GE1716

I. GEORGE HERBERT MEAD’S THEORY OF SOCIALIZATION

Sociologist George Herbert Mead believed that people develop self-images through interactions with other
people. He argued that the Self, which is the part of a person’s personality consisting of self-awareness and
self-image, is a product of social experience. Mead believed that the key to self-development is understanding
the role of the other. He outlined four ideas about how the self develops:
• The Self Develops Solely Through Social Experience. Mead rejected Freud’s notion that personality
is determined partly by biological drives.
• Social Experience Consists of The Exchange of Symbols. Mead emphasized the particularly human
use of language and other symbols to convey meaning.
• Knowing Others’ Intentions Requires Imagining the Situation from Their Perspectives. Mead
believed that social experience depends on our seeing ourselves as others do, or, as he coined it,
“taking the role of the other.”
• Understanding the Role of The Other Results in Self-Awareness. Mead posited that there is an
active “I” self and an objective “me” self. The “I” self is active and initiates action. The “me” self continues,
interrupts, or changes action depending on how others respond.

II. THE INTERPRETATION OF CULTURES BY CLIFFORD GEERTZ

Enlightenment - a view that, whatever else may be said for or against it, was both clear and simple
The Enlightenment view of man was, of course, that he was wholly of a piece with nature and shared in the
general uniformity of composition which natural science, under Bacon's urging and Newton's guidance, had
discovered there.
Consensus gentium (a consensus of all mankind) – the notion that there are some things that all men will be
found to agree upon as right, real, just, or attractive and that these things are, therefore, in fact right, real, just,
or attractive-was present in the Enlightenment and probably has been present in some form or another in all
ages and climes.
Religion – man’s most fundamental orientation to reality

III. ON THE RELATIONSHIPS BETWEEN EXPLICIT AND IMPLICIT GLOBAL SELF-ESTEEM AND
PERSONALITY

Global self-esteem refers to the general value that a person places on him- or herself and should be
distinguished from appraisals of specific traits or abilities (such as academic self-concept).
Implicit self-esteem is defined as an automatic, overlearned, and nonconscious evaluation of the self (“past
experience”) that guides spontaneous reactions to self-relevant stimuli (“set of responses”)
Personality refers to stable, consistent patterns of thought, feeling, and behavior and is most typically measured
by individual self-reports (projective measures would be an exception)

IV. THE BIG FIVE PERSONALITY DIMENSIONS

Eysenck (1967proposed a trait model that conceptualized personality as consisting of three main factors:
Neuroticism, Extraversion, and Psychoticism.
More recent efforts, starting with extensive analyses of the natural language of trait descriptors, consistently
reveal the value of defining personality into five broad fac- tors: Neuroticism, Extraversion, Conscientiousness,
Agreeableness, and Openness to Experience.
• Neuroticism dimension reflects emotional adjustment versus emotional instability. Persons who
score high in Neuroticism tend to be nervous, tense, and moody. In general, such individuals are
considered highly emotionally unstable; their low-scoring counterparts tend to be emotionally stable
and calm.
• Extraversion refers to the quality of interpersonal interaction, with sociability and assertiveness
anchoring one end of the continuum and reserve and shyness at the other end.
• Agreeableness represents the attitudes that the person holds toward other people, whereas E
reflects the degree to which the person enjoys being in the presence of others. “A” refers to such traits

01 Handout 1 *Property of STI

Page 1 of 2
 GE1716

as generosity, kindness, and cooperativeness. Those who score low in A tend to be manipulative,
cynical, and noncooperative.
• Conscientiousness refers to degree of organization, reliability, and carefulness. Low C individuals
tend to be negligent, careless, and undependable.
• Openness to Experience is defined by the appreciation and seeking of experience for its own sake.
O is defined at one end by such traits as curiosity, imagination, and creativity and at the other end by
conventionality, lack of curiosity, and intolerance of the new.

V. TRAIT AFFECTIVITY

A similar approach that focuses on the analysis of self-rated mood descriptors consistently reveals two broad
emotional dispositions:
• Negative affectivity—the chronic tendency to experience negative mood states (e.g., sadness and
anxiety)
• Positive affectivity – the chronic tendency to experience positive mood states (e.g., joy and
enthusiasm)

01 Handout 1 *Property of STI

Page 2 of 2