Social identity operates through three distinct selves, not one continuum

Evidence

Parallel to the constructs of individualism and collectivism, social identity theory is often thought of as a continuum with personal (individuated) identity on one end, and social (collective) identity at the other. The shift between personal and social identities is presumed to lay in universal cognitive processes associated with social categorization and category salience. Against this view of a single continuum, however, Brewer and Gardner (1996) suggested that there may be three qualitatively different views of the “social self”: individual, relational, and collective, each being a distinct self-representation with different structural properties, basis for self-evaluation, and motivational concerns … Unlike relational identities, collective identities do not require interpersonal relationship knowledge or coordination but instead rely on shared symbols and cognitive representations of the group as a unit. — Roderick M. Kramer, Geoffrey J. Leonardelli, Robert W. Livingston, Social Cognition, Social Identity, and…, 1613

Categorization

• XREF: Complicates the ingroup/outgroup mechanism claims from the reader’s Allport reassessment thread by distinguishing collective from relational identification. — connects to: A social movement is defined by three-way interactions, not solo action. — Charles Tilly, Regimes and Repertoires, 338
• DEFINE: Distinguishes collective self (categorical, symbolic) from relational self (dyadic, personalized) - a conceptual fork that matters for how identification cognitively operates.
• corroborated: 2 independent passages support this claim — Roderick M. Kramer, Geoffrey J. Leonardelli, Robert W. Livingston, Social Cognition, Social Identity, and…, 1613