Author(s)

Yu Kasagi¹, Ikuo Daibo²

¹Faculty of Psychology, Rissho University, Tokyo, Japan.
²School of Motivation & Behavioral Sciences, Tokyo Future University, Tokyo, Japan.

This study examined the effects of self-presentation on participants’ self-regulatory resources when the participants were faced with the multiple audience problem. In the experiment, participants (N = 38) were assigned to either the consistent condition or inconsistent condition, and were asked to make a speech in three sessions. The inconsistent condition was manipulated such that the participants would be confronted with the multiple audience problem in speech session 3. After the three speech sessions, the participants were told to work on 200 multiplication problems (3 digits × 3 digits) until they had finished solving all the problems or until they gave up or felt that they were unable to continue working on the problems. An experimenter timed the participants with a stopwatch as they worked on the problems. The results showed that the participants in the inconsistent condition gave up faster than the participants in the consistent condition. Moreover, the participants in the inconsistent condition solved less multiplication problems than the participants in the consistent condition. On the basis of these results, we concluded that when one was faced with the multiple audience problem, self-presentation was extremely difficult and entailed effortful forms of self-presentation that depleted one’s self-regulatory resources. Further research is necessary to examine the effects of compensatory self-enhancement, which has been found to be an effective coping strategy on self-regulatory resources when one is faced with the multiple audience problem.

Self-Presentation, Self-Regulatory Resources, Multiple Audience Problem

Kasagi, Y. and Daibo, I. (2015) Effects of Self-Presentation on One’s Self-Regulatory Resources When One Is Faced with the Multiple Audience Problem. Psychology, 6, 1443-1449. doi: 10.4236/psych.2015.612141.