In Search of a Theory

MY FIRST RESPONSE TO THE task of presenting a theory of the self was the realization that I have never formulated such a theory and

did not know if I had one. The task then became one of either discovering or creating it. Rather than simply presenting the outcome of my grapplings, I think it is more interesting to articulate the details of the process itself.

My search began, oddly enough, elsewhere. That is, I sampled the writings of some of the recognized "self" theorists, and concluded that there are different aspects of a theory of the self—the developmental, functional, structural, and pathological. For example, Laing (1965) writes primarily of the pathological modes of the self. Allport (1955) and Chein (1972) are concerned with the structure of the self. Freud and Sullivan deal with more than one aspect but from different viewpoints. In terms of development, Freud's main interest is in the libidinal or biological stages of development. Sullivan focuses on the interpersonal context in which the self system develops.

My intention in citing these examples is to indicate the unsettled nature of the field in attempting to come to grips with the concept of the self. Such terms as self, ego, person, self-system, self concept, self image, and self-identity are all in common usage, but all variously defined. It is difficult to know what aspects of a theory of self different writers are referring to, and even more difficult to know if they are using similar terms to mean similar things.

Brim (1975) has proposed that we think of the self as a theory we have about ourselves, thus adding the term self-theory to the above list. He claims that our self-theories are made up of inferences about ourselves based on observations of our own behavior and the reactions of others to us. This formulation highlighted for me what is a prevailing, yet frequently neglected, problem in the literature on the self, namely, the nature of the experienced "I". The experienced self