Defeat is a state of mind; no one is ever defeated until defeat has been accepted as a reality. - Bruce Lee
Is defeat really so subjective? Taken, Bruce Lee was probably talking about defeat by another person, in a sports competition or in a professional rivalry or such. Not acknowledging that one has been defeated, even if lying on the ground exhausted, means one is ready to get back up and keep going - that really isn't defeat. But defeat can be even more subjective than just about giving up to another person. Often, the greatest enemy is oneself and we defeat ourselves - more often than we think.
I recently came across an article that talked about exactly these self-defeating behaviors.
Three general models of self-defeating behavior have been identified. These depend on whether the inflicted harm to oneself is foreseen or not and whether it is desired or not.
Therefore, we have 3 categories:
1. Deliberate self-destruction
At one extreme, a person desires to harm herself and engages in actions and behaviors that will likely lead to exactly the desired result. In this case the harm to oneself is the primary intention behind one’s action, and it has therefore been labelled deliberate, or primary self-destruction. This form of self-destruction is the most irrational one, and the least comprehensible.
I must say that when I first thought about self-defeating behaviors, I couldn’t even imagine that there would be such that are really intended and desirable to harm oneself, at all! How would this be reconcilable with evolutionary theories of the self-interested and self-preserving human being? Why would we intentionally defeat ourselves, aside from those of us that really do have a mental disorder? These behaviors are, by the way, called “clinical”, and are not considered when we talk about normal human behavior in psychological terms. They include such mental disorders as psychopathy, narcissism, anorexia, schizophrenia etc etc.
Okay, back to topic: The desire to harm or defeat the self expresses a clearly negative attitude toward the self, and so its causes should reflect this negative attitude. One obvious and central cause is self-esteem. The negative attitude towards oneself in this case must be so strong that it leads to self-destructiveness, so the type of self-esteem issues we have here probably extent beyond a mere insecurity or slight dislike regarding some of the own personal features and traits. This lack of self-esteem is facilitated by factors such as a high self-awareness, especially on the own shortcomings, and very strong negative emotions like guilt, remorse or anxiety. These produce an even stronger disvaluation of the self.
Some possible explanations for intentionally harming the self are actions that harm oneself to be “cleansed of guilt”. Or they could simply be a sign of the desire to escape from all these negative perceptions associated with the self. Deliberately trying to fail at some task would for example evidence for such primary self-destructive behavior. One could think of a night out before an important exam, or starting too late to make a project deadline.
The good news: This kind of deliberate self-defective behavior has actually been shown as non-existent. In all cases that have been proposed to show such behavior, other scholars have shown that it happened to be more of a trade-off or other mechanisms at play.
People who intentionally seem to disappoint others' expectations were for example shown not to want to fail per se, but to keep future expectations low BECAUSE they didn’t want to fail these.
Certain individuals might “purposely” fail in order to prevent any expectations to form in the first place. The self-destructive intention does not seem primary - they don’t fail for failing’s sake. The evidence for intentional failure and other examples of primary self-destruction such as choosing to suffer is weak and dependent on other factors, and often happened in the strategic pursuit of (a delayed) self-advantage. People who believe in a universe in which a certain amount of suffering is a given might choose to suffer now rather than suffer more later.
This could explain why some people stay with their alcoholic and aggressive partners - rather a slap on the cheek now than a broken arm (or the kid being slapped) later. Or they might believe in karma and that their current suffering is a means to future pleasure, such as finally turning that abusive spouse into a loving partner and parent of your kids. This does hardly qualify as deliberate self-destruction, though.
So, we are left with the two other strategies of self-defeating behavior, and for these, the researchers actually did find supporting evidence.
2. Counterproductive Strategies
On the opposite end of the scale, we have harm inflicted on the self that was neither desired nor foreseen. Unintentional self-defeating behaviors therefore make up the category called counterproductive strategies. It is still separated from accidental self-harm, where self-destructive behaviors happen rather isolated and can be considered exceptional accidents. Unintentional self-defeat is undesired and was not planned, but one does engage in it frequently and regularly: people are generally seeking normal goals and outcomes, but then they use ineffective approaches and behaviors to reach these goals which inhibit them from actually reaching the goal.
This is then still a self-defeating behavior because oneself is responsible for not reaching the goal, but it was never planned or even recognised that this would lead to a negative outcome.
An example: You have a new supervisor at work, and you want to impress him. You decide to make him a lot of compliments, stay late when he asks, agree with him in everything he says and side with him in team meetings. Turns out, this guy perceives you as a suck-up, judges you unable to make your own decisions and perceives you to have no “balls" to stand up to him respectfully and voice your opinion. When this happens often, and every time you want to impress someone, it qualifies as a counterproductive strategy. Oops!
