"I'm fit", "I love sports", "I'm a good student", "I'm compassionate", "I'm open-minded", these are the examples of self-schemas. Each individual is being identified with self-concept, which is a series of self-schemas. Self-schemas are normally found in one's characteristics, interests, personality and behaviour. In general, self-schemas are reflected on how a person acts, thinks, behaves and feels. Self-schemas are distinctive and varied from person to person. Some people are schematic on certain dimensions, but some may not. Moreover, people tend to have their own self-chemas on different dimensions. These dimensions are important to people to be identified as individuals.
In social psychology research, self-schemas are said to be influenced by past experiences such as memory of significant event, upbringing, relationship etc. Nevertheless, culture and society are also played important roles in shaping one's self-schemas. Self-schemas are started to form in early childhood as we started to perceive information and ideas from people around us. In other words, our self-schemas tend to be identified by others’ perceptions toward us and this concept is called the "looking-glass self" suggested by Cooley (1902). For example, if a mother tells her son you are very naughty, her son may recognise himself as a naughty boy and he will adopt the self-schema of "I'm naughty". In contrast, if the mother tells her son you are a good boy, her son may recognise himself as a good boy and he will adopt the self-schema of "I'm a good boy". These show that children are susceptible to the concepts of their parents project on them. Hence, the initial development of self-schemas during childhood are more likely to be influenced by adults, more specifically parents or immediate family.
The looking-glass self’s phenomena will persist and develop as a child grows up. Likewise, self-schemas will also develop from time to time as we meet different people throughout our lives. As an individual, one tends to have different self-schemas toward different poeple. For instance, one will regard himself or herself as a "good worker" in front of their bosses or a "caring person" in front of their partners. Thus, the development of our self-schemas by changing our self-images depends on social relationships we develop.
In regards to DeLamater and Meyers', they suggested, "Our self-schema is produced in our social relationships. Throughout life, as we meet new people and enter new groups, our view of self is modified by the feedback we receive from others."(Social Psychology by John DeLamater, Daniel Myers, Jessica Collett, page 122) When we meet people in life, we tend to learn from them, we also tend to receive their opinions about ourselves. After gaining the opinions from others, we will start to evaluate ourselves whether we are ideally perceived based on other people standards. For instance, if a singer is being criticised that his or her performance is bad, he or she may perform better to impress the audience to develop the self-schema of "I'm a good singer". In this context, self-schema is said to be developed to match with other’s perceptions.
On the other hand, according to Higgins (1987) self-discrepancy theory, he suggested that all of us have a set of self-schemas that correlate with each other in developing our self-schemas, they are "actual self", "ideal self" and "ought self". Each of them has different function, the "actual self" reflects on how we currently are, the "ideal self" reflects on how we would like to be, whereas the "ought self" reflects on how we think we should be. Discrepancy occurs if "actual self" is being compared to either "ideal self" or "ought self". This discrepancy reveals the shortcoming of our "actual self". In order to overcome the shortcoming, we will modify our "actual self" to get close to the "ideal self" or "ought self". This discrepancy motivates us to change into a better self on targeted dimension.
In addition, if the change of "actual self" doesn't match the "ideal self", we may feel sad and disappointed. Likewise, if the change of "actual self" fail to meet the "ought self", we may become anxious and fearful. For example, if a person thinks that "I'm poor" and wants to be rich, he or she will find ways to become rich. To achieve that, the "I’m poor" self-schema must be replaced by the "I'm rich" self-schema. In this case, "I’m poor" is said to be the "actual self", whereas "I’m rich" is said to be the "ideal self". Next, if a timid student is being asked to take part in a public speaking, this student might think that he or she has to be brave to overcome the timidity. Likewise, the "I'm timid" self-schema is ought to be transformed into "I'm brave" self-schema. In this case, the student's timid character is said to be the "actual self", whereas to become brave is said to be the "ought self".
