The Strength of Weak Identities: Social Structural Sources of Self, Situation and Emotional Experience

Author: Smith-Lovin, Lynn

Source: Social Psychology Quarterly, Volume 70, Number 2, June 2007 , pp. 106-124(19)

Publisher: American Sociological Association

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Abstract:

Modern societies are highly differentiated, with relatively uncorrelated socially salient dimensions and a preponderance of weak, unidimensional (as opposed to strong, multiplex) ties. What are the implications of a society with fewer strong ties and more weak ties for the self? What do these changes mean for our emotional experience in everyday life? I outline a structural view of self, situated identity, and emotion. It is an ecological theory in which interpersonal encounters are the link between the macro-level community structure and the micro-level experience of self-conception, identity performance, and emotion. In this ecology of encounters, multiple-identity enactments (especially of salient self-identities) are quite rare. But where they occur, they are important indicators of potential social change.

Document Type: Short communication

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