You defeated yourself by choosing actions that, instead of achieving your goal of impressing him, kept you far away from doing that.
By choosing a seemingly rational and adaptive response (complying with your new boss in any way) to achieve a normal, rational goal (impressing him), the counterproductivity of the response is unintentional and only later discovered (when someone else gets the project lead). Judgment errors are the intuitive explanation: One erroneously judges some actions as effective and good strategies. But the problem: one is either unable to carry out the strategy (imagine you get caught complaining about him to your colleagues), or, even if carried out properly, it does not produce the desired result (as shown).
Flaws in self-perception may lead to the first problem, or low-self-awareness about the own capabilities or resources. Overconfidence and a recent success experience may also lead someone to believe in the own ability to carry out a certain course of actions to achieve the goal. Of course, the capabilities of involved people or other contingencies may also be misjudged.
Other examples of counterproductive strategies include self-handicapping, defined as actions that enhance the opportunity to externalize failures and internalize successes. Pretty much: making excuses about the potential failure. Such as not preparing well for an exam (you’re not stupid if you fail, you just didn’t prepare well), health-care negligence (you cannot have a dentist drill a tooth if you don’t even go see him), shy behavior (you cannot be disliked or rejected if you just don’t talk to anyone or ask for anything), or playing a sports match with a taped knee (you’re not a bad player if you lose, you were just injured).
Another recent personal experience: the star tenor in my opera visit of Beethoven’s Fidelio openly let the audience know that he “felt a bit under the weather lately. He will power through but asks kindly to excuse any lowered performance” - as we were told before the curtain was raised. Way to lower the expectations - of course, he still managed an amazing performance - but I heard some elderly British folks behind me whispering discontentedly.
Excuses don’t always harm the self, and are only considered self-destructive behaviors if they do. This happens rather quickly when the people make a habit of these pre-event excuses, and become known for making them, people value them less for it and they start to internalize the excuses they make to perform inadequately. Alcohol consumption and underachievement (low effort) are rather direct and self-destructive self-handicapping strategies.
3. Trade-offs
The third category is in between the two explained ones: Trade-offs involve harm that is foreseen but not desired. In this category, people choose the response towards one of at least two competing goals that could knowingly inflict self-harm on them, even if they don’t want to defeat themselves. Pursuing one of the goals will undermine one’s chances of achieving the other. Cheating (on partners) for example falls in this category, in my own humble opinion.
People who cheat probably do also care about their partner and the relationship with them, and want to keep it alive and successful. At the same time, they have another goal of experiencing physical intimacy with another, maybe new and exciting potential mate. They choose the self-destructive option of cheating (because if it gets out, they will likely lose their stable relationship, trust and support from that person) because the action they choose involves some benefits as well. In this case, well, sex.
The benefits are chosen over the costs to the self associated with cheating. Amongst their multiple goals and desires, where two of them are set in opposition, self-defeating behavior thus occurs as the person makes a choice that is not a (long-term) good choice for the self. By selecting the option where the costs outweigh the benefits, one makes an error in judgment.
There are multiple sources of these judgment errors, such as an inability to perceive the situations and consequences accurately, or a misjudgment that short-term benefits outweigh long-term costs. A common source of the misjudgment may also be miscalculating statistical probabilities associated with the (often only potential but not certain) harm to self. The probability of the partner discovering the cheating is often underestimated when deciding to satisfy that goal instead of the goal about the successful relationship.
Many trade-off situations are of the “now-versus-later” kind, such as not studying now versus studying later under more time-pressure. Here, emotions play an important role: strong negative feelings are experienced in the here and now, and create the desire to end them as soon as possible (even the thought of studying creates anxiety, doesn’t it?).
Future outcomes (even more stress of studying right before the exam) are neglected. Really strong positive emotions (like lust, to go back to the cheating example) in the short-term can also put more emphasis on all the benefits one would immediately get from the action - and then the long-term consequences, which might objectively weigh heavier, are neglected.
The undesirable outcome is merely accepted, not desired, though, and individuals would be happier if they did not happen as a consequence of their choice (this is why most people try to cover up their infidelity). Self-defeating trade-off behaviors thus involve making a poor choice of behavioral response to a situation with multiple, conflicting goals.
One more piece of evidence that proves that we can be victims of our emotions. They rule our little worlds, both for better and for worse (see previous blog posts). They came into existence to keep us alive (by acting as alarm system), and some of them we just don't want to live without. Just watch out that they don't make you defeat yourself :-)
Stay curious!
Valli
xx
Sources:
Baumeister & Scher, 1988, Self-defeating behavior patterns among normal individuals
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