BIO

My name is Cayley Williams and I am from West Palm Beach, Florida. I am a second year student majoring in Anthropology and minoring in Spanish here at FSU. I am also a member of the Honors Program, and I hope to pursue a career in genetic counseling in the future. Within anthropology, I am interested in the physical aspects, such as anthropometric variation and how they relate to evolution. I also enjoy learning about human behavior in the psychosocial sphere, and how individuals construct and live out their realities based on their external environments.

Social Correlates and Consequences of Perfectionism

Abstract

Perfectionism, as defined by Hewitt and Flett (1991), is a personality disposition characterized by setting extremely high standards of performance in the pursuit of flawlessness, often accompanied by overly critical evaluations. Three types of perfectionism have been identified by researchers (Frost et al., 1990; Stoeber, 2016), including socially prescribed, self-oriented, or other-oriented. A socially prescribed perfectionist feels pressured by external factors to uphold high standards, while a self-oriented perfectionist will constantly strive for their goals because of their own intrinsic ideals. Other-oriented perfectionists may bind others to these contrived constructs, by demanding perfection from other people (Stoeber, 2015). Much research examines differences across individuals in the presence and type of perfectionism and the effects on other psychological characteristics and behaviors (e.g., stress, anger, procrastination, grades in school, eating disorders, and others) (Curran and Hill, 2019). However, little research explores how social characteristics shape the probability and types of perfectionism. Socioeconomic and other social statuses shape individual predispositions and behavior through socialization, expectations that align with class values and norms, and individual perceptions of themselves (Navarro-Carrillo et al., 2020). Through quantitative survey, this research evaluates the relationships between SES and presence and type of perfectionism among honors students in a large, public, research-one institution to closer examine how the sphere of class relates to psychosocial development.

Keywords: perfectionism, honors, sociology