When better-than-others compare upward: Choice of comparison and comparative evaluation as independent predictors of academic performance

Journal of Personality and Social Psychology

Volumn 76, Issue 3, 1999, Pages 420-430

  Blanton, Hart ^b   Gibbons, Frederick X ^c   Buunk, Bram P ^a   Kuyper, Hans ^a  

^a UNIVERSITY OF GRONINGEN   (Netherlands)

^b STATE UNIVERSITY OF NEW YORK   (United States)

^c NONE

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 0039374561     PISSN: 00223514     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1037/0022-3514.76.3.420     Document Type: Article

References (69)

1. Alicke, M. D., Klotz, M. L., Breitenbecher, D. L., & Yurak, T. J. (1995). Personal contact, individuation, and the better-than-average effect. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 68, 804-825.
2. Arrowood, A. J., & Friend, R. (1969). Other factors determining the choice of a comparison other. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 5(2), 233-239.
3. Aspinwall, L. G., Frazier, L. E., & Cooper, D. A. (1997, August). Being shown up vs. being shown how: When exposure to upward comparisons fosters superior performance. Paper presented for the symposium The Self Under Threat in Upward Social Comparison at the annual meetings of the American Psychological Association, Chicago.
4. Bandura, A. (1986). The explanatory and predictive scope of self-efficacy theory. Journal of Social and Clinical Psychology, 4, 359-373.
5. Bandura, A., & Jourdan, F. J. (1991). Self-regulatory mechanisms governing the impact of social comparison on complex decision-making. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 60, 941-951.
6. Berger, S. M. (1977). Social comparison, modeling, and perseverance. In J. M. Suls & R. L. Miller (Eds.), Social comparison processes: Theoretical and empirical perspectives (pp. 209-234). Washington, DC: Hemisphere.
7. Blanton, H. (in press). Evaluating the self in the context of another: Assimilation and contrast effects in social comparison. In G. B. Moskowitz (Ed.), The tenure of social cognition. Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.
8. Blanton, H., Gibbons, F. X., & Eggleston, T. (1999). Level of comparison predicts smoking cessation. Manuscript in preparation.
9. Brown, I., Jr., & Inouye, D. K. (1978). Learned helplessness through modeling: The role of perceived similarity in competence. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 35, 900-908.
10. Buunk, B. P. (1995). Comparison direction and comparison dimension among disabled individuals: Towards a refined conceptualization of social comparison under stress. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 21, 316-330.
11. Buunk, B. P. (1998). Social comparison and optimism about one's relational future: Order effects in social judgment. European Journal of Social Psychology, 28, 777-786.
12. Buunk, B. P., Collins, R., Taylor, S. E., Van Yperen, N. W., & Dakof, G. (1990). The affective consequences of social comparisons: Either direction has its ups and downs. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 59, 1238-1249.
13. Buunk, B. P., & Gibbons, F. X. (Eds.). (1997). Health, coping, and well-being: Perspectives from social comparison theory. Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.
14. Buunk, B. P., & Ybema, J. F. (1997). Social comparison and occupational stress: The identification - contrast model. In B. P. Buunk & F. X. Gibbons (Eds.), Health, coping, and well-being: Perspectives from social comparison theory (pp. 359-388). Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.
15. Byrne, D. (1992). The transition from controlled laboratory experimentation to less controlled settings: Surprise! Additional variables are operative. Communication Monographs, 59(2), 190-198.
16. Cantor, N., & Norem, J. K. (1989). Defensive pessimism and stress and coping. Social Cognition, 7, 92-114.
17. Crocker, J. T., Thompson, L., McGraw, K. M., & Ingerman, C. (1987). Downward comparison, prejudice, and evaluations of others: Effects of self-esteem and threat. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 52, 907-916.
18. Davis, J. A. (1966). The campus as a frog pond: An application of the theory of relative deprivation to career decisions of college men. American Journal of Sociology, 72(1), 17-31.
19. Diener, E., & Fujita, F. (1997). Social comparisons and subjective well-being. In B. P. Buunk & F. X. Gibbons (Eds.), Health, coping, and well-being: Perspectives from social comparison theory (pp. 329-358). Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.
