Jan Stets

University of California, Riverside | UCR · Department of Sociology

Identity verification occurs when individuals' situational identity meanings match the meanings in their identity standard. When a person verifies an identity, they feel understood, and they feel good. When an identity is not verified, people feel misunderstood, and they feel bad. Two identity characteristics that may moderate people's negative rea...

COVID-19 marked a change in social life that disrupted interaction, including people’s ability to verify their identities. We examine how identity nonverification associated with COVID-19 exposure helps us understand some of the psychological distress individuals experienced. We assess the relationship between identity nonverification and depressio...

I examine theory and research on the moral identity in sociology as we understand it today. I briefly review what we knew about the moral identity a dozen years ago but then discuss how we have made inroads in better interrogating this concept theoretically and empirically. For example, we have learned more about the conditions under which the mora...

Identity verification occurs when individuals’ situational identity meanings match the meanings in their identity standard. When a person verifies an identity, they feel understood, and they feel good. When an identity is not verified, people feel misunderstood, and they feel bad. Two identity characteristics that may moderate people’s negative rea...

To measure gender identity in past research, identity theorists have used the Personal Attributes Questionnaire (PAQ). Other researchers studying gender identity have used either the PAQ or Bem Sex Role Inventory (BSRI). Both the PAQ and BSRI are classic gender scales that emerged 40+ years ago to measure gender meanings in American culture. At iss...

For more than 50 years, social psychologists have been investigating a central aspect of the self: one’s identity. This volume presents recent advances in identity theory, a prominent and active theory in sociological social psychology. Identity theory has proven to be a versatile framework for explaining the sources of identities, and how identiti...

All people derive their identities from the groups and social categories to which they belong in society, the roles they play out, and their personal characteristics they claim. Introduced more than fifty years ago, identity theory has become a central theoretical perspective in sociological social psychology. Now in a greatly expanded second editi...

All people derive their identities from the groups and social categories to which they belong in society, the roles they play out, and their personal characteristics they claim. Introduced more than fifty years ago, identity theory has become a central theoretical perspective in sociological social psychology. Now in a greatly expanded second editi...

All people derive their identities from the groups and social categories to which they belong in society, the roles they play out, and their personal characteristics they claim. Introduced more than fifty years ago, identity theory has become a central theoretical perspective in sociological social psychology. Now in a greatly expanded second editi...

All people derive their identities from the groups and social categories to which they belong in society, the roles they play out, and their personal characteristics they claim. Introduced more than fifty years ago, identity theory has become a central theoretical perspective in sociological social psychology. Now in a greatly expanded second editi...

All people derive their identities from the groups and social categories to which they belong in society, the roles they play out, and their personal characteristics they claim. Introduced more than fifty years ago, identity theory has become a central theoretical perspective in sociological social psychology. Now in a greatly expanded second editi...

All people derive their identities from the groups and social categories to which they belong in society, the roles they play out, and their personal characteristics they claim. Introduced more than fifty years ago, identity theory has become a central theoretical perspective in sociological social psychology. Now in a greatly expanded second editi...

All people derive their identities from the groups and social categories to which they belong in society, the roles they play out, and their personal characteristics they claim. Introduced more than fifty years ago, identity theory has become a central theoretical perspective in sociological social psychology. Now in a greatly expanded second editi...

All people derive their identities from the groups and social categories to which they belong in society, the roles they play out, and their personal characteristics they claim. Introduced more than fifty years ago, identity theory has become a central theoretical perspective in sociological social psychology. Now in a greatly expanded second editi...

All people derive their identities from the groups and social categories to which they belong in society, the roles they play out, and their personal characteristics they claim. Introduced more than fifty years ago, identity theory has become a central theoretical perspective in sociological social psychology. Now in a greatly expanded second editi...

All people derive their identities from the groups and social categories to which they belong in society, the roles they play out, and their personal characteristics they claim. Introduced more than fifty years ago, identity theory has become a central theoretical perspective in sociological social psychology. Now in a greatly expanded second editi...

