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27
Oct 21

I Would Have Gotten Away With It Too If It Weren’t For… Me?

Are we sometimes the ones behind our own failures?

How do we deal with an upcoming challenge that presents a real chance of failure? Obviously, we do everything in our power to prepare and make sure we can succeed in that challenge. For example, if there is a tough exam coming up in a course, we spend as much time as we can studying the material so that we are ready to take it… right? Interestingly, we might be setting up obstacles in the way of our own successes. In a phenomenon known as self-handicapping, some people prepare excuses or even take certain actions that almost deliberately make it harder to succeed at a future task. A student might spend multiple nights out with their friends, reducing the time they have to study for an exam and thus increasing their chance of getting low scores. But why would we ever get in our own way and sabotage our own tasks? As it turns out, self-handicapping helps us protect our self-esteem, but often at the cost of future improvement.

On the surface, self-handicapping might seem like a completely bad thing. After all, it directly undermines our performance in tasks and increases our chances of experiencing failure. However, self-handicapping actually has a specific benefit to us: It protects our self-esteem by giving us external excuses for failure. As discussed and demonstrated by McCrea (2008), having something else to blame for a failure aside from our own ability can prevent the failure from harming our self-image. Going with our previous example of a difficult exam, consider how a student might react if they studied incredibly hard and still failed. What does it say about that student if doing everything they could to prepare still couldn’t get them to succeed? They may have to conclude that they just are not capable enough, which would severely hurt their self-image. Contrast this reaction with one from a student who self-handicapped. If they fail the exam, they can blame the nights they spent with their friends and conclude, “I could have succeeded if I studied a little more.” The statement implies that they are still capable individuals, and thus their self-image is protected from the effects of failure. Self-handicapping “works” in the short term because it directs the blame for failure away from us and keeps us from concluding that we are completely incapable of accomplishing a task. However, its long-term effects are a different story.

As tempting as it might be to use self-handicapping to protect one’s self-esteem, repeated use of it can result in several negative long-term consequences. As discussed by Gruman, Schneider, & Coutts (2017), self-handicapping can lead to decreases in academic achievement and make it more difficult to take responsibility for your own actions, including successful ones. Additionally, it can lead to a cycle of poorer adjustment to academic settings and further relying on self-handicapping (pg. 228). The main reason for these consequences is that self-handicapping often leads to the assumption that one is already capable of doing something (even though they failed to do so). In their eyes, there is no need to work on improvement. When self-handicaps become the go-to response for every difficult task and one always blames everything on everyone but themselves, it becomes very difficult for them to recognize in what areas they might actually need to improve. Because they never improve, they might face greater chances of failure in future tasks, to which they might have to respond with self-handicapping in order to protect their self-image. Self-handicapping is a twofold threat, decreasing one’s chances of succeeding in a task in the short term and decreasing their motivation to improve their own capabilities in the long run.

Self-handicapping is the human tendency to sabotage one’s own chances of success in order to protect their self-image. It may help people protect themselves from short-term threats to their self-esteem by blaming failure on external factors, but it greatly reduces the likelihood that they will try to improve in the long term. How can we reduce our tendency to self-handicap? One way, as discussed by Gruman et al. (2017) is to participate in self-affirming tasks before taking on a difficult task, such as a test (pg. 448). When we boost our own self-esteem and focus on what is most important to us, we are less likely to rely on self-handicaps to maintain our self-images. Another possible way is to look at “could have” statements differently. McCrea (2008) mentions that when people think about how they could have performed better if not for some external circumstance, how they interpret their shortcomings matters. For example, if a student believes they could have done better on a test and just didn’t show it, as often happens with self-handicapping, then they are unlikely to try to improve for the next test. But if a student believes they should have done better on the test but were unable to demonstrate their ability for some reason, then they are more likely to look for ways to improve their behaviors and increase self-efficacy (McCrea, 2008). When it comes to failures, it might be better to take a little damage to your self-esteem and accept that your actions may have contributed to it, as you can use that failure to motivate your own improvement and make sure that your next attempt at the challenge is a successful one.