20. Dunning, D., Meyerowitz, J. A., & Holzberg, A. D. (1989). Ambiguity and self-evaluation: The role of idiosyncratic trait definitions in self-serving assessments of ability. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 57, 1082-1090.
21. Dutton, K. A., & Brown, J. D. (1997). Global self-esteem and specific self-views as determinants of people's reactions to success and failure. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 73, 139-148.
22. Fontaine, G. (1974). Social comparison and some determinants of expected personal control and expected performance in a novel task situation. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 29, 487-496.
23. Friend, R. M., & Gilbert, J. (1973). Threat and fear of negative evaluation as determinants of locus of social comparison. Journal of Personality, 41, 328-340.
24. Gibbons, F. X., Benbow, C. P., & Gerrard, M. (1994). From top dog to bottom half: Social comparisons strategies in response to poor performance. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 67, 638-652.
25. Gibbons, F. X., Blanton, H., Gerrard, M., & Buunk, B. P. (in press). Does social comparison make a difference? Optimism as a moderator of the impact of comparison level on outcome. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin.
26. Gilbert, D. T., Giesler, R. B., & Morris, D. A. (1995). When comparisons arise. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 69, 227-236.
27. Goolsby, L. L., & Chaplin, W. F. (1988). The impact of normative, ipsative, and idiothetic information on feelings about academic performance. Journal of Research in Personality, 22, 445-464.
28. Gruder, C. L. (1971). Determinants of social comparison choices. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 7, 473-489.
29. Gruder, C. L. (1977). Choice of comparison persons in evaluating oneself. In J. Suls & R. L. Miller (Eds.), Social comparison processes: Theoretical and empirical perspectives (pp. 21-42). New York: Hemisphere.
30. Hakmiller, K. L. (1966). Threat as a determinant of downward comparison. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 2(Suppl. 1), 32-39.
31. Jaccard, J., Turrisi, R., & Wan, C. K. (1990). Interaction effects in multiple regression. In Sage University Paper Series on Quantitative Applications in the Social Sciences (Series No. 07-072). Newbury Park, CA: Sage.
32. Klein, W. M. (1997). Objective standards are not enough: Affective, self-evaluative, and behavioral responses to social comparison information. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 72, 763-774.
33. Klein, W. M., & Weinstein, N. D. (1997). Social comparison and unrealistic optimism about personal risk. In B. P. Buunk & F. X. Gibbons (Eds.), Health, coping, and well-being: Perspectives from social comparison theory (pp. 24-62). Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.
34. Lockwood, P., & Kunda, Z. (1997). Superstars and me: Predicting the impact of role models on the self. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 73, 91-103.
35. Major, B. (1994). From social inequality to personal entitlement: The role of social comparisons, legitimacy appraisals, and group membership. In M. P. Zanna (Ed.), Advances in experimental social psychology (Vol. 26, pp. 293-348). San Diego, CA: Academic Press.
36. Major, B., Testa, M., & Bylsma, W. H. (1991). Responses to upward and downward social comparisons: The impact of esteem-relevance and perceived control. In J. M. Suls & T. A. Wills (Eds.), Social comparison: Contemporary theory and research (pp. 237-260). Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.
37. Marsh, H. W. (1993). Academic self-concept: Theory, measurement, and research. In J. Suls (Ed.), Psychological perspectives on the self (Vol. 4, pp. 1-26). Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.
38. Marsh, H. W., & Parker, J. W. (1984). The multidimensional structure of academic self-concept: Invariance over gender and age. American Educational Research Journal, 30, 841-860.
39. Miller, C. T. (1984). Self-schemas, gender, and social comparison: A clarification of the related attributes hypothesis. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 46, 1222-1228.
40. Miller, D. T., & Prentice, D. A. (1996). The construction of social norms and standards. In E. T. Higgins & A. W. Kruglanski (Eds.), Social psychology: Handbook of basic principles (pp. 799-829). New York: Guilford Press.
41. Miller, D. T., Turnbull, W., & McFarland, C. (1988). Particularistic and universalistic evaluation in the social comparison process. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 55, 908-917.
