1

UNDERSTANDING THE SELF

Introduction to Self Understanding

Understanding oneself is essential to understand behaviors and beliefs that

affects ourselves and others specifically in becoming effective and successful
person in life, work, and relationship. Moreover, self-understanding (1) provides
a sense of purpose; (2) leads to healthier relationships; (3) helps harness your
natural strength; and (4) promotes confidence.

This module will introduce you to the basic concepts of self and
personality, and how they are related with each other. Self and personality
characterized the way we define our existence, also these refers on how we organized
our experiences that are reflected to our behavior. On the other hand, people have different ideas about
themselves. These ideas represent the self of the person. Moreover, we behave in different ways in a given
situation, but people also behave fairly stable in different circumstances. The relatively permanent pattern
of behavior represents personality of the person. In details,

Personality

• The etymological derivative of personality comes from the word “persona”, the theatrical masks
worn by Romans in Greek and Latin drama. Personality also comes from the two Latin words “per”
and “sonare”, which literally means “to sound through”.
• Personality have no single definition since different personality theories have different views on
how to define it. However, the commonly accepted definition of personality is that it is a relatively
permanent traits and unique characteristics that give both consistency and individuality to a
person’s behavior (Roberts & Mroczek, 2008).
• Personality plays a key role in affecting how people shape their lives. It involves the complex
relationship of people with their environment, how they cope and adjust through life, and how they
respond to demands of physical and social challenges.
• Personality is the overall pattern or integration of a person’s structure, modes of behavior, attitudes,
aptitudes, interests, intellectual abilities, and many other distinguishable personality traits.
Personality is the conglomeration of the following components: physical self, intelligence,
character traits, attitudes, habits, interest, personal discipline, moral values, principles and
philosophies of life.

Determinants of Personality

Personality refers to the total person in his/her overt and covert behavior. The determinants of factors
of personality are as follows:

• Environmental Factors of Personality. The surroundings of an individual compose the

environmental factors of personality. This includes the neighborhood a person lives in, his school,
college, university and workplace. Moreover, it also counts the social circle the individual has.
Friends, parents, colleagues, co-workers and bosses, everybody plays a role as the determinants of
personality.

• Biological Factors of Personality. This further includes:

1) hereditary factors or genetic make-up of the person that inherited from their parents. This
describes the tendency of the person to appear and behave the way their parents are;
2) physical features include the overall physical structure of a person: height, weight, color,
sex, beauty and body language, etc. Most of the physical structures change from time to

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time, and so does the personality. With exercises, cosmetics and surgeries, many physical
features are changed, and therefore, the personality of the individual also evolves; and
3) brain. The preliminary results from the electrical stimulation of the brain (ESB) research
gives indication that better understanding of human personality and behavior might come
from the study of the brain.
• Situational Factors of Personality. Although these factors do not literally create and shape up an
individual’s personality, situational factors do alter a person’s behavior and response from time to
time. The situational factors can be commonly observed when a person behaves contrastingly and
exhibits different traits and characteristics.

• Cultural Factors. Culture is traditionally considered as the major determinants of an individual’s

personality. The culture largely determinants what a person is and what a person will learn. The
culture within a person is brought up, is very important determinant of behavior of a person. Culture
is complex of these belief, values, and techniques for dealing with the environment which are shared
among contemporaries and transmitted by one generation to the next.

Personality Traits

Personality traits reflect people’s characteristic patterns of thoughts, feelings, and behaviors.
Personality traits imply consistency and stability—someone who scores high on a specific trait like
Extraversion is expected to be sociable in different situations and over time. Thus, trait psychology rests on
the idea that people differ from one another in terms of where they stand on a set of basic trait dimensions
that persist over time and across situations.

The most widely used system of traits is called the Five-Factor Model. This system includes five
broad traits that can be remembered with the acronym OCEAN: Openness, Conscientiousness,
Extraversion, Agreeableness, and Neuroticism. Each of the major traits from the Big Five can be divided
into facets to give a more fine-grained analysis of someone's personality. In addition, some trait theorists
argue that there are other traits that cannot be completely captured by the Five-Factor Model. Critics of the
trait concept argue that people do not act consistently from one situation to the next and that people are very
influenced by situational forces. Thus, one major debate in the field concerns the relative power of people’s
traits versus the situations in which they find themselves as predictors of their behavior.

The Five-Factor Model of Personality

Research that used the lexical approach showed that many of the personality descriptors found in
the dictionary do indeed overlap. In other words, many of the words that we use to describe people are
synonyms. Thus, if we want to know what a person is like, we do not necessarily need to ask how sociable
they are, how friendly they are, and how gregarious they are. Instead, because sociable people tend to be
friendly and gregarious, we can summarize this personality dimension with a single term. Someone who is
sociable, friendly, and gregarious would typically be described as an “Extravert.” Once we know she is an
extravert, we can assume that she is sociable, friendly, and gregarious.

The most widely accepted system to emerge from this approach was “The Big Five” or “FiveFactor
Model” (Goldberg, 1990; McCrae & John, 1992; McCrae & Costa, 1987). The Big Five comprises five
major traits shown in the Figure 2 below. A way to remember these five is with the acronym OCEAN (O
is for Openness; C is for Conscientiousness; E is for Extraversion; A is for Agreeableness; N is for
Neuroticism). The table below provides descriptions of people who would score high and low on each of
these traits.

Table 1. Descriptions of Personality Traits

Big 5 Trait Definition
Openness The tendency to appreciate new art, ideas, values, feelings, and behaviors.
Conscientiousness The tendency to be careful, on-time for appointments, to follow rules, and
to be hard working.

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Extraversion The tendency to be talkative, sociable, and to enjoy others; the tendency to
have a dominant style.
Agreeableness The tendency to agree and go along with others rather than to assert one
owns opinions and choices.
Neurotism The tendency to be frequently experience negative emotions such as anger,
worry, and sadness, as well as being itnerpersonally sensitive.
Table 2. Example behaviors for those scoring low and high for the big 5 traits
Big 5 Trait Example Behavior for LOW Example Behavior for HIGH Scorers
Scorers
Openness Prefers not to be exposed to Enjoys seeing people with new types
alternative moral systems; narrow of haircuts and body piercing;
interest; inartistic; not analystica; curious; imaginative; untraditional
down-to-earth
Conscientiousness Prefers spur-of-the-moment action Never late for a date; organized;
to planning; unrealiable; hardworking; neat, persevering;
hedonistic; careless; lax punctual; self-disciplined
Extraversion Preferring a quiet evening reading Being the life of the party’ active;
to a loud party; sober; aloof; optimistic; fun-loving; affectionate
unenthusiastic
Agreeableness Quickly and confidently asserts Agrees with other about political
own rights; irritable; opinions; good-natured; forgiving;
manipulative; uncooperative; rude gullible; helpful; forgiving
Neurotism Not getting irritated by sall Constantly worrying about little
annoyances; calm, unemotional; things; insecure; hypochondrical;
hardy; secure; self-satisfied feeling inadequate
Scores on the Big Five traits are mostly independent. That means that a person’s standing on one
trait tells very little about their standing on the other traits of the Big Five. For example, a person can be
extremely high in Extraversion and be either high or low on Neuroticism. Similarly, a person can be low in
Agreeableness and be either high or low in Conscientiousness. Thus, in the Five-Factor Model, you need
five scores to describe most of an individual’s personality. In the exercises part of this module there is a
short scale to assess the Five-Factor Model of personality (Donnellan, Oswald, Baird, & Lucas, 2006). You
can take this test to see where you stand in terms of your Big Five scores.

