Transcript of Audio Lecture
The sentence stems in your homework assignment were
taken from the Washington University Sentence Completion Test developed
by Jane Loevinger. Her sentence completion test is another example of
the type of semi-structured yet semi-projective test ego-psychologists
like to use to assess how people consciously and actively make sense of
their lives. Notice how it is similar to Adler asking you to complete
the sentence: my earliest memory is _________. An important difference
between Adler and Loevinger, however, was that Loevinger was an expert
on test development and developed a very detailed, complex, and reliable
method for coding the sentence completions she elicited. Over 30 years
of research suggests her method is indeed reliable and has some validity
as well. But validity as a measure of what? What Loevinger wanted to
assess was nothing less than the totality of how your ego makes sense of
your life.
Slide two. To Loevinger, the ego was the totality of
the process of making sense of experience and therefore incorporated not
only reality-based ego functions, but also id functions (needs and
impulses), and superego functions (morals and values). All of those
functions are ego functions and, while over the course of life the
nature of the ego changes, it’s still all ego.
Loevinger and Freud agreed that ego development
proceeds through a series of invariant stages. However, whereas Freud
stated that the first 5 years of life were the key period for ego
development, Loevinger stated that ego development was a lifelong
process. Throughout your life, life experiences can prompt you to move
to subsequent stages of ego development or impede you from moving to
subsequent stages of ego development. Consequently some people go
through the development stages quickly and others go through the stages
slowly. Although there is no point of life at which we say ego
development has completely stopped, in adulthood the changes tend come
more slowly and for many people the level of ego development is stable
for decades.
Slide 3. The next several slides will outline each
stage of ego development. In Loevinger’s model there are nine stages of
ego development, which can be abbreviated as E1 for stage 1, E2 for
stage 2, and so on. The first stage is the pre-social and symbiotic
stage. This is the stage that the ego is typically in during infancy. A
baby has a very id-like ego that is very focused on gratifying immediate
needs. They tend to be very attached to the primary caregiver, often the
mother, and while they differentiate her from the rest of the world,
they tend experience a cognitive confusion and emotional fusion between
the caregiver and the self. But our understanding of this stage is more
speculative than our understanding of other stages because pre-verbal
infants we cannot use sentence completions and instead must rely on
inferences based on observations.
The second stage is the impulsive stage. While this is
the modal stage for toddlers, people can be in this stage for much
longer, and in fact a small minority of people remain in this impulsive
stage throughout their life. At this stage the ego continues to be
focused on bodily feelings, basic impulses, and immediate needs. Not
being particularly good at meeting these needs on their own, however,
they are dependent and demanding. They are too immersed in the moment
and in their own needs to think or care much about others; instead, they
experience the world in egocentric terms, in terms of how things are
affecting me. If something or someone meets my needs, it is good; if
something or someone frustrates my needs, it is bad. Thus, their
thinking is very simplistic and dichotomous.
The third stage is the self-protective stage. While
this stage is particularly common in early and middle childhood, some
individuals remain at this stage throughout their lives. The
self-protective ego is more cognitively sophisticated than the impulsive
ego, but they are still using their greater awareness of cause and
effect, of rules and consequences, to get what they want from others.
Therefore, they tend to be exploitive, manipulative, hedonistic, and
opportunistic. Their goals is simply to “get what I want without getting
caught”. Assuming others are like them, they are wary of what others
want. They are also self-protective in the sense of externalizing
blame--blaming others when anything goes wrong. Individuals who remain
in the stage into adolescence and adulthood tend to, unless they are
very smart, get into trouble; indeed, research using Loevinger’s
sentence completion test shows that a high proportion of juvenile
delinquents and inmates score at this self-protective stage.
Slide 4.
The fourth stage is the conformist stage. We tend to see this stage
emerging at the time Freud said the superego first emerges, around five
or six, and is the most common stage later in elementary school and in
junior high school. However, a number of people remain at this stage
throughout their lives. Conformist individuals are very invested in
belonging to and obtaining the approval of important reference groups,
such as peer groups. They tend to view and evaluate themselves and
others in terms of externals—how one looks, the music that you listen
to, the words or slang that you use, the roles people assume to show
what group they are in and their status within the group. They view
themselves and others in terms of stereotypes—broad generalizations
about what members of certain groups are or are not like. While from the
outside such individuals may seem superficial or phony, they do not
experience it that way because this group self is their real self. More
generally, they tend to view the world in simple, conventional,
rule-bound and moralistic ways. What is right and wrong is clear to
them—namely, what their group thinks is right or wrong. Their feelings
also tend to be simple and rule-governed, in the sense that there are
some situations in which one feels happy, and other situations in which
one feels sad. While Loevinger does try to avoid describing some stages
as better than others, she does use the somewhat pejorative terms
"banal" and “clichéd” to describe the conformist understanding of
feelings. Interestingly, both feelings of happiness and feelings of
shame tend to peak at this stage. Shame peaks because they are so
concerned about approval from their group; consequently, the threat of
shame is a powerful tool that groups can use to control individuals at
this stage. On the other hand, as long as their place in the group is
not threatened, conformist egos are quite happy, even happier than egos
at the later stages, where right and wrong can never again be so simple
and clear.
