About the Author

Gregg Henriques, Ph.D.

One Self or Many Selves?

Posted Apr 25, 2014

Properly speaking, a man has as many social selves as there are individuals who recognize him and carry
an image of him in their head. - William James

But the concept of the self loses its meaning if a person has multiple selves…the essence of self involves
integration of diverse experiences into a unity…In short, unity is one of the defining features of selfhood
and identity. - Roy Baumeister

These two quotes capture competing perspectives on one of the most longstanding puzzles of human
psychology: What is the self? And, more specifically, is there just one ‘self’ in each person or do we
really consist of many different selves? When faced with this question, most people respond initially that
there is just one “self” and that is the ‘me’ who is reading this blog! My hope for this rather lengthy blog
is that it will give you a clearer sense of why this is such a complex question.

Let’s start with a basic common sense response and say that there is a single self. This position can
initially be justified by the basic observation that we inhabit one body. My body can be conceived of as an
object and like most “normal sized” objects, it exists in one location in space and time and in that sense it
is singular. But deeper reflection reveals that we are not usually talking about the physical body when we
are talking about the self. If so, my ‘self’ would still be there if I had a heart attack and fell to the floor
and died. But most people, myself [:o)] included, would say that a dead body does not contain the self;
the self resides in the dimension of the mental and cultural and is not really reducible to the physical and
biological (see here and here for my naturalistic analysis of dimensions of reality).

That raises the question, what does the ‘self’ consist of? In other blogs (see here and here), I describe the
human self as consisting of three related, but also separable domains. The first domain is
the experiential self. This is the ‘theater of consciousness’ and the first person felt experience of being. In
this context, it includes the felt consistency of being across periods of time. In that sense, it is tied very
closely to memory. This is the part of you that “disappears” when you enter a deep sleep, flickers on and
off as you dream, and then comes back on line as you wake up. In this TED Talk, the famed
neuropsychologist, Antonio Damasio shares his thoughts on this portion of the self—and he appropriately
notes that it is a portion that relates very directly to experiential consciousness, it also relates deeply to
your core drives/needs and emotionally organized feeling states. This level of self is a mental capacity we
share with other animals, and it presumably forever disappears when we die (at least from a naturalistic
perspective).

A second portion of the human self is called the private self-consciousness system. In more common
parlance, we can call this the “narrator” (or interpreter), because is the portion of your being that verbally
narrates what is happening and why and tries to make sense of what is going on. As you read this blog
and think about what it means, this is your verbal narrator working. It is also the part that includes your

Henriques, Gredd Ph.D. (April 25, 2014). One Self or Many Selves. Retrieved from
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/theory-knowledge/201404/one-self-or-many-selves
 About the Author
Gregg Henriques, Ph.D.
A professor of psychology
at James Madison University.

reportable self-concept and explicit beliefs and values about the way the world works (e.g.,
your religious and political beliefs). This portion of the self is what Damasio calls the “autobiographical
self.”

The final portion of the self is the public self or persona. It refers to the public image that you attempt to
project others, which in turn interacts with how other people actually see you—the crucial element of this
portion of the self is referenced in the James quote above.

Mapping these three parts of “the human self” gives clues about the primary focus of this blog, which is
becoming aware that although we tend to experience a sense of continuity and unity of the self, the fact of
the matter is that it is much too simple to say that we have one self and be done with it. If you have ever
been surprised by how you acted, or felt confused, conflicted, or uncertain about who you truly are, or
realized how dramatically different you feel in different situations or in different moods, then you know
that this thing we call the ‘self’ can have many different and often competing facets and states—and if
you haven’t had this experience, then you probably have not been paying too much attention!