Traits are important and interesting because they describe stable patterns of behavior that persist
for long periods of time (Caspi, Roberts, & Shiner, 2005). Importantly, these stable patterns can have
broadranging consequences for many areas of our life (Roberts, Kuncel, Shiner, Caspi, & Goldberg, 2007).
For instance, think about the factors that determine success in college. If you were asked to guess what
factors predict good grades in college, you might guess something like intelligence. This guess would be
correct, but we know much more about who is likely to do well. Specifically, personality researchers have
also found the personality traits like Conscientiousness play an important role in college and beyond,
probably because highly conscientious individuals study hard, get their work done on time, and are less
distracted by nonessential activities that take time away from school work. In addition, highly conscientious
people are often healthier than people low in conscientiousness because they are more likely to maintain
healthy diets, to exercise, and to follow basic safety procedures like wearing seat belts or bicycle helmets.
Over the long term, this consistent pattern of behaviors can add up to meaningful differences in health and
longevity. Thus, personality traits are not just a useful way to describe people you know; they actually help
psychologists predict how good a worker someone will be, how long he or she will live, and the types of
jobs and activities the person will enjoy.

Who Am I?

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Have you ever ask yourself the question, “Who am I?”? Answering the question 'Who am I?' can
lead to a solid self-concept and self-understanding. For many people, answering this question isn't very
easy. For others, a solid understanding of who they are is a big part of their lives. Understanding of who
you are as a person is called self-concept and understanding what your motives are when you act is called
self-understanding.

In definition, self-concept is generally thought of as our individual perceptions of our behavior,

abilities, and unique characteristics—a mental picture of who you are as a person. For example, beliefs such
as "I am a good friend" or "I am a kind person" are part of an overall self-concept.

Self-concept tends to be more malleable when people are younger and still going through the
process of self-discovery and identity formation. As people age, self-perceptions become much more
detailed and organized as people form a better idea of who they are and what is important to them.

According to the book Essential Social Psychology by Richard Crisp and Rhiannon Turner:

• The individual self consists of attributes and personality traits that differentiate us from other
individuals. Examples include introversion or extroversion.
• The relational self is defined by our relationships with significant others. Examples include siblings,
friends, and spouses.
• The collective self reflects our membership in social groups. Examples include British, Republican,
African-American, or gay.

At its most basic, self-concept is a collection of beliefs one holds about oneself and the responses
of others. It embodies the answer to the question "Who am I?". The lesson to follow will facilitate learning
about the self, and self concept.

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Scoring: The first thing you must do is to reverse the items that are worded in the opposite direction. In
order to do this, subtract the number you put for that item from 6. So if you put a 4, for instance, it will
become a 2. Cross out the score you put when you took the scale, and put the new number in representing
your score subtracted from the number 6.

Items to be reversed in this way: 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20

Next, you need to add up the scores for each of the five OCEAN scales (including the reversed numbers
where relevant). Each OCEAN score will be the sum of four items. Place the sum next to each scale below.

__________ Openness: Add items 5, 10, 15, 20

__________ Conscientiousness: Add items 3, 8, 13, 18

__________ Extraversion: Add items 1, 6, 11, 16

__________ Agreeableness: Add items 2, 7, 12, 17

__________ Neuroticism: Add items 4, 9,14, 19

Compare your scores to the norms below to see where you stand on each scale. If you are low on a trait, it
means you are the opposite of the trait label. For example, low on Extraversion is Introversion, low on
Openness is Conventional, and low on Agreeableness is Assertive.
19–20 Extremely High, 8–10 Low,

17–18 Very High, 6–7 Very low,

14–16 High, 4–5 Extremely low

11–13 Neither high nor low; in the middle,

GED 101 UNDERSTANDING THE

Guide Questions: Answer the following questions in an essay form with a maximum of 300 words. Write
your answers in a clean sheet of paper. Take a photo and turn it in using GED 101 group chat via FB (10
points each).

1. How do you describe your scores on Mini IPIP Scale? Do you think the results are accurate? Why?
2. Do you think personality changes through time? How?
3. Discuss how we develop our personality.
4. Differentiate personality from self.
5. How will you answer the question, “Who am I?”?

References/Sources:
Personality Traits. Edward Diener and Richard E. Lucas. Accessed July 25, 2020.
https://nobaproject.com/modules/personality-traits#discussion-questions
Self-Understanding & Self-Concept: How We Perceive Ourselves. Natalie Boyd. Accessed July 25, 2020.
https://study.com/academy/lesson/self-understanding-and-self-concept.html
Personality. Accessed July 25, 2020.
https://sg.inflibnet.ac.in/bitstream/10603/148426/12/12_chapter%205.pdf

4 Reasons Why Self-understanding is Essential. Kee’s Blog. Accessed July 25, 2020.
https://intuitivehaven.com/4-reasons-why-self-understanding-is-essential/
Self and Personality. National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT). Accessed July 25,
2020. http://www.ncert.nic.in/NCERTS/l/lepy102.pdf
What Is Self-Concept? The Psychological Exploration of "Who Am I?". Kendra Cherry. Accessed July 25,
2020. https://www.verywellmind.com/what-is-self-concept-2795865

END OF WEEK 1
Well done on finishing Week 1!

WHAT COULD YOU LEARN NEXT?

Week 2: THE SELF ACCORDING TO PHILOSOPHY

GED 101 UNDERSTANDING THE SELF

THE SELF ACCORDING TO PHILOSOPHY

Philosophy

Philosophy is defined as the study of knowledge or wisdom from its Latin roots,
philo (love) and sophia (wisdom). This field is also considered as “The Queen
of All Sciences” because every scientific discipline has philosophical
foundations.

