The Social Self Every individual has an inner self and an outer self. The inner self is that which is known only by the individual or person himself. Whereas the outer self is that which we let others know. The capacity for self reflection is necessary for people to feel as if they understand their own motives and emotions and the causes of their behaviour. The self is heavily influenced by social factors that is the way we manage ourselves is influenced by the people around us and the situation at the time. The A, B, C of the self could be examined in three major domains; that is the affective, the cognitive, the behavioural. From the cognitive domain one will ask questions like- How do people come to know themselves? How do the social self, self concept, self esteem, self presentation. They develop a self concept and maintain a stable sense of identity? From the affective or emotional domain, we will ask questions like: How do people present themselves to others? How do they regulate their actions according to interpersonal demands?
What is the self?
The self refers to a person’s inner being including the mind and spirit. Here, we are referring specifically to the ego which is the conscious self, the real person. A person’s nature or personalities are the personal qualities that make up one individual. For example, we usually say that he or she is not his/her cheerful self today.
Self Concept (Cognitive Component) Although we usually talk about the self-concept as a single entity. It is actually a multifaceted structure (Mischel and Morf, 2003). The self concept is an organised collection of beliefs about the self. These beliefs also called self-schema, shape social perception (Green and Sedikides, 2001), are developed form past experience and are concerned with one’s personality traits, abilities, physical features, values, goals and social roles