All people derive their identities from the groups and social categories to which they belong in society, the roles they play out, and their personal characteristics they claim. Introduced more than fifty years ago, identity theory has become a central theoretical perspective in sociological social psychology. Now in a greatly expanded second editi...

All people derive their identities from the groups and social categories to which they belong in society, the roles they play out, and their personal characteristics they claim. Introduced more than fifty years ago, identity theory has become a central theoretical perspective in sociological social psychology. Now in a greatly expanded second editi...

All people derive their identities from the groups and social categories to which they belong in society, the roles they play out, and their personal characteristics they claim. Introduced more than fifty years ago, identity theory has become a central theoretical perspective in sociological social psychology. Now in a greatly expanded second editi...

All people derive their identities from the groups and social categories to which they belong in society, the roles they play out, and their personal characteristics they claim. Introduced more than fifty years ago, identity theory has become a central theoretical perspective in sociological social psychology. Now in a greatly expanded second editi...

All people derive their identities from the groups and social categories to which they belong in society, the roles they play out, and their personal characteristics they claim. Introduced more than fifty years ago, identity theory has become a central theoretical perspective in sociological social psychology. Now in a greatly expanded second editi...

We study how the family structural arrangements individuals inhabit, the cultural meanings that accompany these structures, and individuals' experiences of identity verification within these structures are related to their general happiness. We use data (N = 1304) from the 2014 General Social Survey Identity Module to study the normative and non-no...

I discuss how social psychologists can think about identity change as a nested phenomenon. Identity change occurs at the micro level, but it is embedded in meso and macro levels of social reality. I use changes in the religious identity in the United States as an example of how we can conceptualize identity change in this way. This approach enables...

This introductory chapter overviews some of the important findings that emerge in this volume. Most of the chapters were presented and discussed at the Third Biennial Conference on Identity Theory and Research held in 2018 at the University of Massachusetts, Boston. The chapters covers a wide array of issues. The volume is organized into three part...

This study examines the effect of identity verification of the mother identity on two esteem dimensions: efficacy and worth. Analyses of data gathered from primarily Hispanic, low-income women in a southwestern town shows that women report lower efficacy-based esteem and worth-based esteem when their mother identity is not verified. Other identity...

People tend to form ties with similar others; this is homophily. We examine the processes that undergird homophily from an identity theory perspective, thereby studying the relationship between the self and group ties. We argue that homophily is initially due to shared identity meanings that when verified in interaction, stabilize and reinforce hom...

Research over the past decades has demonstrated the explanatory power of emotions, feelings, motivations, moods, and other affective processes when trying to understand and predict how we think and behave. In this consensus article, we ask: has the increasingly recognized impact of affective phenomena ushered in a new era, the era of affectivism?

In this study, we examine the effects of the structure of a network, the dominance identity of the actors, and the actors' ability to reward or punish on the use of punishment and the development of social bonds in a network. As expected, we find that peripheral rather than central actors in a network use punishment more, as do those with a high do...

We empirically test the concomitant cognitive and behavioral responses to identity verifying and non-verifying feedback. Based on identity theory, we expect that those who experience identity non-verification will enact behaviors aimed at resisting the non-verifying feedback, while at the same time their situated self-view will slowly change in the...

Self-esteem is a common concern in our everyday life. People associate high self-esteem with positive self-feelings, behaviors, and outcomes, and low self-esteem with negative self-feelings, behaviors, and outcomes. We explore how individuals feel about themselves in global terms given the multiple role identities (religious, parent, and spouse/par...

The research that provides the basis of this volume involves theoretical and empirical work on identities in everyday life. The work is divided into six areas, including psychological well-being; authenticity; morality; gender, racial, and sexuality issues; identities and groups; and identities over the life course. Among the many findings are that...

We describe how people can claim to be moral individuals while simultaneously engaging in immoral behavior. We take as our starting point moral disengagement strategies in which people selectively disengage from their harmful behavior. People may equate their harmful actions with worthy goals; soften bad actions to make them sound better; ignore or...