Various thinkers for centuries tried to explain the natural causes of everything
that exist specifically the inquiry on the self preoccupied these philosophers in the
history. The Greek philosophers were the ones who seriously questioned myths
and moved away from them in attempting to understand reality by exercising the art of questioning that
satisfies their curiosity, including the questions about self. The following lecture will present the different
philosophical perspectives and views about self.

Socrates

•
A philosopher from Athens, Greece and said to have the
greatest influence on European thought.
• According to the history he was not able to write any of his
teachings and life’s account instead, he is known from the
writings of his student Plato who became one of the greatest
philosophers of his time. Socrates had a unique style of
asking questions called Socratic Method.
• Socratic Method or dialectic method involves the search for
the correct/proper definition of a thing. In this method,
Socrates did not lecture, he instead would ask questions and
engage the person in a discussion. He would begin by
acting as if
he did not know anything and would get the other person to clarify their ideas
Image Source: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/275648.Socrates

and resolve logical inconsistencies (Price, 2000).

• The foundation of Socrates philosophy was the Delphic
Oracle’s that command to “Know Thyself”. Here, Socrates would like to emphasize that knowing
or understanding oneself should be more than the physical self, or the body.
• According to Socrates, self is dichotomous which means
composed of two things: The physical realm or the one that
is changeable, temporal, and imperfect. The best example
of the physical realm is the physical world. The physical
world is consisting of anything we sense – see, smell, feel,
hear, and taste. It is always changing and deteriorating. The
ideal realm is the one that is imperfect and unchanging,
eternal, and immortal. This includes the intellectual
essences of the universe like the concept of beauty, truth,
and goodness. Moreover, the ideal realm is also present in
the physical world. One may define someone as beautiful
or truthful, but their definition is limited and imperfect for

GED 101 UNDERSTANDING THE SELF

 it is always relative and subjective. It is only the ideal forms
themselves that are perfect, unchanging, and eternal.
• For Socrates, a human is composed of body and soul, the
first belongs to the physical realm because it changed, it is
imperfect, and it dies, and the latter belongs to ideal realm
for it survives the death.
Socrates also used the term soul to identify self.

• The self, according to Socrates is the immortal and unified

entity that is consistent over time. For example, a human
being remains the same person during their childhood to
adulthood given the fact that they undergone
developmental changes throughout their lifespan. Plato

•
A student of Socrates, who introduced the idea of a
threepart soul/self that is composed of reason, physical
appetite and spirit or passion.
o The Reason enables human to think deeply, make wise choices
and achieve a true understanding of eternal truths.
Plato also called this as divine essence.
o The physical Appetite is the basic biological needs of human
being such as hunger, thirst, and sexual desire. o And the spirit
or passion is the basic emotions of human being such as love,
anger, ambition, aggressiveness and empathy.
• These three elements of the self works in every individual
inconsistently. According to Plato, it is always the
Image Source: https://www.alamy.com/plato

responsibility of the reason to organize, control, and

reestablish harmonious
relationship between these three elements.
• Plato also illustrated his view of the soul/self in “Phaedrus”
in his metaphor: the soul is like a winged chariot drawn by
two powerful horses: a white horse, representing Spirit, and
a black horse, embodying appetite. The charioteer is
reason, whose task is to guide the chariot to the eternal
realm by controlling the two independent-minded horses.
Those charioteers who are successful in setting a true
course and ensuring that the two steeds work together in
harmonious unity achieve true wisdom and banquet with
the gods. However, those charioteers who are unable to
control their horses and keep their chariot on track are
destined to experience personal, intellectual, and spiritual
failure.

GED 101 UNDERSTANDING THE SELF

St. Augustine
• He is considered as the last of the great ancient
philosophers whose ideas were greatly Platonic. In melding
philosophy and religious beliefs together, Augustine has been
characterized as Christianity’s first theologian.
• Like Plato, Augustine believed that the physical body is
different from the immortal soul. Early in his philosophical
development he described body as “snare” or “cage” of the soul
and said that the body is a “slave” of the soul he even characterized
that “the soul makes war with the body”. Later on he came to view
the body as “spouse” of the soul, with both attached to one another
by a “natural appetite.” He concluded, “That the body is united
with the soul, so that man may be entire and complete, is a fact we
recognize on the evidence of our own nature.”
Image Source: http://lexchristianorum.blogspot.com/ According to St. Augustine, the human nature is composed
of two realms:
1. God as the source of all reality and truth. Through mystical experience, man is capable of
knowing eternal truths. This is made possible through the existence of the one eternal truth
which is God. He further added that without God as the source of all truth, man could never
understand eternal truth. This relationship with God means that those who know most about
God will come closest to understanding the true nature of the world.
2. The sinfulness of man. The cause of sin or evil is an act of mans’ freewill. Moral goodness
can only be achieved through the grace of God.
He also stated that real happiness can only be found in God. For God is love and he created humans
for them to also love. Problems arise because of the objects humans choose to love. Disordered
love results when man loves the wrong things which he believes will give him happiness.
Furthermore, he said that if man loves God first and everything else to a lesser degree, then all will
fall into its rightful place.
Rene Descartes
• A French philosopher, mathematician, and considered the
founder of modern philosophy.
• Descartes, famous principle the “cogito, ergo sum—“I think,
therefore I exist” established his philosophical views on “true
knowledge” and concept of self.
• He explained that in order to gain true knowledge, one must
doubt everything even own existence. Doubting makes
someone aware that they are thinking being thus, they exist.
The essence of existing as a human identity is the possibility of
being aware of our selves: being self-conscious in this way is
integral to having a personal identity. Conversely, it would be
impossible to be self-conscious if we did not have a personal
Image Source: https://www.sapaviva.com/ identity of which to be conscious. In other words, the essence of self is being
a thinking thing.
• The self is a dynamic entity that engages in metal operations –
thinking, reasoning, and perceiving processes. In addition to

GED 101 UNDERSTANDING THE SELF

 this, self-identity is dependent on the awareness in engaging
with those mental operations.
• He declared that the essential self or the self as the thinking
entity is radically different from the physical body. The
thinking self or soul is a non-material, immortal, conscious
being, independent of the physical laws of the universe while
the physical body is a material, mortal, non-thinking entity,
fully governed by the physical laws of nature.
• He also maintained that the soul and the body are independent
of one another and each can exist and function without the
other. In cases in which people are sleeping or comatose, their
bodies continue to function even though their minds are not
thinking, much like the mechanisms of a clock. He identified
the physical self as part of nature, governed by the physical
laws of the universe, and available to scientific analysis and
experimentation, and the conscious self (mind, soul) is a part of
the spiritual realm, independent of the physical laws of the
universe, governed only by the laws of reason and God’s will.
And because it exists outside of the natural world of cause-and-
effect, the conscious self is able to exercise free will in the
choices it makes.

