Summary
Contents
Subject index
How can you understand yourself? Where do your views, attitudes and values come from and why do they change? This accessible and illuminating book provides a reliable guide to these questions. The book: · Demonstrates that personal identity is formed around basic needs for security and self-esteem and the personal desires that flow from them · Shows the role of the emotions in personal life · Explores the limits of approaches that deny the existence of 'individuals' and 'personal experience' · Demonstrates how we build on everyday problems and dilemmas of life to shape our moods, attitudes and feelings. Shrewd and compelling, the book will be of interest to anyone studying Social Psychology and Sociology.
Understanding YourSelf
Understanding YourSelf
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- The five essential dimensions of self-identity.
- The inner organization of the self; levels and types of awareness.
- The self as a unifying centre of emotional need, consciousness and executive capacities.
In short and simple terms the ‘self’ or ‘personal identity’ is how a person regards themselves and how they, and others, relate to, or behave towards themselves. Put slightly more formally the self is a centre of awareness, emotional needs and desires, in terms of which an individual reflects and acts upon his or her social circumstances. To understand the more complex issues involved it is useful to distinguish three aspects of the self. They are: its general attributes, its internal organization and the needs, functions and capacities of the self (see Figure 1.1).
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