Looking through mirrors: Self-reflections in our evaluations of others
Jack Adams-Webber
Brock University, St. Catharines, Ontario, Canada
Abstract
The golden section hypothesis predicts that when people evaluate other
persons in terms of bipolar constructs (e.g., generous-stingy), they will
assign them to positive poles (e.g., generous) with a mean relative frequency
of approximately 0.62. This hypothesis is consistent with the results of
17 independent repertory grid experiments in which a total of 1,857 participants,
ranging in age from 8 to 23, evaluated themselves and others on bipolar
constructs. The mean relative frequency of similar-to-self evaluations
of others also has been found repeatedly to be close to 0.62. Both of these
findings can be interpreted in terms of a formal model of self-reflection
developed by Adams-Webber (1997) within the explicit framework of Kelly's
personal construct theory. Three related predictions also derived from
this model (50% of our evaluations of others will be both similar-to-self
and positive, 25% will be different-from-self and negative, and 12.5% will
be similar-to-self and negative) were found to closely approximate the
repertory grid responses of 372 participants aged I I to 25; however, findings
for 171 children ages 9 to 10 included some significant differences with
potential developmental implications.
Paper presented at the 13th International Congress on Personal Construct
Psychology, Berlin (Germany), July 26-31, 1999.
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