John Locke
• An English philosopher and physician and famous in his
concept of “Tabula Rasa” or Blank Slate that assumes the
nurture side of human development.

• The self, according to Locke is consciousness. In his essay

entitled On Personal Identity (from his most famous work, Essay
Concerning Human Understanding) he discussed the reflective
analysis of how an individual may experience the self in
everyday living. He provided the following key points:
1. To discover the nature of personal identity, it is important
to find out what it means to be a person.
2. A person is a thinking, intelligent being who has the
abilities to reason and to reflect.
3. A person is also someone who considers themself to be the same thing in
Image Source: https://www.laphamsquarterly.org/

different times and different places.

4. Consciousness as being aware that we are thinking—
always accompanies thinking and is an essential part of the thinking process.
5. Consciousness makes possible our belief that we are the same identity in
different times and different places.
Although Locke and Descartes believed that a person or the self is a thinking intelligent being who
has the abilities to reflect and to reason, Locke was not convinced with the assumptions of Plato,
St. Augustine and Descartes that the individual self necessarily exists in a single soul or substance.
For Locke, personal identity and the soul or substance in which the personal identity is situated are
two very different things. The bottom line of his theory on self is that self is not tied to any particular

GED 101 UNDERSTANDING THE SELF

 body or substance. It only exists in other times and places because of the memory of those
experiences.

David Hume

• He was a Scottish philosopher and also an empiricist.

• His claim about self is quite controversial because he assumed
that there is no self! In his essay entitled, “On Personal Identity”
(1739) he said that, if we carefully examine the contents of [our]
experience, we find that there are only two distinct entities,
"impressions" and "ideas".
• Impressions are the basic sensations of our experience, the
elemental data of our minds: pain, pleasure, heat, cold, happiness,
grief, fear, exhilaration, and so on.
• On the other hand, ideas are copies of impressions that include
thoughts and images that are built up from our primary
impressions through a variety of relationships, but because they
are derivative copies of impressions, they are once removed from
reality.Image Source: https://www.britannica.com/

• Hume considered that the self does not exist because all of the
experiences that a person may have are just perceptions
and this includes the perception of self. None of these perceptions resemble a unified and
permanent self-identity that exists over time.
• He further added that there are instances that an individual is
limited in experiencing their perception like in sleeping.
Similarly, when someone died all empirical senses end and
according to him, it makes no sense to believe that self exists in
other forms. As an empiricist, Hume provide an honest
description and analysis of his own experience, within which
there is no self to be found.
• Hume explained that the self that is being experienced by an
individual is nothing but a kind of fictional self. Human created
an imaginary creature which is not real. “Fictional self” is created
to unify the mental events and introduce order into an individual
lives, but this “self” has no real existence.

Sigmund Freud
• A well-known Australian psychologist and considered as
the Father and Founder of Psychoanalysis. His influence
in Psychology and therapy is dominant and popular in the
20th to 21st century.
• The dualistic view of self by Freud involves the conscious
self and unconscious self.
• The conscious self is governed by reality principle. Here,
the self is rational, practical, and appropriate to the social
environment. The conscious self has the task of
controlling the constant pressures of the unconscious self,

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 as its primitive impulses continually seek for immediate
discharge.
• The unconscious self is governed by pleasure principle. It
Image Source: https://www.researchgate.net/

is the self that is aggressive, destructive, unrealistic and

instinctual. Both of Freud’s self needs immediate gratification
and reduction of tensions to optimal levels and the goal of every individual is to make unconscious
conscious.
• Freud proposed how mind works, he called this as
provinces or structures of the mind. By illustrating the tip
of the iceberg which according to him represents
conscious
awareness which
characterizes the
person in dealing
with the external
world. The
observable
behavior,
however, is
further controlled
by the workings
of the

Image Source: https://courses.lumenlearning.com/

subconscious/unconscious mind.
• Subconscious serves as the repository of past experiences,
repressed memories, fantasies, and urges. The three levels
of the mind are:
1. Id. This is primarily based on the pleasure principle. It demands immediate satisfaction and is
not hindered by societal expectations.
2. Ego. The structure that is primarily based on the reality principle. This mediates between the
impulses of the id and restraints of the superego.
3. Superego. This is primarily dependent on learning the difference between right and wrong, thus
it is called moral principle. Morality of actions is largely dependent on childhood upbringing
particularly on rewards and punishments.
According to Freud, there are two kinds of instinct that drive individual behavior – the eros or the life
instinct and the thanatos of the death instinct. The energy of eros is called libido and includes urges
necessary for individual and species survival like thrist, hunger, and sex.in cases that human behaior is
directed towards destruction in the form of aggression and violence, such are the manifestations of
thanatos.

Gilbert Ryle
• A British analytical philosopher. He was an important
figure in the field of Linguistic Analysis which focused on the

GED 101 UNDERSTANDING THE SELF

 solving of philosophical puzzles through an analysis of
language.
• According to Ryle, the self is best understood as a pattern
of behavior, the tendency or disposition for a person to behave
in a certain way in certain circumstances.
• He opposed the notable ideas of the previous philosophers
and even claimed that those were results of confused conceptual
thinking he termed, category mistake. The category
mistake happens when we speak about the self as something
independent of the physical body: a purely
Image Source: https://www.jstor.org/ mental entity existing in time but not space

Immanuel Kant

• A German Philosopher who made great contribution to the

fields of metaphysics, epistemology, and ethics. Kant is widely
regarded as the greatest philosopher of the modern period.
• Kant maintained that an individual self makes the experience
of the world comprehensible because it is responsible for
synthesizing the discreet data of sense experience into a
meaningful whole.
• It is the self that makes consciousness for the person to make
sense of everything. It is the one that help every individual gain
insight and knowledge. If the self failed to do this synthesizing
function, there would be a chaotic and insignificant collection
of sensations.
Image Source: https://mediaethicsmorning.wordpress.com/ Additionally, the self is the product of reason, a regulative principle
because the self regulates experience by making
unified experience possible and unlike Hume, Kant’s self is not the object of consciousness, but it
makes the consciousness understandable and unique.
• Transcendental apperception happens when people do not
experience self directly, instead as a unity of all impressions
that are organized by the mind through perceptions. Kant
concluded that
all objects of knowledge, which includes the self, are phenomenal. That the true nature of things is
altogether unknown and unknowable (Price, 2000).
• For Kant, the kingdom of God is within man. God is manifested
in people’s lives therefore it is man’s duty to move towards
perfection. Kant emphasized that people should always see
duty as a divine command (Price, 2000).

