Social Comparison Theory Paper

Improved Essays
Show More
Social comparison theory is another social psychological theory that establishes that individuals have a drive to evaluate their opinions, engage in social comparison and are usually with people that look similar to them (T.Morrison, M.Morison, Kalin, 2004). Downward comparison (comparing oneself to someone dissimilar to oneself) is believe to enhance well-being and upward comparison (comparing oneself to someone who is better) is believed to decrease well-being. However, research has shown that social comparison of physical appearance tends to be upward. A study conducted, revealed that comparing one’s appearance to models in magazine advertisement correlate negatively with self-evaluation of attractiveness (T.Morrison, M.Morison, Kalin, 2004).

Related Documents

  • Improved Essays

    Women's Roles Essay: Girl By Katie Makkai
    • 1601 Words
    • 7 Pages

    Women's Roles Essay: Girl By Katie Makkai

    Beauty matters. Well, at least for some. From the clothes you choose to wear (and the ones you don’t) to the items you own, everything surrounding you changes how people perceive you, even things completely out of someone’s control. Pressures to adhere to societal norms can cause long-term harm for certain people, but others can take this concept in stride. Due to different upbringings, along with different environmental influences, it allows for a range of perspectives.…

    • 1601 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Improved Essays
    Read More
  • Improved Essays

    Three Most Important Lessons In Bird's Bird By Bird
    • 560 Words
    • 3 Pages

    Three Most Important Lessons In Bird's Bird By Bird

    Many people go through life constricted with the fear of social judgement. Lamott says, “Be afraid of wasting any more time obsessing about how you look and how people see you”(226). She makes a great keynote by pointing out how individuals who obsess over what other people think of them miss out on much of life. Every minute is spent trying to cover their real selves with layers of perfectionism and prudence. There are always people who will not agree with others’ point of views, but it is our job to not let it affect our opinions.…

    • 560 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
    Read More
  • Superior Essays

    The Devil Wears Prada, And Am I A Better Mother Than You?
    • 1322 Words
    • 6 Pages

    The Devil Wears Prada, And Am I A Better Mother Than You?

    Communication theories are an explanation on how our opinions and actions can become an influence in our lives; however, this paper will focus on Social Comparison Theory. In the Social Comparison Theory there are two types of comparisons: downward and upward; this means that people may judge others feel better about themselves or to improve their abilities. This communication theory is clear in many cases. For instance, there is a study that examines the influence media has on mothering and how that increases competition among mothers, this article is called,‘“Am I a Better Mother Than You?’ Media and 21st-Century Motherhood in the Context of the Social Comparison Theory.”…

    • 1322 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Superior Essays
    Read More
  • Decent Essays

    Attractiveness In Charlie's Angels
    • 184 Words
    • 1 Pages

    Attractiveness In Charlie's Angels

    An older academic study found that college-aged men found normally attractive women much less attractive after watching just a few minutes of Charlie’s Angels, which featured three of the most beautiful actresses of all time: Farrah Fawcett, Jaclyn Smith and Kate Jackson. Doug Kenrick, one of the study’s authors observed: “As in the case of exposure to extremes of water temperature, exposure to extremes of physical appearance affected people’s judgments of what was average. As we had predicted, an average-looking woman was judged significantly uglier than normal if the subjects had just been gazing at a series of beauties.” In a follow-up study, men rated their current partners as less desirable after viewing photos in Playboy and Penthouse,…

    • 184 Words
    • 1 Pages
    Decent Essays
    Read More
  • Improved Essays

    Anorexia In Society
    • 982 Words
    • 4 Pages

    Anorexia In Society

    Throughout our lives, we are surrounded with images; positive images, negative images, any and all can affect our moods, mentalities, and behaviors: what we drive, what we wear, where we live and how we eat. From the time we are old enough to understand the expectations of society, the media and surrounding community is there every step of the way with what it deems acceptable and normal for us. Media of all kinds -- commercials, magazines, TV shows and movies -- can make it impossible for people to keep from comparing themselves not only to each other but to the excessively Photoshopped images they are bombarded with every single Everyone has heard the phrases that suggest standards of beauty. For example, when people say, “real…

    • 982 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
    Read More
  • Improved Essays

    Social Commensurability Summary
    • 1267 Words
    • 6 Pages

    Social Commensurability Summary

    The Commensurability of Different Vulnerability Imam Subkhan One of the chief argument from The Pastoral Clinic is that an ethic of care among the heroin addicts in Española Valley are possible emerge from a common and shared vulnerability. Garcia argues that the common experience of vulnerability of addicts in everyday life is the principle of commensurability in which become basis for an ethic of care such as in the form of watchfulness. She claims that ‘watchfulness’ is able “to offset forms of alienation that accompany addiction” and eventually opens up “the possibility of being together” which Garcia called “the very heart of social commensurability” (182). At this point I would like to raise some reflections: how social commensurability…

    • 1267 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Improved Essays
    Read More
  • Decent Essays

    Social Imagination Paper
    • 390 Words
    • 2 Pages

    Social Imagination Paper

    Chris Cleveland Week 1 “Social imagination” Social imagination is an awareness and understanding of how one’s life experiences play a role in their opinions, decision making, and views of society. We all have our own social location, and social imagination helps us step outside of our comfort zone to view the world through objective eyes. Social imagination is questioning things we take for granted to be natural behavior or beliefs. “Making the familiar strange” was the perfect way for the text to describe it. Take something that is a widely accepted behavior and analyze it.…