Social exchange theories explain how differences in structural power can generate inequalities in exchange networks. We argue here that even in the absence of structural power differences, inequality can emerge out of the identity process. We posit that when structurally equivalent actors are uncertain about the resource levels available for distri...

The article by Chung and Harris (XXXX) brings together an impressive array of literature to formulate a dynamic functional model of jealousy (DFMJ). There is much to like about the model. However, one concern is how it advances a theory of jealousy. Another concern is how the DFMJ operates over time, with different social groups, and cross-cultural...

Although evidence reveals that the social exchange process and identity verification process each can produce social bonds, researchers have yet to examine their conjoined effects. In this paper, we consider how exchange processes and identity processes separately and jointly shape the social bonds that emerge between actors. We do this with data f...

The initiative to increase the number of students in STEM disciplines and train them for a science-related job is a current national focus. Using longitudinal panel data from a national study that followed underrepresented college students in STEM fields, we investigate the neglected role that social psychological processes play in influencing scie...

We introduce a theoretical argument about how the fairness identity influences exchange behaviors in negotiated exchange networks. To test this argument, we use data from a laboratory experiment. Results demonstrate that by providing manipulated feedback that is inconsistent with the fairness identity standard (actual appraisals), inequality change...

Previous sociological research has focused on macro forces that are associated with overall happiness with one's life, but it has neglected an analysis of happiness in immediate situations and the micro forces that may shape it. In this study, we examine social structural as well as individual factors that may influence happiness in situations that...

Early on, the rationalist perspective characterized the way in which moral judgments should be understood in moral psychology. Now the pendulum has swung in the other direction, and we see the popularity of the intuitionist perspective. In this paper, I argue that neither perspective alone explains morality. Instead, I adopt a dual process approach...

We discuss the concept of self with a focus on understanding it from a micro, meso, and macro level of analysis. At the micro level, we focus on the self in interaction, emphasizing role-taking, self-presentation, and self-esteem. At the meso level, we address how the self is embedded within various groups including corporate and categorical struct...

Order and stability are tenuous and fragile. People have to work to create and sustain a semblance of stability and order in their lives and in their organizations and larger communities. Order on the Edge of Chaos compares different ideas about how we coordinate and cooperate. The ideas come from 'micro-sociology', and they offer new answers to th...

Emotions are an emergent feature of interaction, and many of the articles in this special section touch on this. What I find interesting is that we get a glimpse into how emotions unfold in a situation, and how the flow of emotions in any study can run from participant to participant, participant to researcher, and researcher to participant. Part o...

When individuals’ identities are not verified, most theories and research suggest that they feel bad when others evaluate them more negatively than how they see themselves. It is less clear whether they feel good or bad when others evaluate them more positively than how they see themselves. We examine people’s emotional reactions to nonverifying fe...

While most research examines self-esteem in terms of self-worth, we suggest three dimensions of self-esteem: worth-based, efficacy-based, and authenticity-based esteem. Each of these dimensions is linked to one of the three motives of the self, and each of them primarily emerges through verification of social/group, role, and person identities, res...

PurposeThe purpose of this chapter is to review the historical development of identity theory from 1988 to the present, and then outline some thoughts about future directions for the theory. Methodology/ApproachThe chapter discusses major advances in identity theory over the past 25 years such as the incorporation of the perceptual control system i...

The extent to which we see ourselves as similar or different from others in our lives plays a key role in getting along and participating in social life. This volume identifies research relevant to such communal functions of social comparisons and summarizes and organizes this research within a single, coherent conceptual framework. The volume prov...

Since the purpose of this volume is to show commonalities among three seemingly disparate research areas—morality, altruism, and social solidarity—we attempt to make a unique contribution to this endeavor by discussing how identity theory in social psychology can help unify these ostensibly different research areas. In general, identity theory offe...

