Why do you think Susan’s affect changed when you challenged her negative self-referencing beliefs?
Perhaps, Susan’s affect changed because did not expect for this type of task to be proposed and was sure that all the comments written on the paper related directly to her. When she was offered a choice of negative self-referencing beliefs to identify the appropriate ones, the girl became nervous as she believed that all those properties were inherent in her. Despite the fact that there was no purpose to indicate Susan’s shortcomings and highlight the main nuances of negative perception, she regarded this gesture as an attempt to convey her main negative sides. This behavior is quite typical for an insecure person who experiences difficulty in self-identification and is not able to develop the motivation and desire to change for the better independently.
Moreover, the visualization of these ideas also had a significant impact. The visual images that Susan saw became an additional catalyst for the manifestation of her depressive mood. According to Kim and Shapiro (2016), the lack of motivation is one of the fundamental reasons for a negative self-assessment. Probably, if she had seen other, more positive statements, her reaction would have been different. Being a rather receptive and impressionable person, the girl succumbed to the influence of emotions and could not assess the task adequately.
In this scenario, what examples would you give if asked to reframe the six negative self-statements identified in the vignette? In other words, how would you reframe a negative statement such as, “I’m not enough,” into a more realistic, positive self-statement? Remember that reframes should not be future aspirational (“I’m going to be an Olympic gymnast!”) but should reflect an accurate, positive assessment of the person’s present situation (“I’m improving my skills each day.”)
The issues in the vignette could be replaced by others, which would not cause feelings of confusion and misunderstanding for Susan not to experience negative emotions when working with such a task. The described negative self-assessments had too much impact on the girl’s subconsciousness, forcing her to believe that all those features were combined in her. People who are confident of their weaknesses are more likely to be depressed (Chen, Bell, & Taylor, 2016). A more realistic and positive self-determination could help Susan to get rid of her sense of insecurity and become a rather good way to change her self-image.
For example, the statement “I am not enough” is very sharp, especially for such an impressionable girl. If she saw such a phrase as “I am rather competent to…,” maybe she could consider the treat task differently. The statement “I am no good” automatically put certain boundaries before Susan in which she imagined himself. For instance, such a phrase as “I am rather good at…” would allow the girl to think about her strengths and evaluate her abilities not according to her convictions but other people’s opinions.
The variant “I am lazy” made Susan understand that she was not hard-working enough and was not ready for serious steps. If she saw the phrase “I regularly train my skills” on the paper, maybe the girl would not be disappointed in the assignment so much. Another statement that embarrassed her was “I am unwelcome.” If she saw the phrase “I can cope with difficulties easily,” she might think that she had this quality and could develop it in herself. “I’m not going to get any better at it” is the position of a weak and insecure person.
Susan would be less diffused and depressed if she read something like “I can do something to change things for the better.” Finally, an extremely demotivating statement “I cannot do it” could be replaced, for example by “I want to try it,” thereby giving the girl a chance to understand that she could always make a step towards her problems and cope with any difficulties.
References
Chen, M., Bell, R. A., & Taylor, L. D. (2016). Narrator point of view and persuasion in health narratives: The role of protagonist-reader similarity, identification, and self-referencing. Journal of Health Communication, 21(8), 908-918.
Kim, H. K., & Shapiro, M. A. (2016). When bad things happen to a protagonist like you: The role of self in resistance to negatively framed health narratives. Journal of Health Communication, 21(12), 1227-1235.