 

References

Gruman, J. A., Schneider, F. W., & Coutts, L. M. (2017). Applied social psychology: Understanding and addressing social and practical problems. Los Angeles: SAGE.

McCrea, S. M. (2008). Self-handicapping, excuse making, and counterfactual thinking: Consequences for self-esteem and future motivation. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 95(2), 274-292. doi:http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.95.2.274

 

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22
Mar 18

Choosing to fail?

I’m sure we all agree that it is our individuals selves that are mostly responsible for our successes.  If you study hard, you get the good grades.  If you apply yourself, you will do better.  If you believe in yourself you will.  But what about when we do not think this way, and instead think things like, “Good grades aren’t all that important,” and “I’m going to fail anyway, so what’s the use?”  The use of self-serving strategies can be greatly detrimental to development, especially in terms of education and cognition.

Perhaps one of the most dangerous self-serving strategies is that of self-handicapping.  Self-handicapping involves the self-creation of barriers to achievements before achievements have been made (Schneider, Gruman, & Coutts, 2012).  Essentially, an individual will sabotage their chances of success as defense mechanism against sharp jabs to self-esteem.  The example above, “I’m going to fail anyway, so what’s the use?” could be described as a self-handicapping statement.  Now imagine that the individual that said this had a big test the next morning, but decided to forgo studying and went to a party with alcohol instead, where they drank too much and stayed up too late, further hindering their success, all because they thought they would fail anyway.  The individuals furthered their self-handicapping and backed up their own claims when they indeed did poorly on the test the following day.  In this way, the individual avoided the blame for a poor grade and placed it on the fact they were up late partying (Schneider et al., 2012).

While initially, self-handicapping might protect the self-esteem of the individual, researchers have revealed that over time, self-handicapping can lead to serious consequences for academic performance and achievement (Schneider et al., 2012).  Over time, this behavior may actually prevent an individual from accepting even a desired positive achievement (Schneider et al., 2012).  Self-handicapping as a way to avoid the distress of doing poorly academically is just the beginning.  Researchers also warned that individuals who show consistent self-handicapping strategies may also adjust more poorly and also use other negative coping strategies (Schneider et al., 2012).

In order to combat self-handicapping, it is important, of course, to first understand what it is and how it can be detrimental.  From a short-term standpoint, self-handicapping preserves self-esteem when a negative outcome occurs.  But from a long-term perspective, self-handicapping offers no favors to users.  In order to cease self-handicapping behaviors, it is suggested that individuals devote more time to ensuring that they are prepared for future events, rather than devoting time that accepts a potential poor outcome before it has even occured (Schneider et al., 2012).  To put it blatantly, and if using the same example from above, study for the test, do not go out drinking, and get a good night’s sleep.  Using that time to improve the chances of a successful outcome is a better use of time, and also better serves the goal to achieve.  Any other tactic will hinder achievement, and will only preserve image for so long.

Schneider, F. W., Gruman, J. A., & Coutts, L. M. (2012). Applied Social Psychology:  Understanding and Addressing Social and Practical Problems. Second Edition. Sage.

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01
Nov 15

Self-handicapping

When I was eighteen, I was going to college full-time, waiting tables at Don Pablo’s, and using my tips to see a psychotherapist. Some wise part of me recognized that my habit of procrastinating made college even harder than high school, and apparently I was concerned enough to seek help. I remember feeling afraid that procrastination was going to ruin my life. I didn’t understand why I entered into a tortuous cycle of procrastination, anxiety, the inevitable crying fit where I wanted to give up, and then staying up all night every time I had to write a paper or study for a test. I think that when I was younger I could get by and even do well with minimal effort. But then when the difficulty of classes and increase of workload inevitably ensued, I had never developed the proper study skills or the discipline to use them. School had been easy and I grew lazy. Part of problem was that my emotional late-night marathons tended to yield positive results and I think I became dependent on the adrenaline rush to get things done. I romanticized my eccentric creative process as necessary to produce a successful outcome, when really I just hurt myself and the rest of my college career in many ways.