Handbook of the Sociology of Emotions Volume II presents all new chapters in the ever developing area of the sociology of emotions. The volume is divided into two sections: Theoretical Perspectives and Social Arenas of Emotions. It reviews major sociological theories on emotions, which include evolutionary theory, identity theory, affect control th...

Identity theory has developed into an important theoretical framework within sociological social psychology. In this chapter, we provide an overview of the central ideas within the theory such as identity verification and identity salience, the different methodological approaches (survey and laboratory research) that have been used to study identit...

In this paper, the moral person is understood through the lens of identity theory in sociological social psychology. Identity theory helps identify the internal dynamics of individuals as moral persons by apprehending their self-views’, behavior, and emotions within and across situations. When the identity process is activated, the cognitive, behav...

This article provides a survey and analysis of recent research in the sociology of emotions. I address theoretical advances by discussing three theories that have been making some inroads into the study of emotions: identity theory, exchange theory, and justice theory. I also address substantive advances including an analysis of specific emotions a...

Sociology has seen a renewed interest in the study of morality. However, a theory of the self that explains individual variation in moral behavior and emotions is noticeably absent. In this study, we use identity theory to explain this variability. According to identity theory, actors are self-regulating entities whose goal is to verify their ident...

This research uses identity theory to examine the individual variability in moral behavior for acts of commission (committing a bad act) and omission (failing to do a good act). Most research using identity theory has examined behavior in the active sense as in doing something while neglecting behavior in the passive sense as in not doing something...

Stets, Jan E. and Michael J. Carter. 2011. “The Moral Self: Applying Identity Theory.” Social Psychology Quarterly 74(2): 192—215.

This research applies identity theory to understand the moral self. In identity theory, individuals act on the basis of their identity meanings, and they regulate the meanings of their behavior so that those meanings are consistent with their identity meanings. An inconsistency produces negative emotions and motivates individuals to behave differen...

For some time, psychologists have been studying the relationship between moral reasoning and moral behavior. A growing body of research insists that a moral identity rather than moral reasoning is crucial to understanding moral functioning. However, despite the interest in moral identity, there is no general theory that helps us understand this ide...

In this article, I discuss how sociologists can advance the scientific study of emotions by broadening their work and approaching it more creatively. This requires sociologists to examine more closely the cultural, social structural, and biological aspects of emotions. It also requires them to investigate the rich array of emotions that individuals...

Moral emotions that actors experience serve as an important mechanism that simultaneously preserves and reinforces the self-society relationship. While there are patterned regularities in human action, there are also patterned regularities in people's responses to their actions as reflected in their emotional reactions to what they do. Because indi...

Recent developments in identity theory are used to understand emotions in distributive justice theory. Three issues are examined: the consistency vs. enhancement dynamic, the status dynamic, and the resource dynamic. Results reveal individuals initially react positively to over-rewards; later they react more negatively. We suggest that the enhancem...

Many theories in the sociology of emotions assume that emotions emerge from the cognitive consistency principle. Congruence among cognitions produces good feelings whereas incongruence produces bad feelings. A work situation is simulated in which managers give feedback to workers that is consistent or inconsistent with what the workers expect to ge...

Over the past three decades, five general theoretical approaches to understanding the dynamics of human emotions have emerged in sociology: dramaturgical theories, symbolic interactionist theories, interaction ritual theories, power and status theories, and exchange theories. We review each of these approaches. Despite the progress made by these th...

The authors examine how personal, interpersonal, and structural resources are used in interaction to facilitate social actors' goal of self-verification. As the control of resources fosters self-verification, self-verification is expected to influence the availability of additional resources for actors to use to sustain themselves in future interac...

Drawing upon identity theory, expectation states theory, and legitima- tion theory, we examine how the task leader identity is more likely to be verified for persons with high status characteristics in four-person, mix- sexed, task-oriented groups. We hypothesize that identity verification will be accomplished more readily for male group members an...

