Summary Of In Defense Of Masks By Kenneth Gergen

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In the article “In Defense of Masks”, Kenneth Gergen discusses the different ways people change because of their surroundings. Psychologist believe that people have a “firm and coherent sense of identity” and that it is healthy for a person to have one. Despite being a fellow psychologist, Gergen believes that people don’t acquire a coherent sense of identity but they have multiple “mask” that changes depending on the individuals surrounding. He also believes that if a person does develop the “coherent sense of identity”, they would go through a lot of emotional stress. To support his idea, Gergen and his colleagues created social experiments using controlled environments and using real life examples to express how a person’s personality changes.

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