Structure, Content and Inter-relationships between Self-aspects: Integrating Findings from the Social Identity and Self Complexity Traditions

Abstract

The “social cure” literature from the social identity approach, and the self-complexity literature are both concerned with the structure and content of the self, and their relationship to wellbeing. Our work seeks to integrate these two approaches by investigating the exact characteristics of the self-concept that are associated with wellbeing, focusing in particular on self-aspects that are supportive, positive, representative and compatible (“superaspects”). In a pre-registered correlational study (n = 640) we found that the number of collective superaspects was positively associated with affect balance and quality of life (H1a), but the number of non-collective superaspects was positively associated only with affect balance (H1b). We found no evidence that similarity between self-aspects was negatively associated with wellbeing (H2), or that a self-reported measure of positivity was more strongly associated with wellbeing than a calculated measure (H3). These findings suggest potential avenues for an integrated measurement of the self-concept and its association with wellbeing.