Procrastination is associated with self-handicapping, which is where people do something that may sabotage their performance in order to provide an excuse to explain any subsequent failure. This subconscious strategy stems from a lack of self-efficacy and fear of failure, so that a person’s self-worth remains unaffected in the case of a negative outcome. People who self-handicap are afraid that trying hard and failing at a task translates into their inherent stupidity and worthlessness. Without making the separation between personal character and results, it feel too vulnerable to risk the exposure of unadulterated effort (Schneider, Gruman, & Coutts, 2012).

According to Snyder, Malin, Dent, and Linnenbrink-Garcia (2014), self-handicapping is rooted in attribution theory and gifted students tend to have internal attributions for high achievement, associating ability with outcome. However, gifted students also tend to be insufficiently challenged academically so when they eventually experience failure, their resilience skills can be underdeveloped, leaving them fearful as to whether it’s possible to return to being a successful student. When people feel overwhelmed by performance expectations they often develop self-handicaps, and this is frequently the time when gifted students manifest them as maladaptive coping mechanisms. Because they internally attribute their circumstances, the academic failure (which may actually be minute in reality) is interpreted as the loss of intellectual giftedness instead of poor transient decision-making that can be improved upon in the future. This can lead to what researchers call gifted underachievement where ability is high and achievement is low. The self-worth theory of achievement motivation explains this phenomenon by focusing on the compelling motivation people feel to protect their sense of self-worth. In the case of gifted underachievement, students fear failure and accordingly avoid challenging situations, all in an effort to not threaten their perception of self-worth. This is often achieved through self-handicapping (Snyder et al., 2014).

I think this may have been what happened to me. At the end of elementary school, I was on the gifted program’s honor role, became class president, and had won the award for most physically fit girl in my grade. Fast forward a couple years to junior high and I began experimenting with drugs and alcohol, my grades plummeted, and I started wearing that academic failure as a badge of honor. I actually thought it was cool to flunk a test or even a course. What the heck happened? The Snyder et al. (2014) paper helps elucidate my dramatic shift in behavior. I don’t even remember what occurred, but my parents told me that in seventh grade I had a nasty biology teacher who seemed to have it out for me and I started having trouble in his class, earning C’s and D’s on tests. I had been a perfect student up until that point so my parents were concerned, got involved, met with the teacher, guidance counselor, and principal to understand the issue and seek justice. In my mind, there’s little recollection of that class and no memory of having a traumatizing experience. But something happened, and between that event and being less popular in junior high than elementary school, I bet it was just enough to feel like failure. If I internally attributed that failure as reflections of my ability and self-worth, then it makes sense that my subsequent underachievement was facilitated by the self-handicapping behaviors of procrastination, drugs, and alcohol. It’s amazing to think that I was so fragile as to not feel able to rebound, but it’s also comforting to find in the literature that this can be a common behavioral pattern.

As opposed to the entity theory which views intelligence as fixed in nature, the incremental theory recognizes that ability is mutable and success/failure outcomes are more related to effort. This means that poor performance can be improved with increased work, and the promoting of these incremental messages to gifted students is associated with lower behavioral self-handicapping (Snyder et al., 2014). Another set of interventions to help thwart these self-sabotaging tendencies is to associate with peers that value academic achievement and consciously think about the importance of education in relation to one’s career goals. These efforts are particularly effective towards establishing better priorities and decision making right before a project or exam (Schneider et al., 2012). I wish I had been aware of these obvious yet important practices twenty years ago, but then my life may have traveled a very different course. It’s been more difficult to kick and fight to find independent strategies to avoid self-handicapping but my sense of responsibility, accountability, and self-disciple while not nearly perfect are light-years ahead of where I began. And that feels good to say!

References

Schneider, F. W., Gruman, J. A., & Coutts, L. M. (2012). Applied social psychology: Understanding and addressing social and practical problems. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications, Inc.

Snyder, K. E., Malin, J. L., Dent, A. L., & Linnenbrink-Garcia, L. (2014). The message matters: The role of implicit beliefs about giftedness and failure experiences in academic self-handicapping. Journal of Educational Psychology, 106(1), 230-241. doi:http://dx.doi.org.ezaccess.libraries.psu.edu/10.1037/a0034553

 

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