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Updated: Jul 16, 2025
08:24
The Joint Effect of Social Comparison and Social Distance on Evaluation of Intertemporal Choice Outcomes in Event-related Potential Studies
Published on: August 25, 2023
742
Self-construal modulates context-based social comparison preferences in outcome evaluations
Cao Ge1, Panting Liu1, Zheng Zhang2
1Department of Psychology, School of Education, Zhengzhou University, Zhengzhou 450001, China.
Biological Psychology
|September 9, 2023
Summary
Self-construal (SC) influences how individuals evaluate outcomes in social comparisons. The study found that people with independent self-construal showed different responses to wins and losses compared to those with interdependent self-construal.
Area of Science:
- Social Psychology
- Cognitive Neuroscience
- Neuroeconomics
Background:
- Self-construal (SC) shapes perceptions of self-other relationships, typically categorized as interdependent or independent.
- Previous research explored SC's impact on processing personal and others' outcomes.
- Limited research has examined SC's role in outcome evaluation within social comparison contexts.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate the influence of self-construal (SC) on outcome evaluation during social comparison.
- To analyze affective and electrophysiological responses related to SC and social comparison in a gambling task.
Main Methods:
- Randomly assigned participants to interdependent and independent SC priming groups.
- Participants played gambling games against two pseudo-players.
- Measured affective and electrophysiological responses, specifically feedback-related negativity (FRN).
Main Results:
- Self-construal, self-gambling state, and social comparison significantly interacted to affect FRN.
- In self-win scenarios, performance discrepancies elicited more negative FRN than equal outcomes for both SC types.
- In self-loss scenarios, this effect was observed only in the independent SC group.
Conclusions:
- Outcome evaluation patterns in social contexts are dynamic and contingent on self-gambling state and self-construal.
- Independent self-construal leads to distinct neural responses to losses in social comparison compared to interdependent self-construal.
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