老板面前无自我

尝试一下标题党 :)

所谓自我是一个很复杂的心理学概念，简单说来就是一个人对自己身份的认知的和情感的表征。有无自我意识是人和其他动物的主要区别之一。比如，人知道镜子中的图像就是自己，即使是婴儿发现镜中人脸上被画了颜色，也知道在自己脸上擦掉。而其他动物如猴子，却不能区分，甚至会去攻击镜中的影像。

人的自我是一个独特的结构，与自我有关的加工都会被易化。比如，对自我面孔的加工要快于对他人面孔的加工，对于与自我相关的记忆要好于与他人相关的记忆。但是，人的自我概念是依赖于社会情境的，如果人们对自我的概念是负性的，那么对自我面孔的加工就不会变快。内隐正联系理论 (implicit positive association theory, IPA)认为对自我面孔的加工激活了自我概念中的正性属性，因此会使被试行为表现变快。



IPA理论同样预测，如果自我概念的正性联系受到威胁，对与自我相关任务的加工优势就会消失。这里，作者研究了老板 (导师)对研究生被试的自我面孔加工的影响。为什么选择研究生和导师作为研究对象是个很有意思的问题。作者在 footnote 写到：

A common belief in Chinese teachers is that most students would not develop well unless their shortcomings are uncovered frequently. Consequently, students receive more critiques than praise from their teachers. The psychological consequence of such social experience is that teachers such as advisors for each class in elementary, middle, and high schools, who frequently criticize students and remind them of their shortcomings, constitute a threat to students’ self-esteem and students care very much about how their advisors think about them. Similarly, graduate students in universities care very much about their advisors' attitudes towards the self. However, not any positive/respected person constitutes a social threat to students' self-esteem. A faculty member is treated as a positive/respected person but does not constitute a social threat to subjects' self-esteem because a faculty member does not frequently criticize or give negative comments on students' behaviors or work. Graduate students care less about other faculty members' attitudes towards the
self.

简单来说，中国教师通常认为只有不断指出学生们的缺点，学生才能够进步。因此学生会通常受到的是批评而不是表扬。这种经历造成的后果是，学生非常关心老师对自己的看法。这种关系甚至在大学里的研究生和导师之间也是存在的。

作者找了20名研究生，让他们进行面孔朝向辨别任务。在一种实验条件中，实验所用面孔图片是被试自己的头像和被试导师的头像；而在另一种条件中，实验所用面孔图片是被试自己的头像和本系另外一名老师的头像。虽然是同一个系里的老师，地位和权力相似，但被试导师对自己的影响要远大于系里的其他老师。研究结果很明确，如果判断图片是自己和本系其他老师，被试对自我头像的判断要快于老师；而如果判断图片是自己和自己的导师，则对自我头像的判断会显著变慢，远远慢于自己的导师。在导师面前，自我优势消失了。

这是一个很有中国特色的研究，我猜想老外根本就不会想到做这样的实验。他们的学生应该不会如此害怕老板......

Ma, Y., & Han, S. (2009). Self-face advantage is modulated by social threat – Boss effect on self-face recognition Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 45 (4), 1048-1051 DOI: 10.1016/j.jesp.2009.05.008