Case Study on Self and Control
Mark and Joe are organizing a get-together for their friends and family. Mark has found a reasonable setting with a security limit cutoff of 50 individuals. However, Mark has discovered that the rental price will be reduced more significantly the more people they invite. Joe is eager to throw a big party and needs to be aware of the financial and safety details. Mark is concerned about the safety limit, and Joe wants to invite as many people as possible to make the party more fun. Mark and Joe also discuss how many people they should invite.
Because it focuses on Mark and Joe’s priorities and motivations, the chosen case study emphasizes self-control. In order to adhere to the venue’s safety capacity limit, Mark is concerned about their guests’ safety and wants to restrict attendance. Joe, on the other hand, is focused on earning the title “Mr. Party” and wants to make the party as fun as possible by inviting as many people as possible. This demonstrates their divergent values and priorities, and it raises concerns regarding their capacity for self-control when making decisions that place the safety of their guests ahead of their desire to throw a massive party.
PSYC FPX 3520 Assessment 2 Self and Self-Control
Self-serving bias is a social psychology concept that will be applied to this case study. It is the tendency for people to attribute their successes to their abilities or efforts while they attribute their failures to factors outside of their control. Mark is trying to get a better deal on the venue in this instance by inviting more people to the party than the safety limit allows. Mark takes all the credit for organizing the party and negotiating a lower price for the location. He is willing to put the safety of the attendees at risk in order to get a bigger discount without thinking about the possible consequences of going over the venue’s safety limit. Mark’s actions demonstrate that he is ignoring the potential dangers involved in order to claim credit for the party and make his efforts successful.
As indicated by Kogan et al. ( 2021), self-serving bias is a person’s tendency to protect their self-esteem and self-image by focusing on their positive qualities and accomplishments and ignoring their shortcomings. According to Cherry (2019), self-serving bias is a type of cognitive bias in which one takes personal credit for accomplishments while attributing negative outcomes to external factors. It’s a way to keep one’s self-esteem up and safe.
A concentration in 2011 found that students who performed well on a web-based test credited their prosperity to their capacity, while the people who performed ineffectively ascribed their inability to the trouble of the test. Liu and Wang’s 2011 article, titled “Emotion and the Self-Serving Bias,” was published in the Journal of Educational Psychology. An online experiment with 240 undergraduate students from a Chinese university served as the research method. After completing a 20-item multiple-choice test on general knowledge, the students underwent a mood-altering emotional induction procedure and received positive or negative feedback. The students then rated how much they attributed their test performance to the following four elements: luck, effort, the difficulty of the task, and ability (Coleman, 2011). The pertinent findings were as follows:
Compared to students who experienced sadness or fear, those who received positive feedback and were happy or enraged made more internal attributions (ability and effort).
Compared to students who were happy or enraged, those who received negative feedback and were sad or afraid made more external attributions (task difficulty and luck).
PSYC FPX 3520 Assessment 2 Self and Self-Control
Students who received positive feedback and experienced happiness or rage were more likely to experience self-serving bias than students who received negative feedback and experienced sadness or fear. According to Coleman (2011), these findings suggest that emotions play a significant role in how students explain their academic outcomes and that self-serving bias is a dynamic phenomenon influenced by situational factors rather than a stable personality trait.
Mark’s behavior exemplifies self-serving bias in the classic sense that he is willing to take credit for the party’s success by inviting more people and receiving a larger discount while ignoring the potential dangers of going over the venue’s safety limit.
Research Support
Research Outline
Oneself-serving predisposition is a social mental hypothesis that depicts the propensity of people to credit positive occasions to their capacities or endeavors, while unfavorable occasions are credited to outside factors. Sanjuan and Magallanes looked into the connection between self-serving attributional bias and coping strategies and subjective well-being in 2014. The review utilized an example of 237 college understudies and estimated their self-serving inclination, survival techniques, and profound prosperity.
According to the study’s findings, using adaptive coping strategies was positively correlated with subjective well-being, which in turn was positively correlated with self-serving attributional bias. However, there was a negative correlation between emotional well-being and maladaptive coping strategies. The study provides concrete evidence of the self-serving bias’ influence on coping strategies and, in the end, on subjective well-being. For instance, people who have characteristic accomplishment to their capacities might be bound to utilize versatile adapting frameworks, improving their prosperity. On the other hand, people who attribute their failures to external factors may be more likely to employ maladaptive coping mechanisms, which can have a negative impact on well-being.
PSYC FPX 3520 Assessment 2 Self and Self-Control
Coping strategies mediated the relationship between self-serving bias and subjective well-being, with the former having a negative association with the latter, according to Sanjuan and Magallares’ (2014) research interpretation. To put it another way, people who used self-serving attributional bias were less happy, but this relationship was stronger for people who used good coping mechanisms. This study emphasizes the significance of effective coping mechanisms for mitigating the negative effects of self-serving bias.
Likewise, Chen et al. ( 2023) discovered that bargaining game participants with a self-serving bias were more likely to engage in unethical behavior. By demonstrating the connection between unethical behavior and self-serving bias, this study lends credence to the recognized concept of self-serving bias in social psychology.
By demonstrating its negative effects on subjective well-being and its connection to unethical behavior, these studies demonstrate the self-serving bias as a well-known concept in social psychology.
Application of Self-Serving Bias to the Case Study Mark and Joe’s party planning is the chosen case study to illustrate the concept of self-serving bias. According to Sanjuán & Magallanes (2014), self-serving bias is the tendency to attribute positive outcomes (such as one’s abilities) to internal factors and negative effects (such as other people’s actions) to external factors. For this situation study, Imprint is displaying a self-serving inclination by focusing on his monetary profit over the security of the party participants. He is aware of the possibility of overcrowding and has located an affordable location with a 50-person maximum capacity. He has the information, but he has not shared it with Joe. He is focusing on getting more people to take advantage of a bigger discount on the rental price. Mark exhibits self-serving bias by prioritizing his financial gain over the safety and well-being of the partygoers.
