Social categories function as cognitive tools that position the self comparatively

Evidence

Social categorizations are conceived here as cognitive tools that segment, classify, and order the social environment, and thus enable the individual to undertake many forms of social action. But they do not merely systematize the social world; they also provide a system of orientation for self-reference: they create and define the individual’s place in society. Social groups, understood in this sense, provide their members with an identification of themselves in social terms. These identifications are to a very large extent relational and comparative: they define the individual as similar to or different from, as “better” or “worse” than, members of other groups. — John T. Jost and Jim Sidanius, Political Psychology, 2716

Categorization

• DEFINE: Introduces the Tajfelian social identity concept: self-image derived from comparative, relational social categorizations.
• XREF: connects to: Working-class representation traps the speaker in an assigned social place — Mark Fisher (edited by Darren Ambrose), K-Punk: The Collected and Unpublished…, 1101; Whoever controls category definitions holds the basis of social power. — Stephen Reicher, S. Alexander Haslam, and Nick Hopkins, Social identity and the dynamics of…, 77; Social category definitions both reflect context and actively remake social relations — Stephen Reicher, S. Alexander Haslam, and Nick Hopkins, Social identity and the dynamics of…, 79 (+3 more)