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Motive congruence and interpersonal identity status
Jan Hofer1, Holger Busch, Athanasios Chasiotis
1Cross-cultural Life-span Psychology Research Group, Department of Human Sciences, University of Osnabrück, Germany. Jan.Hofer@uos.de
Journal of Personality
|March 15, 2006
Summary
Motive congruence relates to interpersonal identity achievement and foreclosure. This finding highlights the link between self-attributed and implicit affiliation motives and identity development in adults.
Area of Science:
- Psychology
- Social Psychology
- Personality Psychology
Background:
- Ego identity formation is a key developmental task.
- Affiliation motives, both explicit and implicit, influence social behavior.
- Understanding the interplay between identity and motivation is crucial for psychological well-being.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate the association between interpersonal ego identity formation and the congruence of self-attributed and implicit affiliation motives.
- To explore how different identity statuses (achievement, foreclosure, diffusion, moratorium) relate to motive congruence.
Main Methods:
- 177 participants completed the Thematic Apperception Test (TAT)-type picture-story test, the Personality Research Form, and the Extended Objective Measure of Ego Identity Status.
- Need for Affiliation was assessed using Winter's scoring system for picture stories.
- Statistical analyses examined the relationship between motive congruence and identity statuses.
Main Results:
- Motive congruence was significantly associated with higher levels of identity achievement and identity foreclosure in the interpersonal domain.
- No significant relationship was found between motive congruence and identity diffusion or moratorium.
Conclusions:
- Congruence between self-attributed and implicit affiliation motives is linked to specific interpersonal identity statuses.
- These findings suggest that a unified sense of self in relation to affiliation needs is characteristic of identity achievement and foreclosure.
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