PSY 13 - SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY
PERFORMANCE TASK 2
Direction: Give five major threats to your self-concept. Explain how it will give harm
to yourself and ways of coping to it.
Input from the social environment that is inconsistent with an individual’s self-concept such as
changes is a major threat to our self-concept. Change is inconsistent and inevitable, it will be
experienced as stressful. It would harm a person if you are not able to adapt and adjust to the
changes in the social environment. You will get confused and lost along with the changes. For a
person to cope up with changes, one must acknowledge and adapt to them. Don’t restrict your
life to a limited set of contexts. Take time to reflect on what happened and find comfort in
those changes. With that, you can re-frame your thinking and use it as a way to build your self-
concept.
Peer pressure - especially when it is negative peer pressure. It would harm a person because
you will find yourself overly dependent on your peers. It will feel like you brand yourself
because of your peers, sometimes you are trying to fit in the wrong puzzle pieces. You become
unaware of who you truly are. It would influence your belief, decision-making, and behavior,
thus negative peer pressure would influence negative attributes to your self-concept. For a
person to cope up with peer pressure, one must have friends with similar values and beliefs.
Simply stay away from peers who pressure you to do stuff that is not in the same vision as
yours. Reflect on your personal values and preferences and make decisions based on those
rather than on peer pressure.
Failures - tends to cause a negative impact on our self-concept. It harms a person in a way that
it destroys our self-esteem. It will make you feel bad, demoralized, hopeless about yourself to
the point that you will become afraid to take a risk anymore. It will limit your likelihood of going
forward. Failure makes your mink trick you into believing things that aren’t true. For a person to
cope up with failures in life, one must respond to failure in adaptive ways, develop realistic
thoughts about it. Create a new plan. Don’t feel threatened by failure, forgive yourself and take
responsibility. Lastly, channel it into a positive one, make it as a motivation to strive more.
Trauma - it has a long-term impact on a person. It harms a person in a way that it affects the
way of living of a person, his perception, feelings, decision making, relationship with others,
memory, and behavior. Trauma is self-destructive. It could lead to more serious problems such
as mental health problems. It causes lower self-acceptance, self-image, and self-esteem.
Sometimes it is the source of anxiety and depressive symptoms of an individual. It is really hard
to cope up with trauma, professional help would be the best help to cope up. For a person to
cope up with trauma, give yourself time to heal. Don’t try to force the healing process. Have a
support system, re-engage in a hobby and develop a healthy coping mechanism.
