Symbolic Self-Completion, Attempted Influence, and Self-Deprecation

A concept of symbolic self-completion states that people define themselves as musicians, athletes, etc. by use of indicators of attainment in those activity realms, such as possessing a prestige job, having extensive education, or whatever is recognized by others as indicating progress toward completing the self-definition. The self-completion idea postulates that when important symbols—indicators of self-definition—are lacking, the person will strive after further, alternative symbols of the self-definition. In the present research two modes of symbolizing completeness were studied: (1) attempting to influence others directly within the self-definitional area; or (2) simple self-descriptions of ones own performance, such that others would be exposed to those self-descriptions. Two correlational studies showed that the less education (Study 1) or on-the-job experience (Study 2) subjects had, the more they desired to influence others. Experimental subjects (Study 3) who were interrupted while writing a positive, self-descriptive statement manifested stronger influence attempts than did subjects who were allowed to finish. Finally, Study 4 examined self-descriptions as a self-symbolizing effort. Incompleteness