Humanistic Self-Concept
The humanistic perspective treats self-concept—a person's organized set of beliefs about who they are—as central to personality.
Closely related is self-esteem, which is the overall evaluative judgment a person makes about their own worth.
Incongruence, or a mismatch between self-concept and actual experience, causes distress. Conversely, unconditional positive regard fosters healthy integration.
| Concept | Scope | Key theorist |
|---|---|---|
| Self-concept | Global beliefs about who one is | Rogers |
| Self-efficacy | Belief in capability for a SPECIFIC task | Bandura |
| Locus of control | General belief about what determines outcomes | Rotter |
Social-Cognitive Views
Albert Bandura's self-efficacy is a person's belief in their capability to succeed at a SPECIFIC task, predicting effort and resilience.
Julian Rotter's locus of control describes outcome beliefs: an internal locus credits one's own actions, while an external locus credits luck or fate.
Common pitfall: Treating self-efficacy and self-esteem as identical. Self-esteem is a GLOBAL evaluation of worth, whereas self-efficacy is SPECIFIC to a domain. You can have high self-efficacy in cooking yet low global self-esteem.