    • 390 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Decent Essays
    Read More
  • Superior Essays

    The Role Of Obstacles In The Oppression Of Women
    • 2248 Words
    • 9 Pages

    The Role Of Obstacles In The Oppression Of Women

    Social comparisons can take place intentionally and when they do people tend to compare to better performing same-sex others. Social comparisons can also happen unintentionally when individuals are subliminally primed with comparison information. Typically, downward comparisons lead to an increase in self-esteem and self-view where as upward comparisons lead to a decrease in self-esteem and self-view. While upward comparisons may eventually lead individuals to greater achievements that does not negate the negative impact it can initially have on conceptions of the self. Upward comparisons, especially when people are uncertain of their self-views, can have “powerful, and sometimes painful, contrast effects…in the self-evaluation of ability” (Pelham and Wachsmuth, 1995,…

    • 2248 Words
    • 9 Pages
    Superior Essays
    Read More
  • Improved Essays

    Social Dissonance Theory Paper
    • 682 Words
    • 3 Pages

    Social Dissonance Theory Paper

    In relation to the first question, the results showed that subjects in the control group rated their experience somewhat negatively. Subjects in the one dollar category rated their experience statistically more positively in comparison to the control group while the twenty dollar category’s average rating was only minimally higher than that of the control group. Participants in the one dollar group also responded more positively when asked about their willingness to participate it similar experiments compared with the control group. There was no significant difference in responses from all subjects in relation to how much they had learned from the experiment. These results are in line with the authors predictions as the response to this question should not be affected by the created element of cognitive dissonance.…

    • 682 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
    Read More
  • Improved Essays

    Empathy In Frankenstein
    • 672 Words
    • 3 Pages

    Empathy In Frankenstein

    Further even today, people still judge others by their appearances. They tend to be nicer to those whose physical appearances are beautiful, while being indifferent, to those who do not have good physical appearances. However, important to remember that people who might have nice appearances do not always have good virtues, while on the contrary, people who appear “ugly” might have “beautiful hearts”. Therefore, people should try to look beyond others’ appearances, and judge them instead by their…

    • 672 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
    Read More
  • Improved Essays

    Figurative Comparison Paper
    • 798 Words
    • 4 Pages

    Figurative Comparison Paper

    Richard Nordquist (2017) articles delineate the concept of Organizational metaphor as a figurative comparison utilized while redefining the significant aspects of an Organization and while explaining the operation methodologies applied by the Company. On a different perspective, Gareth Morgan’s (1997) manuscript identifies different organizational metaphors described to be authentic and which include organization as machine, 'organization as organism,' 'organization as brain,' 'organization as a culture.' Other metaphors include 'organization as political system,' 'organization as psychic prison,' 'organization as the system of change and flux,' and 'organization as an instrument of domination.' The chosen articles for this specific case study…

    • 798 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
    Read More
  • Improved Essays

    Effects Of Social Media On Body Image
    • 1550 Words
    • 6 Pages

    Effects Of Social Media On Body Image

    Most young adults, especially teenage girls, have social media such as Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and Tumblr. Even more people read magazines, watch TV and movies and listen/watch music videos. Social media has become an everyday part of life. But has it gone so far that it helped to alter someone 's view of themselves? Social media has indeed affected the body image of many.…

    • 1550 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Improved Essays
    Read More
  • Improved Essays

    Leon Festinger's Social Comparison Theory
    • 919 Words
    • 4 Pages

    Leon Festinger's Social Comparison Theory

    In the mid of 1950’s, the Behavioral Sciences Division of the Ford Foundation gave Leon Festinger a grant, which was part of the program of the Laboratory for Research in Social Relations. From this grant, he was able to write his first document on the Social Comparison Theory which was published in the Journal of Human Relations in 1954. Leon Festinger at 1954 was the first who used the theory of social comparison and the first proposed the theory of methodology, but the general concept in trading since he was a social philosophers and sociologists. Among the social psychologists, Festinger was the first to use the term “Social Comparison,” although it must be made clear that the general idea did not come from him alone.…

    • 919 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
    Read More
  • Improved Essays

    Characteristics Of The Halo Effect
    • 759 Words
    • 4 Pages

    Characteristics Of The Halo Effect

    The halo effect can be understood as a type of cognitive bias where our overall impression of someone influence the way we feel about their character. The term first originated by psychologist Edward Thorndike who used it in his study in 1920 to explain the way officers rated their soldiers. It is a phenomenon in which highly influences first impressions. The halo effect uses global characteristics (such as attractiveness or likeable) to make judgments about specific personality traits (such as outgoing or nice). Individuals overall impressions of a person influences their feelings and thought about that person 's character.…

    • 759 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
    Read More
  • Brilliant Essays

    Effects Of Social Media And Self Esteem
    • 3949 Words
    • 16 Pages

    Effects Of Social Media And Self Esteem

    According to Coopersmith’s definition, self-esteem is “the evaluation which the individual makes and customarily maintains with regard to himself: it expresses an attitude of approval and indicates the extent to which an individual believes himself to be capable, significant, successful and worthy. In short, self-esteem is a personal judgment of the worthiness that is expressed in the attitudes the individual holds towards himself.” (p. 4–5) To put it more simply, self-esteem is the attitude that people have toward their own…

    • 3949 Words
    • 16 Pages
    Brilliant Essays
    Read More

Related Topics

Ready To Get Started?
Discover
Company
Follow
©2024 Cram.com
Privacy Policy |  About Ads |  Site Map |  Advertise  | 
  • Cookie Settings