Document Type

Article

Publication Date

2017

Publication Source

Journal of Experimental Psychology: General

Abstract

Self-enhancement is a pervasive motivation that manifests broadly to promote and protect the positivity of the self. Research suggests that self-enhancement is associated with improved task performance. Untested, however, is whether that association is causal. The present research experimentally manipulated self-enhancement to examine its causal effect on task performance. Participants in 5 experiments were randomly assigned to self-enhance or not before completing a creativity task (Experiments 1–4) or pain-inducing cold-pressor task (Experiment 5). Results indicate that self-enhancing (but not self-effacing) on a dimension relevant (but not irrelevant) to the task facilitated performance. Furthermore, the data were consistent with the possibility that the performance facilitating effect of self-enhancement was mediated through task-relevant self-efficacy.

Inclusive pages

442-455

ISBN/ISSN

1939-2222

Document Version

Postprint

Comments

The document available for download is the authors' accepted manuscript, provided in compliance with the publisher's policy on self-archiving. To view the version of record, use the DOI provided. Permission documentation is on file.

Publisher

American Psychological Association

Volume

146

Issue

3

Download
Link to published version

Included in

Psychology Commons

Share

COinS