Internalization of self-presentation may not generalize to socially undesirable traits: The case of introversion

Abstract

Although traditional accounts of the internalization of self-presentation (IOSP; i.e., shifts in individuals’ self-perceptions toward the direction of their self-presentation) assumed that IOSP occurs for any trait, an alternative account based on self-deception predicts that it occurs only for socially desirable traits and that merely recalling trait-relevant episodes for self-presentation is sufficient to produce IOSP. This pre-registered study examined whether IOSP occurs for introversion that is defined in a socially undesirable manner. Japanese university students (N = 227; 129 women, 97 men, 1 other; M_age = 19.40, SD = 1.70) completed a measure of introversion twice: T1 as a baseline and T2 after 7–10 days, after merely preparing to present themselves as introverted based on their own introverted episodes. At T1, they also rated social desirability of trait words defining introversion. As predicted, the present definition of introversion was rated as socially undesirable (M = 2.78, SD = 0.57; range = 1-7). More importantly, a one-sample t-test under the null hypothesis that the shift in introversion would be equal to or greater than the smallest effect size of interest revealed that the shift was negligible (dz = 0.01, p = .004). Taken together with previous findings that IOSP occurs after merely preparing to self-present oneself as introverted when introversion is defined in a more socially desirable way, these results suggest that IOSP may occur only when target trait is framed in a socially desirable direction through self-deception.