RELATIONSHIPS BETWEEN SELF-PERCEPTIONS AND
PERCEPTIONS OF OTHERS
Ralph Waldo Emerson insightfully observed “What we are, that only can we see.” As both common sense and research have demonstrated, this simple aphorism stands as the cornerstone upon which are built our most important principles of how we see others. Psychoanalyst Erich Fromm was one of the first to notice the close relationship between a person’s feelings toward himself and his feelings toward others. As Fromm[1] expressed it, “Hatred against oneself is inseparable from hatred against others.”’
Summarizing from his more than forty years of experience as a psychotherapist, Carl Rogers [2] has noted a somewhat similar phenomenon in many of his clients. Those who feel least capable of reaching their goals are also inclined to be most rejecting of the people around them. On the other hand, he has also noted that as persons move toward accepting themselves as worthy individuals, they are also inclined to move toward accepting others more uncritically. This is quite consistent with the research of N. A. Kuiper and T. B. Rogers,[3] who concluded from their investigation of how people encode personal information about others that “how we summarize information about other people is bound up with our own view of self.”
What we seem inclined to see “out there” in the behavior of other people is quite frequently a projection of our own drives and needs and fears. The person who tells us that people are basically untrustworthy and cruel—ignoring the plain fact that they are also dependable and kind—may be saying more about himself than about the world. Early research by Elizabeth Sheerer [4] and by D. Stock,[5] and Ruth Wylie’s[6] review of later research generally support the idea that if an individual thinks well of him- or herself, he or she is more likely to think well of others. Conversely, if one disapproves of oneself, one is more likely to disapprove of others. Perhaps another way of saying this is that what we find “out there” is what we put there with our unconscious projections. When we think we are looking out a window, it may be, more often than we realize, that we are really gazing into a looking glass
[1] E. Fromm “Selfishness and Self-Love,”
in C. Gordon and K. J. Gergen. ( Eds.), The Self
in Social Interaction, Vol. I. New York: Wiley, 1968, p. 331
[2] C.R. Rogers, On
Becoming a Person, Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1961, pp. 163-176
[3] N.A. Kuiper and T. B.
Rogers, “ Encoding of Personal Information, “ Journal of Personality and
Social Psychology, 37 ( 1979) 499-514
[4] E.T. Sheerer, “ Analysis of the Relationship Between Acceptance of and Respect for Others in Ten Counseling Cases,” Journal of Counseling Psychology 45 ( 1949): 169-175
[5] D. Stock, “ An Investigation into the Interrelationships Between Self-Concept and Feelings Directed Toward Other Persons and Groups, “ Journal of Consulting Psychology” 13 ( 1949): 176-180
[6] R.C. Wylie, The Self-Concept: Theory and
Research on Selected Topics, Vol. 2 Lincoln, Nebr: University of Nebraska
Press, 1978