The fifth stage is the self-aware stage. This stage is
the most common stage among adults in the United States. The self-aware
ego shows an increased but still limited awareness deeper issues and the
inner lives of themselves and others. The being to wonder what do I
think as opposed to what my parents and peers think about such issues as
God and religion, morality, mortality, love and relationships. They tend
to not be at the point where they reach much resolution on these issues,
but they are thinking about them. They are also more aware that they and
others have unique feelings and motives, different from those that might
be prescribed by the feeling rules they have learned from movies and
books and other people. They recognize that just because one is part of
the group does not mean that one always feels or thinks the same as the
other group members and that’s true for other people in other groups as
well. In short, they are appreciating themselves and others as unique.
Increasing awareness of one’s unique feelings and motives creates
tension between the “real me” and the “expected me”, which can lead to
increased conflicts with family and peers. Finally, this ability to
wonder whether your family or peers are right about what is right and
wrong, to question whether you have been right about what is right and
wrong, can lead to increased self-criticism.
Slide 5. At the sixth
stage, the conscientious stage, this tendency towards self-evaluation
and self-criticism continues. The conscientious ego values
responsibility, achievement and the pursuit of high ideals and long-term
goals. Morality is based on personally-evaluated principles, and
behavior is guided by self-evaluated standards. Consequently, violating
one’s standards induces guilt. This differs from the conformist stage
where the tendency is to feel shame. Shame arises from not meeting the
others’ expectations; guilt arises from not meeting one’s own
expectations. Greater self-reflection leads to greater conceptual
complexity; experiencing the self and the world in more complex ways;
and this includes experiencing one’s own feelings and motives in more
accurate and differentiated ways and expressing them in more unique and
personal terms. Finally, with increasing awareness of the depth and
uniqueness of others’ feelings and motives as well comes increasing
concern with mutuality and empathy in relationships.
Before going on I
should mention that the preceding three stages—the conformist,
self-aware, and conscientious stages—are the most common for adults in
the United States, and there are fewer and fewer people at the stages we
are about to examine. Moreover, Loevinger suggested that we all have a
hard time understanding stages that are more than one level above our
own, so for many of us who are at the middle stages it can be hard to
fully grasp the highest stages.
At the seventh stage, the
individualistic stage, the focus on relationships increases, and
although achievement is still valued, relationships tend to be more
valued even more. The individualistic ego shows a broad-minded tolerance
of and respect for the autonomy of both the self and others. But a wish
gives others the autonomy to be who they really are can conflict with
needs for connection and intimacy. The heightened sense of individuality
and self-understanding can lead to vivid and unique ways of expressing
the self as well as to an awareness of inner conflicts and personal
paradoxes. But this is an incipient awareness of conflicting wishes and
thoughts and feelings—for closeness and distance, for achievement and
acceptance, and so on—but there is unlikely to yet be any resolution or
integration of these inner conflicts.
Slide 6. At stage eight, the
autonomous stage, there is increasing respect for one’s own and others’
autonomy. The autonomous ego cherishes individuality and uniqueness and
self-actualization; individuals’ unique and unexpected paths are a
source of joy. And these independent paths are no longer seen in
opposition to depending on each other; rather relationships are
appreciated as an interdependent system of mutual support; in other
words, it takes a village to raise and sustain an autonomous ego. There
is also greater tolerance of ambiguity. In particular, conflicts—both
inner conflicts and conflicts between people—are appreciated as
inevitable expressions of the fluid and multifaceted nature of people
and of life in general; and accepted as such, they are more easier faced
and coped with. Finally, the heightened and acute awareness of one’s own
inner space is manifest in vivid ways of articulating feelings.
At the
final stage, the integrated stage, the ego shows wisdom, broad empathy
towards oneself and others, and a capacity to not just be aware inner
conflicts like the individualistic ego or tolerate inner conflicts like
the autonomous ego, but reconcile a number or inner conflicts and make
peace with those issues that will remain unsolvable and those
experiences that will remain unattainable. The integrated ego finally
has a full sense of identity, of what it is, and at this stage it is
seeking to understand and actualize my own potentials and to achieve
integration of all those multi-faceted aspects of myself that have
become increasing vivid as I’ve moved through the preceding three
stages. In Loevinger’s research this highest stage is reached by less
than 1% of adults in the United States.