Furthermore, a person has the tendency to develop positive or negative self-schemas. If a person thinks that he or she is "good looking", then they will believe themselves that they are good looking on that dimension and this positive self-schema will provide a sense of satisfaction to them. Conversely, if a person think that he or she is "ugly", then they will believe they are ugly and this will become a negative self-schema and will cause a negative emotion. In regards to Showers' compartmentalisation of positive and negative self-schemas (1992). He suggested that compartmentalised self-schemas cause mood swing if either the positive or negative self-schema is primed. For example, if Joe believes that he is a fantastic footballer but an awful student, he is said to have developed a highly compartmentalised self-schemas. If either one of these self-schema is primed, it will either create a very positive mood or negative mood in Joe.
As I mentioned earlier, culture is another factor that influenced the development of self-schemas. According to Markus and Kitayama (1991), they suggested that an independent self is influenced by individualistic culture, whereas an interdependent self is influenced by collectivist culture. Markus and Kitayama also suggested that the individualistic culture separated oneself from the community. This is because one's self-schemas are different from others as they portray inner thoughts and feelings in promoting personal goals. This is normally found in Western cultures which are highly independent. Contrary to individualistic culture, collectivist culture attached oneself to the community by defining one's role and one's relationships to others. For example, I am a mother, I must stay at home to take good care of my family rather than go out for work. This example demonstrates the self-schema of a mother and her relationship towards her family and is normally found in traditional Asian culture.
In addition to culture, "Wundt’s social psychology dealt with collective phenomena, such as language, religion, custom and myth, that could not, according to Wundt, be understood in terms of the psychology of the isolated individual."(Social Psychology 5th edition, Michael A. & Graham M., p.114) This statement showed that religion is also another factor that influenced the development of collective self-schemas. People who follow the principles of a religion, are likely to develop self-schemas that influenced by the religion. People who practise the same religion are likely to adopt collective lives. This is because they share the common values within the religious context. For example, according to Islamic context, women must dress in a decent way. Muslim's women who follow this principle will dress decently, for instance, they cover their heads with veils. By dressing in the same way, these women shows the same characteristic within the Islam community. Therefore, they will be regarded as collectivists as they adopt the interdependent self-schema (dressing decently) which confined by the religion.
After the development of self-schemas, reinforcement and maintenance of self-schemas will take place. In general, self-schemas are reinforced when people focusing on reassuring the positive aspects in them. This could be explained by self-affirmation theory. Whereby people will become more affirmative in maintaining their self-schema by reassuring their positive aspect. For example, I am a famous artist and I strongly believe that I am famous, so therefore the "I am famous" self-schema is maintained. Besides, self-schemas are also maintained through fulfilling other's expectations. In this case, self-schemas will become self-perpetuating if a person choose the activity based on other's expectations instead of followed by own desire. For instance, when a student is praised by a teacher about working hard in learning the subject, he or she will continue to work hard to maintain the "hardworking" self-schema in the teacher's eyes, even though he or she dislikes the subject.
After the development of self-schemas, maintenance will take place. Regarding Self-affirmation theory (Sherman & Cohen, 2006), self-schema is reinforced to reduce the impact from condemning dimension by focusing on affirming positive aspects. Which means self-schemas will be reinforced when one's self-schema has been threatened. One will affirm the condemned self-schema in order to maintain his or her competency and capability on that dimension. For example, Christine is being criticised as a lousy artist but she denies. This denial affirms her self-schema of being a good artist. So the "I am a good artist" self-schema is reinforced and maintained. Apart from self-affirmation, self-schemas can also be maintained by fulfilling other's expectations. For example, when a student is praised by a teacher about working hard in learning the subject, the student will continue to work hard to maintain the "hardworking" self-schema in the teacher's eyes, even though the student dislikes the subject. In this case, self-schemas will become self-perpetuating if a person choose to follow other's expectation instead of own desire.