42. Moore, J., Strube, M. J., & Lacks, P. (1984). Learned helplessness: A function of attribution style and comparative performance information. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 10, 526-535.
43. Morse, S., & Gergen, K. J. (1970). Social comparison, self-consistency, and the concept of self. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 9, 351-358.
44. Norem, J. K., & Cantor, N. (1986). Defensive pessimism: "Harnessing" anxiety as motivation. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 51, 1208-1217.
45. Nosanchuk, T. A., & Erickson, B. H. (1985). How high is up? Calibrating social comparison in the real world. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 48, 623-633.
46. Pelham, B. W., & Wachsmuth, J. O. (1995). The waxing and waning of the social self: Assimilation and contrast in social comparison. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 69, 825-838.
47. Perloff, L. S., & Fetzer, P. A. (1986). Self-other judgments and perceived vulnerability. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 50, 502-510.
48. Pyszczynski, T., Greenberg, J., & LaPrelle, J. (1985). Social comparison after success and failure: Biased search for information consistent with a self-serving conclusion. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 21, 195-211.
49. Schunk, D. H. (1987). Peer models and children's behavioral change. Review of Educational Research, 57(2), 149-174.
50. Seta, J. (1982). The impact of comparison processes on coactors' task performance. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 42, 281-291.
51. Shrauger, S. J., & Schoeneman, T. J. (1979). Symbolic interactionist view of self-concept: Through the looking glass darkly. Psychological Bulletin, 86, 549-573.
52. Sudman, S., Bradburn, N., & Schwarz, N. (1996). Thinking about answers. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
53. Suis, J. M., & Tesch, F. E. (1978). Students' preferences for information about their test performance: A social comparison study. Journal of Applied Social Psychology, 8(2), 189-197.
54. Taylor, S. E., & Brown, J. D. (1988). Illusion and well-being: A social-psychological perspective on mental health. Psychological Bulletin, 103, 193-210.
55. Taylor, S. E., & Lobel, M. (1989). Social comparison activity under threat: Downward evaluation and upward contacts. Psychological Review, 96, 569-575.
56. Taylor, S. E., Wayment, H. A., & Carrillo, M. (1996). Social comparison, self-regulation, and motivation. In R. M. Sorrentino & E. T. Higgins (Eds.), Handbook of motivation and cognition (pp. 3-27). New York: Guilford Press.
57. Tesser, A. M. (1988). Toward a self-evaluation maintenance model of social behavior. In L. Berkowitz (Ed.), Advances in experimental social psychology (Vol. 20, pp. 181-227). New York: Academic Press.
58. Thornton, D., & Arrowood, A. J. (1966). Self-evaluation, self-enhancement, and the locus of social comparison. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 2(Suppl. 1), 40-48.
59. Vrugt, A. (1994). Perceived self-efficacy, social comparison, affective reactions and academic performance. British Journal of Educational Psychology, 64, 465-472.
60. Weinstein, N. D. (1983). Reducing unrealistic optimism about illness susceptibility. Health Psychology, 2, 11-20.
61. Weinstein, N. D., & Lachendro, E. (1982). Egocentrism as a source of unrealistic optimism. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 8, 195-200.
62. Wheeler, L. (1966). Motivation as a determinant of upward comparison. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 2(Suppl. 1), 27-31.
63. Wills, T. A. (1981). Downward comparison principles in social psychology. Psychological Bulletin, 90, 245-271.
64. Wilson, E. S. R., & Benner, L. A. (1971). The effects of self-esteem and situation upon comparison choices during ability evaluation. Sociometry, 34, 381-397.
65. Wood, J. V. (1989). Theory and research concerning social comparisons of personal attributes. Psychological Bulletin, 106, 231-248.
66. Wood, J. V. (1996). What is social comparison and how should we study it? Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 22, 520-537.
67. Wood, J. V., & Taylor, K. L. (1991). Serving self-relevant goals through social comparison. In J. Suls & T. A. Wills (Eds.), Social comparison: Contemporary theory and research (pp. 23-50). Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.
68. Ybema, J. F., & Buunk, B. P. (1993). Aiming at the top: Upward social comparison of abilities after failure. European Journal of Social Psychology, 23, 627-645.
69. Ybema, J. F., & Buunk, B. P. (1995). Affective responses to social comparison of abilities after failure. British Journal of Social Psychology, 20, 277-288.