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Paul and Patricia Churchland
An American
philosopher interested in the
fields of philosophy of mind,
philosophy of science, cognitive
neurobiology, epistemology, and
perception.
Churchlands’ central
argument is that the concepts and
theoretical vocabulary that people
use to think about the selves —
using such terms as belief, desire,
fear, sensation, pain, joy—
actually misrepresent the reality
Image Source: http://thesciencenetwork.org/
of minds and selves. He claims
that the self is a product of brain
activity.
• The behavior of the self can be attributed to the
neuropharmacological states, the neural activity in specialized
anatomical areas.
• Neurophilosopy was coined by Patricia Churchland, the
modern scientific inquiry looks into the application of
neurology to age-old problems in philosophy. The philosophy
of neuroscience is the study of the philosophy of science,
neuroscience, and psychology. It aims to explore the relevance
of neurolinguistic experiments/studies to the philosophy of the
mind.
• Patricia Churchland claimed that man’s brain is responsible for
the identity known as self. The biochemical properties of the
brain according to this philosophy of neuroscience is really
responsible for man’s thoughts, feelings, and behavior.
• Paul Churchland is one of the many philosophers and
psychologists that viewed the self from a materialistic point of
view, contending that in the final analysis mental states are
identical with, reducible to, or explainable in terms of physical
brain states. This assumption was made due to the physiological
processes of the body that directly affecting the mental state of
the person. The advent of sophisticated technology and
scientific research gives hope to understand the connection
between the physical body and the mind/brain relationship that
integrated in the self.
• Being an eliminative materialist, he believes that there is a need
to develop a new vocabulary and conceptual framework that is
grounded in neuroscience. This new framework will be a more
accurate reflection of the human mind and self.

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Maurice Merleau-Ponty
• A French philosopher and phenomenologist. He took
a very different approach to the self and the mind/body
“problem.” According to him, the division between the
“mind” and the “body” is a product of confused
thinking. The self is experienced as a unity in which the
mental and physical are seamlessly woven together.
This unity is the primary experience of selves and begin
to doubt it when an individual use their minds to
concoct abstract notions of a separate mind and body.
Developed the concept of self-subject and contended
that perceptions occur existentially. Thus, the
consciousness, the world, and the human body are all
interconnected as they mutually perceive the world.
According to him, the world and the sense of self
are emergent phenomena in the ongoing process of man’s becoming.
Image Source: http://all-to-human.blogspot.com/

Phenomenology provides a direct description of the human experience which serves to guide man’s
conscious actions. He further added that, the world is a field of perception, and human consciousness
assigns meaning to the world. Thus man cannot separate himself from his perceptions of the world.
• Perception is not purely the result of sensations nor it
is purely interpretations. Rather consciousness is a
process that includes sensing as well as
interpreting/reasoning.

GED 101 UNDERSTANDING THE SELF

THE SELF ACCORDING TO SOCIOLOGY AND ANTHROPOLOGY

Sociology and Anthropology

Sociology and Anthropology are two interrelated disciplines that

contributes to the understanding of self. Sociology presents the self as a
product of modern society. It is the science that studies the development,
structure, interaction, and collective behavior of human being. On the other
hand, Anthropology is the study of humanity. This broad field takes an
interdisciplinary approach to looking at human culture, both past and present.
The following set of sociologists and anthropologist offered their views about
self.

George Herbert Mead and the Social Self

• Mead is an American philosopher, sociologist, and

psychologist. He is regarded as one of the founders of social
psychology and the American sociological tradition in
general. Mead is well-known for his theory of self.
• He postulated that, the self represents the sum total of
people’s conscious perception of their identity as distinct
from others. Mead argued that the self like the mind is social
emergent. This means that individual selves are the products
of social interaction and not logical or biological in nature.
• He claimed that the self is something which undergoes
development because it is not present instantly at birth. The
self arises in the process of social experience and activity as
a result of their relations to the said process as a whole and
to other individuals within that process. In other words, one
cannot
Image Source: https://wannabeinsociology.wordpress.com/ experience their self alone, they need other people to experience their self.
•
The social emergence of self is developed due to the three
forms of inter-subjective activity, the language, play, and the
game.
• He proposed the stages of self formation:
1. Preparatory Stage. Mead believed that the self did not exist at birth. Instead, the self
develops over time. Its development is dependent on social interaction and social
experience. At this stage, children’s behaviors are primarily based on imitation. It was
observed that children imitate the behaviors of those around them. At this stage, knowing
and understanding the symbols are important for this will constitute their way of
communicating with others throughout their lives.
2. The Play Stage. Skills at knowing and understanding the symbols of communication is
important for this constitutes the basis of socialization. Through communication, social
relationship are formed. Now children begin to role play and pretend to be other people.
Role-taking in the play stage is the process of mentally assuming the process of another
person to see how this person might behave or respond in a given situation (Schefer, 2012).
The play stage is significant in the development of the self. It is at this stage where child

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 widens his perspective and realizes that he is not alone and that there are others around him
whose presence he has to consider.
3. The Game Stage. Here, the child is about eight or nine years of age and now does more
than just role-take. The child begins to consider several tasks and various types of
relationships simultaneously. Through the learnings that were gained in stage two, the child
now begins to see not only his own perspective but at the same time the perspective of
others. In this final stage of self development, the child now has the ability to respond not
just to one but several members of his social environment.
• Generalized other the person realizes that people in society have cultural norms, beliefs and values
which are incorporated into each self. This realization forms basis of how the person evaluate
themselves.
• The self, according to Mead is not merely a passive reflection of the generalized other. The
responses of the individual to the social world are also active, it means that a person decides what
they will do in reference to the attitude of others but not mechanically determined by such
attitudinal structures. Here, Mead identified the two phases of self:
1. the phase which reflects the attitude of the generalized other or the “me”; and
2. the phase that responds to the attitude of generalized other or the “I”.
• In Mead’s words, the "me" is the social self, and the "I" is a response to the "me". Mead defines
the "me" as "a conventional, habitual individual and the “I” as the “novel reply” of the individual
to the generalized other.
• Generally, Meads theory sees the self as a perspective that comes out of interactions, and he sees
the meanings of symbols, social objects, and the self as emerging from negotiated interactions.

