Humans are social beings and if there’s one thing universal about us, it is the fact that we interact daily with the people around us. And this interaction takes place for multiple reasons. We usually communicate with the people around us to share our thoughts, emotions, ideas, feelings, needs and many things along these lines.
Do you usually strive to work hard and finish challenging tasks? Or do you give up easily? Do you believe in yourself to reach a career or fitness goal, or do you not believe in yourself to fulfil challenging goals or issues that life comes up with?
Henry comes to work regularly on time and his performance has been consistent. One of his colleagues, Riya, believes that he is a diligent worker and gains satisfaction through working hard. Another colleague, Joseph, sees him as a worker who performs just for the sake of money. Do you agree with Riya or Joseph? This judgement could say a lot about your style of management.
Social Identity refers to an individual’s sense of who they are based on which group they belong to. It basically refers to their identity in the context of a group. Henri Tajfel and his student, John Turner developed this theory in the 1970s.
Amy is well aware of the benefits of engaging in some form of physical activity. Yet, she wakes up feeling zero motivation to move her body an inch. So she chooses to stick to her daily routine of waking up, glugging down a mug of cold coffee and driving her way to the office. She feels guilty about it every single day and decides things will change tomorrow.
An effective communication takes place when the message sent across by the conveyer is clear and easily comprehended by the receiver and relevant response is fed back to the one who conveyed the message and the flow continues similarly.
Does “communicate” only mean talking and having verbal conversations? Won’t anything beyond that be considered as a form of communication?
As things become heated up, a big argument spews between Nicole and Petra. They are throwing cuss words and hurtful statements at each other without realizing the kind of consequences it would later lead to. In that overwhelming moment, both forgot everything about each other and let their impulses completely take over.
So what is the matter exactly?
Theory of mind is the tendency or ability to interpret others by labelling mental states onto them. These states include our own biases, beliefs, intentions, thoughts, emotions, desires and opinions. The theory of mind, as the name suggests, includes ‘theories’ that we form for other people’s thoughts and feelings and how they come to exist.
“Am I capable of doing this?”
We question ourselves about our abilities on numerous occasions; Be it in terms of our skills, character, personalities etc. and how do we try to find answers to these questions? The only yardstick by which we measure ourselves is through others.
Erik Erikson was a developmental psychologist and psychoanalyst, who contributed to the study of development, by giving us the stages of psychosocial development. He believed that an individual’s personality develops through 8 stages, from infancy to adulthood.