To see what I mean, let’s start with an everyday example that recently happened to me, and then let me
give an extreme example from my clinical practice a decade ago. The other day I received a call on the
heels of a conference presentation I offered, in which the caller invited me to be in charge of the
membership of a particular organization. The caller, who interacted with me on several occasions during
the conference but did not know me prior to the event, said to me, “We need someone in charge of
membership like you who is gregarious and socially engaging.” Later, when I told my wife about the way
he characterized me, she laughed said, “I thought you psychologists could read people. He obviously
failed there!” My wife, who knows me very well, was basing this comment on the fact that in many social
situations I tend to be fairly reserved, am hesitant to make ‘small talk’, and am more likely to find myself
in a corner rather than the center of attention. So, which is the “real me,” gregarious or reserved?

Now consider a patient I worked with, call her Hannah. I met Hannah because she was enrolled in a
clinical research study I was running for folks who attempted suicide (between 1999 and 2003). She had
made many serious attempts. In a fairly short period of time, I began to see that there were many
dramatically different sides to Hannah. First, she presented as cold and aloof. Then, by about our third or
fourth session, she switched, attaching to me, praising me, telling me she thought I could “save” her and
that she needed to keep seeing me. Then as the therapy progressed, I saw a rageful, destructive part of her.
I had Hannah doing some diary work, and when she became activated in this way, she wrote differently,
talked differently, and had different memories (in addition to relating to me dramatically differently). She
even had a different name for her self (Fran) and often could not remember what Hannah was doing when
she adopted the persona of Fran. Hannah had been seriously and horribly abused as a child, both
physically and sexually, over many years. She suffered what used to be known as Multiple Personality
Disorder and what is now called Dissociative Identity Disorder. MPD/DID is a fascinating (and tragic)
condition and has been controversial diagnosis (which is one of the reasons the name was changed). It is
controversial precisely because it seems that some individuals do operate as radically different
personalities within the same body, and yet this observation clashes with the strong felt sense that each
individual has a single person residing within them. (It is also controversial because it is so exotic that it
provides an incentive to fake it or fake report on it).

Henriques, Gredd Ph.D. (April 25, 2014). One Self or Many Selves. Retrieved from
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/theory-knowledge/201404/one-self-or-many-selves
 About the Author
Gregg Henriques, Ph.D.
A professor of psychology
at James Madison University.

My overall point with these two examples is that it is very clear that people have a multiplicity of self-
states; without wading into the complicated debate about the validity of MPD/DID, at the very least DID
shows how extreme these multiple self-states can be in people. Moreover, as a clinician, although DID is
very unusual, it is very common in the clinic room to see a situation when the multiplicity of self-states is
an obvious source of distress and maladaptive behavior patterns. Because of this and the general value of
self-knowledge, it is important for folks to understand the forces that go into why we humans experience
a multiplicity of self-states, which is what follows here.

Conceiving the “self” as patterns of behavior through time. Although we often think about the self as a
“thing,” it is also the case that one can think of the self as a pattern of behavior through time. In this view,
the “I” is synonymous with what I feel, think, and do feel across time. When examined in this light, then
the idea that there are multiple self-states becomes clear in the sense that we do very different things
across time. This basic insight frees us to think about the self in a much more dynamic way, as opposed to
attempting to characterize it as a specific, fixed, and unchanging object.

Situations matter. Thinking of the self as a pattern of behavior across time blends into another key point
as to why we have a multiplicity of self-states, which is that our behavior is largely a function of the
situation. This fact should not be too surprising, but as fellow PT blogger Sam Sommers points out, it is a
surprisingly easy thing to lose sight of. If we go back to my everyday example, there are some situations
that are rewarding for me to be gregarious, whereas there are other situations that are much less so. If I am
in a situation where others will reward talk about theoretical and philosophical dimensions of psychology,
I am likely to become energized and talkative. However, if the social system is rewarding talk about other
topics I both know and care little about, I become reserved. In sort, change the situation and you change
my behavior and thus I enter into a different self-state. It is also, of course, the case that our self is defined
by roles that society has constructed. There are very different expectations for myself as a husband as
opposed to a friend as opposed to the director of a doctoral program in professional psychology. And not
only that, how I experience myself will be hugely influenced by how others see me, a point so important
that we need to spell it out further.