The Self as a product of modern society among other constructions Georg

Simmel

• Simmel was a German sociologist, philosopher, and critic. He

was intensely interested in the ways in which modern, objective
culture impacts the individual’s subjective experiences.
• In contrast to Mead, Simmel proposed that there is
something called human nature that is innate to the individual.
This human nature is intrinsic to the individual like the natural
inclination to religious impulse or the gender differences. He
also added that most of our social interactions are individual
motivations.
• Simmel as a social thinker made a distinction between
subjective and objective culture. The individual or subjective
culture refers to the ability to embrace, use, and feel culture.
• Objective culture is made up of elements that become
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separated from the individual or group’s control and identified

as separate objects.
• There are interrelated forces in modern society that tend to
increase objective culture according to
Simmel. These are urbanizations, money, and the configuration of one’s social network.
• Urbanization is the process that moves people from country to
city living. This result to the concentration of population in one
place brought about by industrialization. This paved way to the

GED 101 UNDERSTANDING THE SELF

 organization of labor or increased division of labor, which
demands specializations wherein this creates more objective
culture.
• Simmel also stressed that the consumption of products has an
individuating and trivializing effect because this enables the
person to create self out of things. By consumption, an
individual able to purchase things that can easily personalized
or express the self. People used commodities to create self-
concept and self-image. Simmel also said that products used in
the modernity to express and produced the self is also
changing. It becomes more and more separated from
subjectivity (subjective culture) due to division of labor and
market economy. Many products are easily replaced, subjected
to the dynamics of fashion and diversification of markets which
leads to inappropriate sign use.
• Money creates a universal value system wherein every
commodity can be understood. Money also increases
individual freedom by pursuing diverse activities and by
increasing the options for selfexpression. Money also makes
the individual to be less attached to the commodities because
the individual tends to understand and experience their
possession less in terms of their intrinsic qualities and more of
their objective and abstract worth. Additionally, money also
discouraged intimate ties with people. Money comes to stand
in the place of almost everything – and this includes
relationship! Money further discourages intimate ties by
encouraging a culture of calculation.
• Because of urbanization, Simmel observed that social networks
also changed. Group affiliations in urban is definitely different
from rural settings wherein the relationship are strongly
influenced by family. An individual tends to seek membership
to the same group which makes the family as basic
socialization structure. This natural inclination to join groups
is called by Simmel as organic motivation and the grouping is
called primary group. This group is based on ties of affection
and personal loyalty endure over long periods of time, and
involve multiple aspects of a person’s life.
• On the other hand, in the modern urban settings, group
membership is due to rational motivation or membership due
to freedom of choice. This characterized the secondary group
which is goal and utilitarian oriented, with a narrow range of
activities, over limited time spans. As a result, it is more likely
that an individual will develop unique personalities. Moreover,
Simmel said that a complex web of group affiliations produces
role conflicts and blasé attitude. Role conflict is a situation that
demands a person of two or more roles that clash with one
another. Blasé attitude is an attitude of absolute boredom and
lack of concern. This is the inability or limited ability to
provide emotional investment to other people.

GED 101 UNDERSTANDING THE SELF

The Self and Person in the Contemporary Anthropology

• The four subfields of anthropology – Archeology, Biological Anthropology, Linguistics, and

Cultural Anthropology, suggest that human beings are similar and different in varying ways and
tendencies. For example, people have the same need for food and water, but they have different
means on how to satisfy them. These similarities and differences make life so interesting. As one
learn facts/information that make them similar to the other, they will also discover that they have
different characteristics the define them. This knowledge aims to highlight the uniqueness of each
person and making them value life and existence even more. The subfields of Anthropology are as
follows:
o Archeology. Focus on the study of the past and how it may have contributed to the
present ways of how people conduct their daily lives. Archeologists have so far
discovered the unique ways in which human beings adapted to the changes in their
environment in order for them to survive. Among their discoveries around the world is
the species, homo sapiens did not become extinct because of their ability to think, use
tools and learn from experience. In relating to the contemporary society, people still aim
for survival, for their basic needs to be fulfilled and to live legacy to their society. o
Biological Anthropology. Focus on how the human body adapts to the different earth
environments. Among the activities of Anthropologists are identification of probable
causes of diseases, physical mutation, and death, evolution, and comparison of dead and
living primates. They are interested in explaining how the biological characteristics of
human being affects their way of living. Accordingly, human beings at present still share
the same biological strengths and vulnerabilities. Like eating balanced nutrients and
minerals that are beneficial to all human beings while being exposed to a virus in a
pandemic might cause negative implications to many.
o Linguistic Anthropology. Focused on using language as means to discover a group’s
manner of social interaction and their worldview. Anthropologists in this field want to
discover how language is used to create and share meanings, to form ideas and concepts
and to promote social change. Furthermore, they also study how language and modes
of communication changes over time.
o Cultural Anthropology. Focused in knowing what makes one group’s manner of living
forms an essential part of the member’s personal and societal identity. This encompasses
the principles of Theory of Cultural Determinism which suggests that the human nature
is determined by the kind of culture he is born and grew up in. Cultural diversities are
manifested in different ways and different levels of dept. The following are the ways in
which culture may manifest itself in people:
▪ Symbols. These are the words, gestures, pictures or objects that have recognized
or accepted meaning in a particular culture. Example: colors have similar meaning
across all cultures.
▪ Heroes. These are persons from the past or present who have characteristics that
are important in culture. They may be real of work of fictions. Example: Fiction –
Thor, Captain America; Real – Jose Rizal, Apolinario Mabini.
▪ Rituals. These are activities participated by a group of people for the fulfilment of
desired objectives and are concerned to be socially essential. Example: Wedding,
fiesta, Christmas celebration, graduation, etc.
▪ Values. These are considered to be the core of every culture. These are
unconscious, neither discuss or observed, and can only be inferred from the way
people act and react to situations. Example: hospitality, respect for elders etc.

GED 101 UNDERSTANDING THE SELF

 • The field of Anthropology offers another way by which a person can view themselves. As self is
formed or determined by the past and present condition, by biological characteristics, the
communication and language use, and the lifestyle we choose to live.

The Self Embedded in the Culture Clifford Geertz

• Clifford Geertz was an Anthropology Professor at the
University of Chicago. He studied different cultures and
explored on the conception of the self in his writings entitled,
“The Impact of the Concept of Culture on the Concept of Man”
(1966) in his fieldwork at Java, Bali and Morrocco.
• The analysis of Geertz (1966) in his cultural study about
the description of self in Bali is that the Balinese person is
extremely concerned not to present anything individual
(distinguishing him or her from others) in social life but to enact
exclusively a culturally prescribed role or mask. In one instance,
Geertz (1973) gave an example of the stage fright that pervades
persons in Bali because they must not be publicly recognizable
as individual selves and actors points precisely to the fact that agency or an
Image Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clifford_Geertz

ability to act in one’s own account is an integral ability of human

beings—an ability which continually threatens
the culturally established norm of nonindividuality

THE SELF ACCORDING PSYCHOLOGY

Psychology

Psychology is a scientific study of mental processes and

human behavior. It aims to describe, analyze, predict, control human
behavior in general. Self is an essential construct in psychology
because it fulfills the goals of the discipline in studying human and
the reason for their action. Many psychologists tried to define the
origin of mental processes and behavior but they all settle down with
numerous theories and assumptions. The following descriptions on
the formation of self were presented for you to have a clear picture on
the psychological perspective of self.

