Self-Confidence and Social Interactions

Abstract

This paper studies the interactions between an individual's self-esteem and his social environment -in the workplace, at school, and in personal relationships. Because a person generally has only imperfect knowledge of his own abilities, people who derive benefits from his performance (parent, spouse, friend, teacher, manager, etc.) have incentives to manipulate his self-confidence.We first study situations where an informed principal chooses an incentive structure, such as offering payments or rewards, delegating a task, or giving encouragement. We show that extrinsic rewards may have hidden costs -as stressed by psychologists-in that they undermine intrinsic motivation.As a result, they may be only weak reinforcers in the short run, and become negative reinforcers once withdrawn. Similarly, empowerment is likely to increase motivation, while offers of help may create a dependance. More generally, we identify when the hidden costs of rewards are a myth or a reality.We next consider situations where people criticize or downplay the performance of their spouse, child, colleague, or subordinate. We formalize ego-bashing as reflecting battles for dominance or authority within the relationship. Finally, we turn to the self-presentation strategies of privately informed agents. We study in particular how depressed individuals may engage in self-deprecation as a way of seeking leniency (a lowering of expectancies) or a "helping hand" on various obligations.

The Economics of Parenting, Self-esteem and Academic Performance: Theory and a Test

“…The second focuses on the demographic and environmental determinants of educational achievement. Be´nabou and Tirole (2003) discuss the effects of rewards and empowerment on selfesteem and motivation. They study the connection between an individual's motivation and her social environment in a variety of relationships, including manager and employee, teacher and student, and parent and child.…”

“…Social psychology has long examined the role of motivation and confidence in the propensity to undertake or succeed in a given task (Deci 1971;Condry and Chambers 1978;Henderlong and Lepper 2002). Recently, economics has introduced new tools to investigate the effects of incentives on performance (Kreps 1997;Be´nabou and Tirole 2003;Kremer et al 2004). Our research adds to the growing body of literature bridging social psychology and economics by focusing on the relationship between self-esteem and achievement.…”

“…Thus the principal's attempts to motivate the agent exert both direct and indirect influences: directly from the payoff provided for completing the task, and indirectly through the agent's reflective inference of the signal sent by the principal's actions toward her. It has been argued in the literature that empowering and encouraging an agent can effectively send signals of confidence and raise self-esteem, which may raise achievement (Be´nabou and Tirole 2003). Conversely, 'per contract' rewards or excessive forms of assistance may introduce extrinsic motivation that dominates an agent's own intrinsic ambition (Deci 1971;Lepper et al 1973;Kreps 1997).…”

“… 2. A more general assumption is made by Bénabou and Tirole (2000), who assume a density function f ( θ ) with distribution F ( θ ) that is common knowledge between the players of the game, and assume that the Child receives a signal σ that is indicative of θ i , in the sense that for some σ 1 > σ 2 , E [ θ i | σ 1 ]> E [ θ i | σ 2 ], and that the ratio of the conditional densities g ( σ | θ H )/ g ( σ | θ L ) is increasing in θ i . …”

Volunteering and the state

“…He postulates a change in preferences arising from an external intervention. Benabou and Tirole (2000) model the influence of extrinsic factors on the crowding effect via their impact as a signal on given preferences. 6 From a sociopolitical perspective, extensive political rights and a high degree of democratization represent such motivating interventions that can crowd in private provision of voluntary labor.…”