Our sense of self is shaped deeply by others. James Mark Baldwin has a great quote that “ego and alter
are born together,” which means our self-concept is foundationally shaped both by how others see us and
how we see ourselves in relation to others. This starts with our earliest attachments, when our
fundamental sense of security is shaped by how well our care-takers were attuned to our needs and
vulnerabilities. Thus we come to experience ourselves first via the eyes of others. In addition, our self-
consciousness system was shaped as a social reason giving device. That means that our “narrator” first
starts off via speech narrating to others why we are doing what we are doing, and this means that our self-
concept is formed in large part by the audiences. In terms of a multiplicity of self-states, this means that
our self-concept is deeply influenced by the “audience” we initially narrate to. Change the audience, and
we change the self. That is in part what William James is getting at in his quote.

An excellent example of this was found in a classic social psychology experiment on attractiveness. In the
experiment, done in the 1970s, men and women, who had never met, were arranged to have a phone
conversation. The man was given a picture of the woman he was talking to. The picture actually was
either of a very attractive woman or a much less attractive woman (this was the experimental
manipulation, it was not really a picture of the other woman). The transcripts of the conversation were
taken and then the male’s portion was removed. Independent reviewers then assessed the female’s portion
of the conversation for the degree of friendliness, engagement and likability. And, lo and behold, the

Henriques, Gredd Ph.D. (April 25, 2014). One Self or Many Selves. Retrieved from
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/theory-knowledge/201404/one-self-or-many-selves
 About the Author
Gregg Henriques, Ph.D.
A professor of psychology
at James Madison University.

women who were talking to men who believed they were talking to someone beautiful were rated as
being more positive on these socially desirable qualities. In short, our very essences are profoundly
shaped by others and how others see us.

The core self is organized by motives and emotions—and these fluctuate! Our experiential self forms the
organized core of our self, and it in turn is organized by emotions which are tied to our goals. As I note in
this blog here, our perceptual-motivational-emotional system will fluctuate, depending on things like
biorhythms (time of day, month, season) and what goals have been sated (e.g., hunger, sex, sleep) or are
active. A vivid example of this is the hunger drive. In her wonderful novel, Unbroken, Laura Hillenbrand
reports on the life of Louie Zamperini, a WWII vet, who is shot down and spends six weeks on a raft with
a fellow solider. As their hunger sets in, it comes to completely dominate their minds, such that they smell
food, dream of food, and talk of food around the clock.

We have evolved “subselves.” We can be even more specific about our motivational systems and how
they give rise to our experience of a multiplicity of self-states. In The Rational Animal (2013), PT
Blogger Doug Kenrick and Vladas Griskevicius argue that there are seven major evolutionary goal states
that have shaped our psychology in profound ways; as such we should consider ourselves as really a
collection of “subselves” that have different perceptual-motivational-emotional structures designed to
solve the following adaptive problems: 1) self-protection/injury avoidance; 2) disease avoidance; 3)
affiliation; 4) status seeking; 5) mate acquisition; 6) mate retention; and 7) kin care. Importantly, because
these different subselves have different goals, they may often be in conflict and different situations will
activate them in different ways.

The present versus future self. One of the most common conflicts between self-states that people
experience is the conflict between their present and their future self (here is a TedTalk on this). Almost
everyone can relate to this. Our current self wants the piece of cake, but our future self wants to be fit and
trim. Our current self wants to be relaxed by a cool drag on a cigarette, but our future self does not want
lung cancer. Our current self wants to take the day off and go on a vacation, but our future self does not
want to face an annoyed boss or depleted bank account. As fellow PT blogger, A. David Redish
articulates brilliantly in his book The Mind Within the Brain, the mind (of which the self as we are
thinking about it is a part) is an action selection system that consists of many different subsystems that
operate on different time scales. The most basic is the reflex system, which operates almost
instantaneously. Another quick acting/reacting system is the emotional-Pavlovian response system. There
is also, however, a deliberative system that extends the animal/human in time, simulating future situations
and future costs and benefits. Because these systems compute action selection differently, then it is not at
all uncommon to experience very different and conflicting self-states as a consequence. And, as any
addict can attest, these systems can produce very different and highly conflicted self-states.