The Self as Cognitive Construction

• The cognitive aspect of the self is known as self-concept. Self-concept is defined as self-knowledge,
a cognitive structure that includes beliefs about personality traits, physical characteristics, abilities,
values, goals, and roles, as well as the knowledge that an individual exist as individuals. As humans
grow and develop, self-concept becomes abstract and more complex.
• According to the psychologist Dr. Bruce A. Bracken in 1992, there are six specific domains that
are related to self-concept these are:
1) the social domain or the ability of the person to interact with others;

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 2) the competence domain or the ability to meet the basic needs;
3) the affect domain or the awareness of the emotional states;
4) the physical domain or the feelings about looks, health, physical condition, and overall
appearance;
5) academic domain or the success or failure in the school; and 6) family domain or how well
one function within the family unit.

William James and the Me-Self and I-Self

Image Source: https://the- mous e- trap.com/

• William James is a well-known figure in Psychology who is considered as the founder of

functionalism. He brought prominence to U.S. psychology through the publication of The Principles of
Psychology (1890) that made him more influential than his contemporaries in the field.
• James made a clear distinction between ways of approaching the self – the knower (the pure or the I
– Self) and the known (the objective or the Me – Self). The function of the knower (I-Self) according
to James must be the agent of experience. While the known (Me-Self) have three different but
interrelated aspects of empirical self (known today as selfconcept): the Me viewed as material, the Me
viewed as social, and the Me viewed as spiritual in nature.
• The material self is consists of everything an individual call uniquely as their own, such as the body,
family, home or style of dress. On the other hand, social self refers to the recognition an individual get
from other people. Lastly, spiritual self refers to the individual inner or subjective being.

GED 101 UNDERSTANDING THE SELF

Real and Ideal Self
Carl Rogers
• Carl Rogers is best known as the founder of clientcentered
therapy and considered as one of the prominent humanistic or
existential theorists in personality. His therapy aimed to make
the person achieve balance between their selfconcept (real-self)
and ideal self.
• The real self includes all those aspects of one's identity that
are perceived in awareness. These are the things that are known
to oneself like the attributes that an individual possesses. The
ideal self is defined as one’s view of self as one wishes to be.
This contains all the aspirations or wishes of an individual for
themselves.
• A wide gap between the ideal self and the self-concept
indicates incongruence and an unhealthy personality.
Image Source: https://socialworkpodcast.blogspot.com/ Psychologically healthy individuals perceive little discrepancy between their
self-concept and what they ideally would like to be.

Multiple versus Unified Self

• According to Multiple Selves Theory, there are different aspects of the self exist in an individual. From
here, we can say that self is a whole consist of parts, and these parts manifest themselves when need
arise.
• Gregg Henriques proposed the Tripartite Model of Human Consciousness, wherein he described that
self is consist of three related, but also separable domains these are the experimental self, private self,
and public self.
o The experiential self or the theater of consciousness is a domain of self that defined as felt
experience of being. This includes the felt consistency of being across periods of time. It is tightly
associated with the memory. This is a part of self that disappears the moment that an individual
enter deep sleep and comes back when they wake up.
o The private self consciousness system or the narrator/interpreter is a portion of self that verbally
narrates what is happening and tries to make sense of what is going on. The moment that you read
this part, there is somewhat like a “voice” speaking in your head trying to understand what this
concept is all about.
o Lastly, the public self or Persona, the domain of self that an individual shows to the public, and
this interacts on how others see an individual. Henriques’ Tripartite Model attempts to capture the
key domains of consciousness, both within the self and between others.
• Unified being is essentially connected to consciousness, awareness, and agency. A well-adjusted
person is able to accept and understood the success and failure that they experienced. They are those
kinds of person who continually adjust, adapt, evolve and survive as an individual with integrated,
unified, multiple selves.

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True versus False Self
Donald Winnicott

• Donald Winnicott was a pediatrician in London who

studied Psychoanalysis with Melanie Klein, a renowned
personality theorist and one of the pioneers in object relations
and development of personality in childhood.
• According to him, false self is an alternative personality
used to protect an individual’s true identity or one’s ability to
“hide” the real self. The false self is activated to maintain social
relationship as anticipation of the demands of others.
Compliance with the external rules or following societal norms
is a good example of this. false self can be a healthy self if it is
perceived as functional for the person and for the society and
being compliant without the feeling of betrayal of true self. On
the other hand, unhealthy false self happens when an individual
Image Source: http://freudquotes.blogspot.com/ feels forced compliance in any situation.
• On the contrary, true self has a sense of integrity and
connected wholeness that is rooted in early infancy. The baby
creates experiences of a sense of reality and sense of life worth living. Winnicott claimed that true
self can be achieved by good parenting that is not necessarily a perfect parenting.

The Self as Proactive and Agentic Albert Bandura

Albert Bandura is a psychologist and Professor Emeritus of
Social Science in Psychology at Stanford University. He is
known for his theory of social learning by means of
modeling. He is famous for his proposed concept of
selfefficacy.
• His personality theory, The Social Cognitive
Theory asserts that a person is both proactive and agentic,
which means that we have the capacity to exercise control
over our life. This theory emphasized that human beings are
proactive, self-regulating, self-reflective, and
selforganizing.
• Self as proactive means an individual have control
in any situation by making things happen. They act as agent
in doing or making themselves as they are. Agency is a
defining feature of modern selfhood. Agents assume some
degree of ownership and control over things, both internally
(I control my own thoughts) and externally (I make things
Image Source: https://www.uky.edu/
happen in the environment). The ability of an individual to
pursue their goals in life is an example of agentic approach
to self.
• According to Bandura (1989), self-efficacy beliefs
determine how people feel, think, motivate themselves and
behave. Such beliefs produce these diverse effects through four major processes. They include
cognitive, motivational, affective and selection processes. A strong sense of efficacy enhances human
accomplishment and personal well-being in many ways.

GED 101 UNDERSTANDING THE SELF

 • In contrast Bandura (1989) said that people who doubt their capabilities shy away from difficult
tasks which they view as personal threats. They have low aspirations and weak commitment to the
goals they choose to pursue. When faced with difficult tasks, they dwell on their personal
deficiencies, on the obstacles they will encounter, and all kinds of adverse outcomes rather than
concentrate on how to perform successfully. They fall easy victim to stress and depression.