This paper examines the effect of interpersonal control on sexual aggression while dating. A sample of white, heterosexual, college dating relationships is examined. Data are collected on men and women who inflict and sustain sexual aggression. The results indicate that, net of other effects, interpersonal control is a significant predictor of both...

Identity theory grows out of structural symbolic interaction (Stryker [1980] 2002). Two features that are particularly important in structural symbolic interaction are society and self. Society is viewed as a stable and orderly structure as reflected in the patterned behavior within and between social actors. When we look at the patterned behavior...

The “moral emotions” are often considered to be shame, guilt, sympathy, and empathy (Tangney and Dearing 2002), and, to a lesser degree, contempt, anger, and disgust (Rozin et al. 1999), but a moment of reflection reveals that this view is far too narrow. The palate of human emotions is much larger and diverse than this short list of moral emotions...

Basic Processes.- The Classification of Emotions.- The Neuroscience of Emotions.- Gender and Emotion.- Theories.- Power and Status and the Power-Status Theory of Emotions.- Cultural Theory and Emotions.- Ritual Theory.- Symbolic Interactionism, Inequality, and Emotions.- Affect Control Theory.- Identity Theory and Emotions.- Self Theory and Emotion...

Identity Control Theory (ICT) (Burke 1991; 1996), one strand of identity theory (Stryker and Burke 2000), has been developing a program of research over the past decade that focuses on the internal dynamics within the self that influence behavior (Burke and Cast 1997; Burke and Reitzes 1991; Burke and Stets 1999; Cast and Burke 2002; Stets and Burk...

We began assembling the chapters for this handbook at about the same time that we completed The Sociology of Emotions, in which we reviewed the theory and research on emotions over the past 30 years (Turner and Stets 2005). It became very clear to us in writing this book that the sociology of emotions has made remarkable progress since its emergenc...

Identity control theory has long posited that there are positive emotional consequences to identity verification and negative emotional consequences to the lack of identity verification. While some of the positive consequences of identity verification have been discussed, little work has been done to elaborate the variety of negative emotions that...

In this research we study the identity verification process and its effects in marriage. Drawing on identity control theory, we hypothesize that a lack of verification in the spouse identity (1) threatens stable self-meanings and interaction patterns between spouses, and (2) challenges a (nonverified) spouse's perception of control over the environ...

All social relations involve emotional responses, from the simplest face-to-face encounter through the mobilization of social movements to the commitments that individuals develop for culture and society. The social world is thus dependent upon the arousal of emotions, and equally significant conflict and change in societies is ultimately driven by...

In this study I develop theoretically the role of emotions in identity theory by examining individuals' emotional reactions to identity nonverification (in a positive and a negative direction) and identity verification, which occurs once versus repeatedly, and which is perpetrated by a familiar other compared with an unfamiliar other. Predictions f...

This research continues to advance the role of emotion in identity theory by examining how the external social structure influences internal identity processes to produce negative emotions. According to identity control theory, negative arousal emerges when one experiences identity feedback that is non-verifying, persistent, and from a source who i...

We explore how the external social structure influences internal self-processes by examining whether one's status in the social structure influences one's ability to self-verify across multiple identities. We also examine whether greater verification is related to positive self-feelings (higher self-esteem and mastery) in a stable manner, across id...

In an effort to explain pro-environmental behavior, environmental sociologists often study environmental attitudes. While much of this work is atheoretical, the focus on attitudes suggests that researchers are implicitly drawing upon attitude theory in psychology. The present research brings sociological theory to environmental sociology by drawing...

In its current form, identity theory has two slightly different emphases and thus two somewhat different programs of research (Stryker & Burke, 2000). In the work of Stryker and his colleagues (Serpe & Stryker, 1987; Stryker & Serpe, 1982, 1994), the focus is on how social structure in fluences one’s identity and, in turn, behavior. Thoits’ (Thoits...

This research examines the relationship between gender, controlling one's spouse, and the effect this control has on staying married as expressed in marital commitment. The authors examine structural and cultural views as a way of theoretically understanding the relationship between gender, control, and commitment. The results suggest that both the...