The sense of self-continuity across time is dependent on memory systems. I have been thinking of writing
this blog for the last couple of weeks. How do I know this? Because I have memory systems that connects
my current self to my past self. As anyone who has experienced amnesia, worked with a demented elder,
or had an alcohol induced black out, if the memory system is knocked out, the self-system is greatly
compromised. As I note in this blog, we have several memory systems that are relevant, including short
and long term, as well as procedural, episodic and semantic. Crucial for understanding why we have so
many different potential self-states is that these memory systems are influenced by many different things.
For example, we code memories by emotional states. Thus, if you are in a happy mood, you remember
positive events; in contrast, being in a negative mood results in being more likely to recall

Henriques, Gredd Ph.D. (April 25, 2014). One Self or Many Selves. Retrieved from
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/theory-knowledge/201404/one-self-or-many-selves
 About the Author
Gregg Henriques, Ph.D.
A professor of psychology
at James Madison University.

disappointments and failures. In addition, the memory system, as described here, organizes events based
on themes and is heavily shaped by primacy, recency, and goal states. Because memories are encoded by
emotion, traumas can result in very powerful shifts in memory systems, such that for some, they can be
blocked out completely and for others, they can result in the chronic activation. PTSD occurs in some
folks because of the inability of the memory system to effectively integrate and habituate to the trauma,
which can then result in fairly dramatic changes to the self-state.

Psychodynamic Defense Mechanisms. The autobiographical self, or ego, is a knowledge system that is
organized by different forces. Most notably, it is inclined toward aligning information that is: 1) accurate
and coherent; 2) consistent with existing structures; and 3) enhances the self, depicting it has good, right,
and effective (here and here are some additional blogs on this topic). Because of the needs to see one’s
self in this manner and to manage one’s impulses and the impressions that one forms in others, the human
psyche comes equipped with filters that shift attention, block impulses, and rationalize events. These
processes have been documented by psychodynamic theorists in great detail. Dissociative Identity
Disorder represents perhaps the most extreme manifestations of these processes, such that aspects of the
self are so “split off” or “compartmentalized” (see here) that not only is the person not conscious of them
(which is common), but whole personalities can be built around them and then emerge.

In sum, there are many forces that influence and shape our sense of self such that in retrospect is it no
surprise that we all experience a multiplicity of self-states. In fact, with so many forces, it is almost a
miracle that we have a sense of continuity at all! However, as Damasio notes, an experiential reference
point is crucial for learning over time, and this, in addition to the capacity to integrate many streams of
information at once, is likely why nature gave us experiential consciousness. And autobiographical
consciousness becomes a stabilizing force when one realizes that they themselves are the audience that
they are justifying their actions to as they engage in private speech. It is this sense of “I” that remains
fairly constant across settings, and functions not unlike the executive of a company—the company is far
larger and more divergent than she is, but she nevertheless remains a central control point. A quote from
Carl Jung captures the emergence of this frame of reference brilliantly.

I was taking the long road to school…when suddenly for a single moment I had the
overwhelming impression of having just emerged from a dense cloud. I knew all at once: I am
myself!...Previously I had existed, too, but everything merely happened to me…Previously I had been
willed to do this and that: now I willed. This experience seemed to me tremendously important and new:
there was “authority” in me.

Many people, however, struggle to form a stable, healthy executive that serves as a coherent control
system for the multiplicity of self-states that emerge as a function of shifting moods, biorhythms, roles
situations, and relationships, and so on. Instead, they experience themselves as a collection of competing,
incoherent parts, which can create much conflict, functional impairment, and distress. For these
individuals, they need a form of psychotherapy that recognizes the multiplicity of self-states (e.g.,
see Parts Psychology by Jay Noricks) and allows them pathways to begin to weave together these parts of
self into a more functioning whole.

Henriques, Gredd Ph.D. (April 25, 2014). One Self or Many Selves. Retrieved from
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/theory-knowledge/201404/one-self-or-many-selves