Becoming your true self: Perceptions of authenticity across the lifespan

Abstract

Two studies investigated how authenticity is believed to change over time. We tested for two possible trajectories: (1) A simple positive linear progression driven by self-enhancement motives and (2) a linear progression followed by a plateau indicative of the end of the history illusion. Across both studies, participants completed measures of perceived authenticity for different points in their lives. Study 1 was over a relatively short period of time. Study 2 was over the course of the lifespan. Both studies revealed upward linear trends suggesting that participants believe they are becoming more authentic over time. Study 2 also revealed that people perceive particularly high rates of change in the recent past and near future. The preponderance of evidence favored the self-enhancement perspective.

Keywords:

• Authenticity
• true self
• self-enhancement
• end of the history illusion
• time

Notes

1. It is important to note that the current work treats authenticity and the true self-concept as completely subjective judgments and doesn’t speak to whether people’s judgments have any objective truth to them. This is consistent with our previous work that consistently utilizes a lay theory approach (Schlegel & Hicks, 2011; Schlegel, Hicks, Davis, Hirsch, & Smith, 2013; Seto & Hicks, 2016).

2. See OSF for a detailed description of all the study materials.

3. All of the figures include chapters that had data for at least 20 participants. For figures of the all the life chapters, please see OSF.

4. It is important to replicate our findings in other samples. For example, there may be some differences between MTurk participants and the general population (though see Buhrmester, Kwang, & Gosling, 2011 for some evidence that MTurk is a reliable source of data).

5. We thank a reviewer for these suggestions for future research.