The Dual Self: First and third person categorisations of the self and the role of objective self-awareness

• Main Authors: Guido Peeters, Ann Hendrickx
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Ubiquity Press 2007-10-01
• Series: Psychologica Belgica
• Online Access: http://www.psychologicabelgica.com/articles/117

<span>The classic duality of self-subject and self-object is related to the linguistic duality of self as a pronoun of the first and the third person. The latter duality is related to alternative ways of categorising people either as self versus other (SO categorisation) or as objects conceived in the third person (3P categorisation). Research is reviewed showing that these categorisations underlie personalised and depersonalised representations, respectively. Nevertheless, depersonalising 3P categorisation has been found more prominent in self-other comparisons than in comparisons between hypothetical others. In search for an explanation Duval and Wicklund's theory of subjective and objective self-awareness as well as causal attribution theory are discussed. In an experiment it is shown that conditions associated with objective self-awareness (e.g., presence of a mirror, instructions stimulating self-evaluation) increase 3P categorisation in self-other comparisons. The results add to our understanding of the role of objective self-awareness in self-other comparisons and in causal attributions from actors' and observers' perspectives.</span>