People are often motivated to enhance or protect their ...

[justinmsk]

People are often motivated to enhance or protect their self-images. In what circumstances are self-image enhancement and protection especially important?
 
  Describe three cognitive or behavioral strategies that people use for boosting and protecting their self-images.
 
  What will be an ideal response?

Question 2

Discuss the role of culture, and the individualism/collectivism dimension in particular, on social cognition. Include discussion of research on attributional and self-enhancement processes.
 
  What will be an ideal response?

[eliasc0401]

Answer to Question 1

Answer: Circumstances include various threats to self-esteem such as poor performance, negative interpersonal feedback, thinking about one's death, fragile or unstable self-esteem. Strategies include upward and downward social comparison, self-serving attributions, exaggerating our strengths, diminishing our weaknesses, believing we have control when it is possible, but giving up this perception when it is not possible.

Answer to Question 2

Answer: Students should describe the cultural boundedness of the fundamental attribution error and the research on attributions in the press. In addition, they should describe cultural differences in the need for positive self-regard, including the self-serving bias. Finally, students should discuss the finding that members of the two kinds of cultures are likely to self-enhance with regards to traits that are highly valued in the respective cultures.

[justinmsk]

Thank you!

[eliasc0401]

Happy to help