In addition, Joe is exhibiting self-serving bias by prioritizing his desire to throw a large party and maintain his status as “Mr. Party” over the well-being and safety of the partygoers. He isn’t worried about the expected risk of congestion and on second thought needs to welcome whatever number of individuals as could be allowed to make the party really invigorating. In addition, Joe’s actions demonstrate self-serving bias by prioritizing a fun and exciting party over the attendees’ safety and well-being.
Generally, the contextual analysis of Imprint and Joe’s party arranging features the idea of self-serving predisposition, as both Imprint and Joe focus on their cravings and individual addition over the security and prosperity of the party participants.
PSYC FPX 3520 Assessment 2 Self and Self-Control
Application of Ethical Reasoning Loss aversion is a psychological trait in which individuals experience more negative emotions in relation to losses than positive emotions in relation to equivalent gains (Koan et al., 2021). The idea of misfortune repugnance can be applied to the Imprint and Joe contextual analysis. People with loss aversion prioritize avoiding losses over achieving gains. Mark and Joe are spurred by the apprehension about losing something for the situation study. Mark is willing to make concessions regarding the well-being and safety of partygoers in order to cut costs because he is afraid of losing money. In contrast, Joe is willing to compromise on the safety of partygoers in order to maintain his image because he is concerned about losing his reputation as “Mr. Party.”
In the case study, Mark and Joe’s behavior can be attributed to their fear of losing something. Mark wants to cut costs on the venue’s rental by inviting more people than the space can hold. In doing so, he is willing to put the safety of the partygoers at risk. Likewise, Joe fears losing his standing as the bubbling energy source everyone crowds around. By allowing more people to attend the party than the venue can accommodate, he is willing to compromise on the attendees’ safety.
In the case study, the idea of loss aversion is relevant because it explains why Mark and Joe behaved the way they did. They are acting unethically and putting others’ safety and well-being at risk because they are afraid of losing something. By understanding the idea of the misfortune revolution, we can distinguish the potential for dishonest ways of behaving and do whatever it takes to forestall it before it happens. In this instance, Mark and Joe could have prioritized the safety of the partygoers over their worries about losing money by considering the losses that could result from an accident caused by overcrowding.
Decisive Reasoning Application
Egocentric reasoning alludes to the propensity to see and decipher occasions according to one’s viewpoint disregarding the perspectives of others (Abreu Pederzini, 2019). Both Mark and Joe exhibit egocentric thinking in the case study.
Mark’s decision to place financial gain ahead of the safety of partygoers suggests that he is egotistical. He found a venue with a discount for 50 or more people and encouraged Joe to invite more people to take advantage of the discount instead of telling Joe about the capacity limit. Mark’s decision demonstrates that he is only concerned with the potential financial gain for himself and does not take into account the dangers to the partygoers’ safety.
Joe’s desire to throw a large party and maintain his status as “Mr. Party” without considering the attendees’ safety and well-being demonstrates his egocentric thinking. He is more worried about the quantity of individuals going to the party and the energy it will produce than the dangers of the participants. Joe will disregard any potential dangers posed by overcrowding because he is so intent on his desire for a large gathering.
In general, the case study’s egocentric thinking demonstrates the significance of critical thinking in decision-making. Assume they had thought about the perspectives of others and assessed the potential benefits and impediments of their decisions. Concerning the party’s planning, they could have reached a resolution that was more accountable and ethical.
Final Words
PSYC FPX 3520 Assessment 2 Self and Self-Control
The idea of self-serving predisposition is clear from the picked contextual analysis. This is demonstrated by Joe’s willingness to prioritize his desire for a fun party over potential safety concerns and Mark’s desire to invite more people to the party to increase the rental discount. The focus on the rental discount and the fun of the party may lead Mark and Joe to justify their potentially harmful actions, which is consistent with the ethical principle of loss aversion. Finally, egocentrism is a problem for critical thinking. Mark and Joe may only look for evidence that favors their preferred outcome of a larger party, ignoring or downplaying the possibility of negative outcomes.
References
Abreu Pederzini, G. D. (2019). Realistic egocentrism: Caring leadership through an evolutionary lens. Culture and Organization, 5(2), 1–16. https://doi.org/10.1080/14759551.2019.1637875
Cherry, K. (2019). Why We Take Credit for Success and Blame Others for Failure. Verywell Mind. https://www.verywellmind.com/what-is-the-self-serving-bias-2795032
Chen, Y., Pan, Y., Cui, H., & Yang, X. (2023). The contagion of unethical behavior and social learning: An experimental study. Behavioral Sciences, 13(2), 172. https://doi.org/10.3390/bs13020172
Coleman, M. D. (2011). Emotion and the self-serving bias. Current Psychology, 30(4), 345–354. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12144-011-9121-2
Koan, I., Nakagawa, T., Chen, C., Matsubara, T., Lei, H., Hagiwara, K., Hirotsu, M., Yamagata, H., & Nakagawa, S. (2021). The negative association between positive psychological well-being and loss aversion. Frontiers in Psychology, 12(5). https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2021.641340
Kogan, S., Schneider, F. H., & Weber, R. A. (2021). Self-serving biases in beliefs about collective outcomes. Working Paper Series / Department of Economics, 3(379). https://doi.org/10.5167/uzh-201445
Sanjuán, P., & Magallares, A. (2014). Coping strategies as mediating variables between self-serving attributional bias and subjective well-being. Journal of Happiness Studies, 15(2), 443–453.
