It Depends on Who I Am! Self-Construals, Attention to Comparative Feedback, and Self-Assessments of Performance

Abstract

Feedback and self-assessment can improve awareness and enhance training or learning processes. This study explores whether self-construals correspond to relative attention paid to either social- or temporal-comparative feedback, and self-assessments of performance following feedback. We distinguish between independent and interdependent self-construal differences. A total of 214 undergraduate participants in Korea (n = 109) and the United States (n = 105) completed multiple rounds of a task and simultaneously received manipulated temporal- and social-comparative feedback on performance following each round. Participants with independent self-construals were more attentive to temporal-comparative feedback, while those with interdependent self-construals were more attentive to social-comparative feedback. More positive combinations of comparative feedback led to more positive self-assessments, while more negative combinations of comparative feedback had the opposite relationship, and all relationships between feedback combinations and self-assessments were positively moderated when participants had more independent self-construals. These results highlight the importance of providing multiple types of comparative feedback to ensure that individuals have access to self-relevant feedback that matches their self-construal orientation. Additionally, efforts to assess training or educational programs/processes need to collect objective measures of performance, such as accuracy of tasks, alongside self-assessed performance, because self-assessments may be subject to self-construal related biases.