Construct · 4 names · 4 citations
Different names. Different fields. One construct. One map.
● jangle · measuring the self against others Nearest construct by meaningequitycompare the meaningsEvery construct on the map is compared with every other by the meaning of its definitions, and the closest one is surfaced here. The nearest construct to social comparison is equity.
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The tendency to restore or protect well-being by comparing oneself with someone worse off, a self-enhancing move rather than the accuracy-seeking one Festinger described. Wills's 1981 Downward comparison principles in social psychology gathered evidence that people under threat, in poor health, or low in self-esteem raise their subjective welfare by contrasting themselves with a less fortunate other, whether that target is found, recalled, or actively derogated. The comparison here is a coping resource: its purpose is to feel better rather than to know better, and its preferred direction is downward, reversing the upward pull of Festinger's ability case.[2]
The choice of whom or what an employee measures their pay against when judging whether it is fair, the referent at the heart of equity and justice theories. Goodman's 1974 An examination of referents used in the evaluation of pay asked managers which comparisons they actually made and sorted the answers into other-referents (colleagues inside or outside the firm), self-referents (one's own past, skills, and needs), and system-referents (the pay structure and its promises). Equity theory holds that satisfaction turns on the ratio of one's outcomes and inputs relative to a chosen other, so the same comparison process now decides pay fairness, and the finding is that no single referent governs it.[3]
The comparison people make with the curated lives and images others post online, and its toll on self-esteem and mood. Vogel, Rose, Roberts, and Eckles's 2014 Social comparison, social media, and self-esteem reported across two studies that heavier Facebook use went with more frequent social comparison and lower trait self-esteem, and that exposure to an upward profile depressed state self-esteem more than a downward one did. The referents here are near-strangers presenting their best selves, the direction is predominantly upward, and the same process Festinger named now runs continuously against a feed engineered to invite it.[4]
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Social psychology
the drive to evaluate one's own opinions and abilities by comparing them with those of other people.The drive to evaluate one's own opinions and abilities by comparing them with those of other people, invoked most strongly when objective, non-social standards are unavailable. Festinger's 1954 A theory of social comparison processes set out the idea in a series of hypotheses: a person holds a drive to appraise their opinions and abilities, turns to others when no physical yardstick exists, and compares most readily with someone close to their own position, since a divergent other yields little useful information. He added a one-directional push upward for abilities, absent for opinions, because a skill carries a value that a mere view does not. This is the origin construct: every field below inherits the same act of gauging the self against another person.[1]