The Psychology of Competition & Social Comparison Perspective – Psychology Assignment Help

Assignment Task

Abstract Social comparison 

the tendency to self-evaluate by comparing ourselves to others—is an important source of competitive behavior. We propose a new model that distinguishes between individual and situational factors that increase social comparison and thus lead to a range of competitive attitudes and behavior. Individual factors are those that vary from person to person: the relevance of the performance dimension, the similarity of rivals, and their relationship closeness to the individual, as well as the various individual differences variables relating to social comparison more generally. Situational factors, conversely, are those factors on the social comparison landscape that affect similarly situated individuals: proximity to a standard (i.e., near the number 1 ranking vs. far away), the number of competitors (i.e., few vs. many), social category fault lines (i.e., disputes across vs. within social categories), and more. The distinction between individual and situational factors also helps chart future directions for social comparison research and generates new vistas across psychology and related disciplines

Competitions are ubiquitous. At work, we vie for a promotion, seek to increase a company’s market share, or try to win the race to patent a new invention. In the social domain, we may try to increase our number of Facebook “friends,” run faster than another at the gym, or strive to outdo the Joneses. Indeed, people commonly seek to achieve a superior position vis-à-vis others in a variety of contexts, from daily social situations to organizational settings and market transactions (De Botton, 2004; Festinger, 1954; Frank, 1985; Podolny, 2005; Porter, 1979). Although past psychological research valued the study of competition (Deutsch, 1949; Gardner, 1939; Hastorf & Cantril, 1954; Triplett, 1898; Vaughn & Diserens, 1938; Whittemore, 1924, 1925), social comparison scholarship has paid relatively little attention to this important social dynamic in recent decades. Instead, much of the study of competition has been relinquished to other disciplines—most notably economics and business but also sociology, political science, and more (e.g., Axelrod, 1984, 1997; Carlton & Perloff, 2005; Podolny, 2005; Porter, 1979; Spence, 1973). This state of affairs might appear perplexing, given Festinger’s (1954) prominent linking of the social comparison process to competitive behavior. That early linkage, however, was followed by much research that primarily studied the self-evaluation process—that is, how people evaluate their present state relative to others (e.g., Beach & Tesser, 2000; Tesser, 1988)—rather than its consequences for competitive behavior per se. The present framework therefore synthesizes early developments in social comparison theory with more recent ones into a coherent account of the key psychological forces that increase social comparison and, in turn, competitiveness. We draw not only on research that has directly examined competition but also on studies in social comparison and related fields that have significant implications for its analysis. Moreover, although our framework emphasizes the role of social comparison in increasing competitiveness, we recognize that competition—like other complex behavioral phenomena—is multiply determined. This review focuses on the role of individual and situational factors that increase social comparison concerns and thus competitiveness. In developing the framework of the model, we link social comparison and competitiveness, organize the extant literature to account for both individual and situational factors, highlight the interactions within and between these factors, and, finally, suggest future directions and lessons for fields within psychology and related disciplines.