Self-enhancement in organizations
Self-enhancement in organizations
This chapter presents an overview of the self-enhancement motive, noting some of the many phenomena to which it has been linked as well as touching on the debate over whether self-enhancement is good or bad. It discusses how self-enhancement has been used in industrial-organizational/organizational behavior (IO/OB) research, including how it has typically been assessed. The chapter focuses on contributions of IO/OB research to the self-enhancement literature. It considers future research directions for self-enhancement in IO/OB research. Research has suggested different taxonomies to provide some semblance of order to self-enhancement strategies that comprise the self-zoo. Defensiveness represents cognitive and behavioral strategies that protect the self from threats and thus primarily represents strategies that serve the self-protection motive. Positivity embracement represents a set of cognitive and behavioral strategies serving the self-enhancement motive that deal with the solicitation and interpretation of positive feedback. As few employees are perfect, receiving threatening feedback is part and parcel of most performance evaluation systems.
91-118
Ferris, D. Lance
402b7d3c-8d34-4b04-8369-5a186633a8a5
Sedikides, Constantine
9d45e66d-75bb-44de-87d7-21fd553812c2
12 December 2017
Ferris, D. Lance
402b7d3c-8d34-4b04-8369-5a186633a8a5
Sedikides, Constantine
9d45e66d-75bb-44de-87d7-21fd553812c2
Ferris, D. Lance and Sedikides, Constantine
(2017)
Self-enhancement in organizations.
In,
Ferris, D. Lance, Johnson, Russell E. and Sedikides, Constantine
(eds.)
The Self at Work.
1 ed.
Routledge, .
(doi:10.4324/9781315626543).
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Book Section
Abstract
This chapter presents an overview of the self-enhancement motive, noting some of the many phenomena to which it has been linked as well as touching on the debate over whether self-enhancement is good or bad. It discusses how self-enhancement has been used in industrial-organizational/organizational behavior (IO/OB) research, including how it has typically been assessed. The chapter focuses on contributions of IO/OB research to the self-enhancement literature. It considers future research directions for self-enhancement in IO/OB research. Research has suggested different taxonomies to provide some semblance of order to self-enhancement strategies that comprise the self-zoo. Defensiveness represents cognitive and behavioral strategies that protect the self from threats and thus primarily represents strategies that serve the self-protection motive. Positivity embracement represents a set of cognitive and behavioral strategies serving the self-enhancement motive that deal with the solicitation and interpretation of positive feedback. As few employees are perfect, receiving threatening feedback is part and parcel of most performance evaluation systems.
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Ferris, Johnson, & Sedikides, 2018
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Published date: 12 December 2017
Identifiers
Local EPrints ID: 510585
URI: http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/id/eprint/510585
PURE UUID: abeb2074-5ffb-4435-b94c-de2bed3dde97
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Date deposited: 13 Apr 2026 18:15
Last modified: 14 Apr 2026 01:36
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Contributors
Author:
D. Lance Ferris
Editor:
D. Lance Ferris
Editor:
Russell E. Johnson
Editor:
Constantine Sedikides
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