Handbook of self-concept: Developmental, social, and clinical considerations.

Abstract

It is one of the most intimate of realities and the slipperiest of abstractions. For Sartre it was a double negative and for B. F. Skinner, a set of learned responses. Among exponents of artificial intelligence it is the Oz at the end of the rainbow, while for Voltaire it was an unavoidable pathology. And, ever since William James first identified consciousness of self as a discrete psychological phenomenon, more than a century ago, it has been the source of intense speculation and debate among psychologists. In the past twenty years alone, over 11,000 studies have been conducted on various aspects of self-concept