A few days ago, I was at my dentist's to have a painful tooth attended to. Having a fairly low threshold of pain I was at my grumpiest. The drill started with a pretty lady Junior dentist first examining my teeth- molar to canine & amidst friendly banter passed me on to a guy with a crew cut & scowl on his face. This gent was brusque,cold & cut me short every time I wanted to say something.
I was pretty annoyed, in fact very annoyed & in order to vent my feelings found the junior lady doctor an appropriate target.I did not spare the male dentist & called him all sorts of names.I also reflected, as to how the guys wife could live with an idiot like that, all the while ignoring the feeble defense of my lady friend and frantic signals from the reception. Eventually satiated, I found a seat to park myself & retreated. After a while the receptionist informed me with a glint in her eye, that the pretty lady dentist & the painful guy were husband & wife. What a horror! The events that followed are too painful to relate here, but the point is that, how could I have been so abysmally low in intellect?
OB Theory will tell you that these kind of people ( me ) are what are called as 'low self monitors' & are notorious for gaffes. Self-monitoring refers to how individuals control and regulate their self-presentation in social situation. High self-monitoring individuals typically act in accordance with the demands of their social setting. They are attuned to the image they project to others, and they are particularly adept at regulating their self-presentation to fit these situational demands. As a result, their behavior may change from situation to situation. In contrast, low self-monitoring individuals rely on their attitudes, beliefs, and values to guide their behavior. Consequently, they are more likely than high self-monitoring individuals to show greater consistency in their behaviors from one situation to the next.
I had a very jovial captain, who could not resist cracking jokes & got demoted because he cracked a joke in a very serious situation!While high self monitors rise higher professionally, there is evidence suggesting that high self-monitors could have difficulty sustaining long-term relationships. With regard to jobs, high self-monitors have lower job commitment and are more likely to quit their jobs than are low self-monitors. In addition, high self-monitors are less committed to their dating relationships and more willing, than low self-monitors, to leave their current romantic partners for others . Finally, high self-monitors are more prone to divorce than are low self-monitors and experience more stress because they are very concious of the impression that they create.
So what are you?