Slide 10. Let us now consider
some examples of ways in which people have completed the Loevinger’s
sentence completion test and she coded those sentence completions. Let
us start with the sentence stem “My main problem is…”. At the impulsive
stage an example is fight with my brother; a response which shows
impulsiveness and lack of self-control, and also is very concrete and
specific. Examples of a self-protective response are “my mouth” and
"filling out this questionnaire". These responses are also somewhat
concrete and impulsive, but also display the smart-alecky attitude that
is so diagnostic of self-protective egos. At the conformist stage, the
problems tend to be broader but still fairly concrete and oftentimes
focused on personal appearance and meeting others' expectations; thus,
the response “my main problem is my weight” is a good example. (By the
way, I should reiterate that these examples show actual sentence
completions and how Loevinger coded them.) An example of a self-aware
response was “not knowing how I really feel about love”; while a
conformist ego would apply feeling rules, a self-aware ego asks
questions about how do I feel. An example of a conscientious response is
“feeling complete responsibility for four lives”; the concern with
responsibility is characteristic of the conscientious stage. An example
of an individualistic or autonomous stage response is “impatience and a
judgmental attitude"; it shows concern with tolerance in relationships
along with self-criticism. Finally, an example of an integrated response
is “learning not to worry too much and tolerating weakness in those
around me”; integrated responses are typically complex responses; the
completion may contain parts similar to responses from earlier stages
(for example tolerating weakness in those around me is similar to an
autonomous stage response), but it’s combined with another idea as well,
as if this wide-reaching ego is trying to pack as much as it can into a
single response.
Slide 8. Let’s now look at responses to the stem "being
with other people". An example of an impulsive stage response is “is
OK”; this is quick and unreflective response. An example of a
self-protective response is “makes you feel good if you’re with the
right crowd”; this displays a self-protective and manipulative attitude.
An example of a conformist response is “is a good feeling”; this is a
straightforward but somewhat bland response. Examples of self-aware
responses are “helps me to forget things that make me sad” and “I like
very much and need”; these are more unique, complex, and self-reflective
responses than appear at the preceding stages. Examples of conscientious
responses are "is generally refreshing" (which is a vivid and unusual
term) and "It’s a great way to discover different types of people and
personalities" (which describes others as unique and intrinsically
interesting). Examples of Individualistic and autonomous responses are
“is great, I like to be alone sometimes but not too often” and
“stimulates me when we have something in common”; these responses are
unique, self-expressive, a show recognition of inner conflicts--that you
like and don’t like being with others, or you like it but only under
certain circumstances. An example of an integrated response is
“sometimes upsets me and sometimes its something I really need, a lot of
it depends on who the other people are”; again, while each piece might
fit at the individualistic or autonomous stages, collectively the
response shows a greater level of complexity and a fuller
self-awareness.
Slide 9. We’ll look at one more stem: "The thing I like
about myself is". An example of an impulsive response is "I’m cute",
which is very concrete. An example of a self-protective response is
"Everything"; this person is refusing to look at themselves honestly and
instead is expressing their smart-alecky self-protective attitude. An
example of a conformist response is "I’m happy" or "I’m a true friend",
which are very conventional responses. Examples of self-aware responses
are "I get along with others” and “my intelligence"; these responses are
more unique and self-reflective. An example of a conscientious response
is "that I like most people and try hard not to be critical"; an
emerging concern with tolerance and personal standards is characteristic
of this stage. An example of an individualistic or autonomous response
is "My honesty in dealing with other people as well as myself"; these
concerns are typical of individualistic and autonomous egos. Finally an
example of an integrated response is "my ability to face the actuality;
sometimes pleasant, often not, about life and myself”; this response
emphasizes being fully aware and honest, and moreover integrates
multiple ideas into a single phrase.
Slide 10. It’s probably time for me
to make a confession. I really like this model and this sentence
completion test; indeed, I used it in my own dissertation research. Why
I am so enamored of this test can perhaps be shown by two of the
subjects in my dissertation research, who happened to be subjects 64 and
65, and so which I coded one after the other. Number 64 responded to the
stem "when they avoided me" with "I felt like a loser". Number 65
responded "when they avoided me my self-esteem falls tremendously, I
begin to worry about how I look and who I am with and how I am acting".
To the stem “I am…” #64 responded “I am happy to be at Stanford”; #65
responded “I am a happy, positive thinking individual who tries her very
best to take the time to care about others as well as expand my own
horizons”. These two individuals looked similar on objective tests—they
were both optimistic, bright, ambitious young women. But when we allows
these two individuals, these two egos, to express how they experience
life in their own words, you hear two qualitatively different voices
(with 65 obviously being at a much higher of ego-development). So, let
us end with this brief quote from Loevinger herself: "We cannot build
personality assessment and personality psychology exclusively and what
can penetrate through the filter of objective pencil and paper tests. We
must seek other ways of achieving broader and deeper insights into the
meaning of people’s unique perception and their spontaneous words.”
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