for further research.

The processing of self-relevant personality trait information was examined using the five factor model of personality. The major question addressed was whether these five personality dimensions impact on the manner in which individuals process information about themselves, relevant to these personalty dimensions, across a range of cognitive processes. Accessibility of self-knowledge, attention and memory were assessed in relation to each of the five factors. Given the strong relation between personality and affect, the role of affect in processing personality information was also examined. Overall, the results indicate that personality and mood states both influence the processing of self-relevent personality trait terms. On a self-endorsement task, Neuroticism, Extraversion and Conscientiousness were associated with shorter response latencies, indicating that individuals can access rapidly information about themselves in relation to these personality dimensions. The results of memory tasks indicate that negative mood exerted a largely disruptive influence on memory performance. On an analog Stroop task, individuals in negative mood states were found to orient to negatively-valenced trait information. An interaction was found between negative mood states and Neuroticism: individuals high in Neuroticism who were also in a negative mood state were more likely to orient to negative trait information. These findings indicate that both personality and mood factors are important variables which operate on different cognitive processes. The results are interpreted in terms of model of representation of the self.

Over the past forty years, polls have clearly indicated a decrease in expressions of racism and sexism. However, while people appear more tolerant, many social scientists claim that prejudice is still prevalent, although in a more disguised form. Indeed, it may be difficult to distinguish a person who is genuinely nonprejudiced from someone simply conforming to external nonprejudiced norms. This thesis presents three experiments that focus on amen and women in the workplace in order to investigate the extent to which the dilemma of genuine nonsexism exists. Experiment I investigated men's hiring preferences. Men whose nonsexist self-conceptions were threatened with sexist feedback were more likely to choose a less competent female over more competent male worker, than nonthreatened men, especially if they had a well-internalized nonsexist self-conception. Are these men genuinely nonprejudiced? Experiment II investigated the alternative explanation that better-internalized nonsexist men who preferred the less competent woman, may simply have been conforming to nonsexist norms rather than being genuinely nonsexist. Male participants read a scenario wherein sexism was deemed inappropriate and were also required to respond to a romantic attraction between a male manager and female employee that conflicted with the nonsexist workplace norms. Unlike less well-internalized nonsexist men, better-internalized nonsexist men were predicted to avoid potentially sexist expressions of attraction towards a female employee, despite endorsing the workplace romance. Results unexpectedly reveal that better-internalized men, even when threatened, were as likely to express attraction towards the female employee as threatened, less well-internalized men. Better-internalized men therefore responded inconsistently with their nonsexist self-conceptions and instead conformed to a potentially sexist norm of romance in the workplace. Experiment III further explored the influence of romantic norms on men's responses to a female employee. Results reveal that threatened, better-internalized men tended to comply with romantic norms as did threatened, less well-internalized men. Norms appear to encourage compliance with both attraction and nonsexism, even in men apparently motivated by genuinely internalized nonsexism. Thus, apparently "genuine" nonsexist men may instead be viewed conforming to nonsexist norms rather than having authentically internalized a nonsexist self-conception.

Complementing field research among severely disadvantaged minority groups, the present laboratory analogue investigates how the clarity of a group member's cultural (collective) identity is related to positive feelings about oneself and one's performance. Participants were assigned to a clear, conflicted, or unclear collective identity condition, and were then faced with challenging tasks (study 1) or a challenging social interaction (study 2). In study 1, the hypotheses were not confirmed because participants overcame a lack of collective identity clarity by simply applying their own familiar collective identity to the tasks. This default alternative was removed in study 2, which resulted in a confirmation of the hypotheses. Participants in the clear condition felt more positive and successful than participants in the conflict and unclear conditions. Compared to participants in the clear and unclear conditions, participants in the conflict condition found the interaction to be the most difficult presumably because they were challenged to resolve competing identities. Clarity of collective identity was related to feelings of positivity, success, task difficulty, and to the expression of positive emotions, certainty, and achievement, thereby emphasizing the importance of collective identity clarity for the self.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Toronto, 2004. / Adviser: F. Michael Connelly.

Thesis (Dipp.App.Psych. 1976) - The Department of Psychology, University of Adelaide.

Thesis (B.A. Hons.) -- University of Adelaide, Department of Psychology, 1974.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Hong Kong, 2008. / Includes bibliographical references (leaf 80-89) Also available in print.