Behaviors begin with patterns of events, way of thinking, feelings, and actions. These actions are either healthy or unhealthy, and they both occur in patterns. The events that occur in our daily lives make us have additional thoughts and feelings which lead to actions. The feelings lead to thinking, and thinking causes more feelings which cause actions. It is not easy to stop an unhealthy behavior pattern than it is to a healthy behavior pattern.
For instance, a healthy pattern occurs when a person feels uncomfortable with the way they feel, and thus decide to improve on their eating habit and do exercises. A person does this in order to feel better and happy. To change unhealthy behavior, we need to manage our feelings, way of thinking and actions. This paper focuses on the patterns of behaviors.
Human beings tend to develop a sense of self through interaction with others. People respond to others either verbally or non-verbally. Through response from others, it is easy for an individual to know how he is doing, what is expected of him, his importance and how others identify him. Nevertheless, the way other person responds to an individual identifies the self.
In addition, an individual discovers some things about themselves according to the responses given by others. The sense of self is developed when a person tries out a behavior such as change of dress, then receives reactions from others; reflects on reactions from others to know their meaning and depending on the meanings he either maintains or tries out other behaviors (Stark c.3).
Dressing is one of the things that create ease for interactions. People usually guess what an individual’s role by just looking at what they are wearing, and thus they have an idea of the type of person they are about to communicate with. This helps individuals to change their actions towards others and they are able to communicate. However, the way individuals judge others just by looking at the appearance may be erroneous.
Nevertheless, individuals continue to use appearance to base interactions and that is the reason why many people try to improve their appearance. Taking the role of others is essential because an individual places himself to another’s position to understand his own self from other peoples view. It helps a person to control his own response and to link him with arranged social processes. It is also viewed as self-criticism.
In social exchange theory, people make social decisions according to the costs and benefits gained from other people. They assess relationships to know the gains they are likely to get out of them. Some leave the relationships when they learn that their effort and cost does not equal to advantages. Others are happy when they learn that they are getting more than what they are giving. Therefore, solidarity is maintained through reliance on each other.
For example, social exchange occurs in a situation where workmates exchange favors or even associate courtesies. According to Chadwick, this theory is individualistic because the relationship is maintained based on personal gains (41). In addition, the relationship is maintained in reciprocity where a person obligates another. In essence, people will only be generous if they are getting a benefit in return.
Learning about self does not end because as people grow, they have many experiences and changes. We have learned that the self is identified through interactions between individuals. Individuals learn about themselves depending on the responses they get through interactions.
In social exchange theory, it is clear that people assess the benefits and risks to decide whether they will stay in a relationship or look for another. Therefore, human beings make decisions about relationships after weighing the costs and benefits and when the costs outweigh the benefits, they will end the social relationship.
Works Cited
Chadwick, Jones. Social Exchange Theory: It’s Structure and Influence in Social Psychology. London: Academic Press, 2000. Print.
Stark, Rodney. Sociology. 10th ed. Stamford: Cengage Learning, 2007. Print.