SELF IN THE WESTERN AND ORIENTAL/EASTERN THE THOUGHT

Western and Oriental/Eastern Thought

Cultural differences and environment creates different perceptions of

the self. The most common distinction between people and cultures is the
Eastern-Western distinction. Eastern are known as the Asian countries, and
Western represents the Europe and Northen America. It must be noted that
countries who are geographically closer to each other my share
commonalities, but factors that may create diffrences must be considered.

Individualistic versus Collective Self

Understanding individualism and collectivism could help in the understanding of the cross-cultural
values of a person. Not every culture is at one end or the other of the spectrum, but the majority tend to
favor one over the other in everyday life.

Individualistic Self

• Individualism is not the idea that individuals should live like isolated entity, nor the idea that they
should never get or give help from others, nor the idea that an individual never owes anything to other
people.
• Individualism is the idea that the fundamental unit of the human species that thinks, lives, and acts
toward goals is the individual. This means that we can form our own independent judgments, act on
our own thoughts, and disagree with others.
• Each adult individual can consider what is in his own best interests. Each can act on his own private
motivations and values and can judge other people as good people to form relationships with, or as bad
people to be avoided. Each can decide whether to cooperate with others to solve problems. Each can
choose to think for himself about the conclusions that the majority of others in a group come to,
accepting or rejecting their conclusions as indicated by his own thought.
• Example of the description would include an individual identifies primarily with self, with the needs of
the individual being satisfied before those of the group. Looking after and taking care of ourselves,
being self-sufficient, guarantees the well-being of the group. Independence and self-reliance are greatly
stressed and valued.
• In general, people tend to distance themselves psychologically and emotionally from each other. One
may choose to join groups, but group membership is not essential to one’s identity or success.
Individualist characteristics are often associated with men and people in urban settings. Western
cultures are known to be individualistic.

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Collective Self

• Collectivism is the idea that the fundamental unit of the human species that thinks, lives, and acts toward
goals is not the individual, but some group. In different variants, this group may be the family, the city,
the economic class, the society, the nation, the race, or the whole human species. The group exists as a
super-organism separate from individuals: A group may make its own decisions, acts apart from the
actions of individuals, and has its own interests apart from those of the individuals that compose it.
• Under collectivism, individuals are analogous to ants in the protection of their queen ant. The individual
ant doesn’t have minds of their own, and generally cannot disagree with the hive. Any ant that acts in
a way contrary to the interests of the group is a malfunctioning ant. If an ant does not follow the certain
pattern of how they protect their queen, it will be entirely unable to support itself, find other ants that
support other queen ant and will surely die in short order. If the malfunctioning ant stays within the
group, it will be a threat to the line appropriate to protecting the queen ant.
• Examples of the collectivist thinking is when our identity is in large part, a function of our membership
and role in a group, e.g., the family or work team. The survival and success of the group ensures the
well-being of the individual, so that by considering the needs and feelings of others, one protects
oneself. Harmony and the interdependence of group members are stressed and valued. Group members
are relatively close psychologically and emotionally, but distant toward non-group members.
Collectivist characteristics are often associated with women and people in rural settings.
• Asian countries are known to be collective in nature.

The Social Construction of the Self in Western Thought

• Self has been an area of interest by French and English philosophers, and evident in the ideas of
Greek philosophers like Socrates and Plato.
• Descartes in 17th century emphasized the self in his dictum “I think therefore I am” which claims
that cognitive basis of the person’s thoughts is proof for the existence of the self.
• Kant believed that the self is capable of actions that entitles it to have rights as an autonomous
agent.
• Here are some qualities imparted to the Western subjective self. It sketches some features on
subjectivity and ways of thinking of western persons. This provides an impressionistic profile
through the use of a few strokes characterizing some ways of being and thinking of many western
persons.
o Western self as analytic. Since analytic and inductive modes of thinking were
prominent for person in western cultures, to see objects as divisible combinations of
yet smaller objects. Real things are not only visualized but immaterial things like
thoughts, ideas and memories would be given emphasis.
o Western self as monotheistic. Monotheism can be known as the rigid consequence of
the doctrine of normal human being. It is like forcing the concentration of supernatural
capabilities.
o Western self as individualistic. The emphasis on individualism has direct and indirect
effects on both the presentation of self (in public ways) and the experience of the self
(in private awareness).
o Western Self as materialistic and rationalistic. The western accentuation of rational,
scientific approach to reality has tended to define spiritual and immaterial phenomena

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 as potentially superstitious and dangerous. In any society, belief system is stratified
and composed of a hierarchy of interrelated, causal-explanatory models.

The Self as Embedded in Relationships and through Spiritual Development in Confucian Thought
• Confucius was born in the period of the Zhou Dynasty in
551 BCE in the state of Lu. He grew up poor although he was
descended from scholarly family.
• Confucius philosophy is known as humanistic social
philosophy which focusses on human beings and the society in
general.
• Confucianism is centered on ren which can be manifested
through the li (propriety), xiao (filiality), and yi (rightness). For
Confucius, ren reflects the person’s own understanding of humanity.
It is found within each person and can be realized in one’s personal
life and relationship. Ren guides human actions that makes life worth
living which can be realized through li, xiao, and yi:
•

o Li the propriety. Rules of propriety should be followed to guide Image Source:

https://www.oshonews.com/ human actions. These rules are the customs, ceremonies, and traditions

that forms the basis of li. According to Confucius, “to

master oneself and return to propriety is humanity” (Koller, 2007). Self mastery
involves self development. Self mastery is characterized by self-control and the will to
redirect impulses to change these to socially accepted expression of human nature. Li
conforms to the norms of humanity, thus one must fulfill their duties and
responsibilities in this five (5) relationships: father and son, ruler and subject, older and
younger brothers, husband and wife, friend and friend.
o Xiao the filiality. This is the virtue of reverence and respect for the family. Parents
should be revered for the life they and given. Children show respect to their parents by
exerting efforts to take care of themselves. Reverence for parents and family is further
demonstrated by bringing honor to the family, making something of himself and to
earn respect of other. If, however, the person is having difficulty giving his family the
honor that they deserved, he should just do this best to not disgrace the family.
Relationship that exist in the family reflect hoe the person relates to others in the
community. The family is the reflection of the person. How the person interacts
socially and the values they emulate can all be traced back to their family environment.
This forms the bases of the person’s moral and social virtues (Koller, 2007).
o Yi the rightness. The right way of behaving which is unconditional and absolute. Right
is right, and what is not right is wrong. Actions must be performed and carried out
because they are right actions. Confucius emphasized that actions should be performed
because they are right and not for selfish benefits that they provide.

GED 101 UNDERSTANDING THE SELF