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How much control do we have in shaping our identities

The question of how our identities are shaped has been tackled in a number of different guises. It was Gergen (1971) who identified the difference between personal and social identities in writing on self-concept. Some have seen identity reflected through society and social relations while some have seen identity more situated in the individual and in cognitive processes - for example personality psychologists. This essay will examine two theories which attempt a synthesis of these two aspects but place different emphases on how we control (or are influenced in) the formation of our identities.

Turner (1982) saw personal and social identity as two different levels of self-categorisation. This idea rests on the fact that people, at one level, distinguish themselves from others by their individual differences between each other, and at another level, see differences in social groupings. This self-categorisation theory concentrates on how a person categorises themselves at any given moment, and it is through this categorisation in the moment that identity can be analysed. Depending on the group with which a person is with, they take on the values and attributes of that group.

The process involved in this formation of identity was seen by Turner (1982) as depersonalisation. When an individual identifies with a group and this category becomes more salient, their own identity at that moment changes to make way for the group's identity. This does not mean that personal identity is lost, simply that the level at which it operates changes. How then do the personal and social interact so that people access these categories and form their identities at any given moment? Two aspects have been identified: the relative accessibility and the fit. The former will vary primarily with a person's experience, values and motives. The latter has been analysed as involving both the comparative and normative fits (Oakes, 1987). The comparative fit will compare average differences between the identities in a situation and use this as the basis for self-categorisation. The normative fit, however, makes a comparison to the social categories and meanings that are relevant. What this means is that our identities are formed in comparison to other people and when those comparisons change, our identity effectively changes as well.

A clear example of this can be seen in the research of Haslam, Turner, Oakes, McGarty, & Hayes (1992). These researchers examined how perceptions of Americans changed before and after the Gulf War. The results showed that the perception of being American changed during the war and also varied depending on which other nationality Americans were being compared to.

Importantly, self-categorisation theory does not see the social circumstances as warping or changing a person's identity, but it is in the person's relationship with their social environment that identity is formed (Lyons, 1998). Therefore it is the process of how our identities are formed and change in self-categorisation theory that allows for our control through the ways in which we categorise ourselves. It is through identifying with different social groups that this theory sees us forming our identities. In as far as we have control over which social groups we identify with, we also have control over the moment-to-moment formation of our identities.

Other theories of identity formation have attempted to provide a balance between personal and social identity, as clearly they are both important. Identity process theory (Breakwell, 1986) sees an interaction between the social context of a person's life, the processes of influence and the social structures, with the individual organism, in the form of cognitive processes such as memory and attention. Breakwell (1986) sees a person's identity as being constructed by two types of processes. The first is called 'assimilation-accommodation' and involves the absorbing of new information and the rearrangement of existing structures to incorporate this information. The second process is called 'evaluation' and involves assigning the new aspects of identity with a value.

In identity process theory, these two processes are guided by four principles. The first is that the individual will try to gain self-esteem - this forms the core of most identity theories. The second is continuity, which is a desire to provide a consistent display of the self over time. The third is the principle of distinctiveness which means that people will try to increase their difference from other people, but only to a reasonable extent - people don't want to be too different. The fourth is that the individual will try to maintain their competence and control. Breakwell (1986) states that it is probably the self-esteem principle that is most important in identity formation and will override the others if necessary.

This particular model of identity processes shows the importance of the interaction between the personal and social and clearly sees the formation of personality as being constructed in this space. While a person might not always have control over their surroundings and their innate cognitive gifts, they can certainly choose how to react with what is available. The processes made explicit in identity process theory allow a person to control their identity formation within the boundaries set by the four principles, primarily controlled by self-esteem.

Both identity process theory and self-categorisation theory see the process of identity formation at the confluence of a number of different processes, some social and some personal. Both these theories, through different processes, allow ways for us to control the formation of our identities, but both also emphasise the importance of our social circumstances. Our identities are always going to be a result of both personal and social factors, and the extent to which we have control over this is going to vary with our particular social circumstances.

References

Breakwell, G. M. (1986) Coping with threatened identities, London and New York: Methuen.

Gergen, K. J. (1971) The concept of self. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston.

Haslam, S. A., Turner, J. C., Oakes, P. J., McGarty, C., & Hayes, B. K. (1992) Context-dependent variation in social stereotyping 1: The effects of intergroup relations as mediated by social change and frame of reference. European Journal of Social Psychology, 22, 3–20.

Lyons, E. (1998) Social psychology 1. In Eysenck, M. W. (Ed.), Psychology, an integrated approach. London: Prentice Hall.

Oakes, P. (1987). The salience of social categories. In J. C. Turner M. A. Hogg, P. J. Qakes, S. D. Reicher, & M. S. Wetherall (Eds.), Rediscovering the social group: A self-categorization theory (pp. 117-41). Oxford: Blackwell.

Turner, J. (1982) Towards a cognitive redefinition of the social group. In H. Tajfel
(Ed.), Social identity and inter-group relations, pp15-40. Cambridge: Cambridge
university Press.