Sex, “Lies,” and Videotape: Self-Esteem and Successful Presentation of Gender Roles

When presenting themselves to others, people attempt to create the impression that they possess socially desired traits. Verbally claiming to possess such traits is relatively simple, but making good on one’s promises by actually behaving in kind is more challenging. In particular, lower self-esteem individuals’ relational insecurity may undermine their ability to present themselves in a socially desired manner. The present research used a behavioral coding method to test these hypotheses. Participants filmed a brief introductory video in an evaluative, first impression situation. Independent sets of observers then coded participants’ verbal, nonverbal, and global self-presentations on two dimensions: communion/femininity and agency/masculinity. Results revealed that for both sexes, self-esteem was unrelated to participants’ ability to “talk the talk” by verbally describing themselves in a socially valued and gender-role specific manner, but was predictive of participants’ ability to “walk the walk” by actually behaving in kind.