Self-Verification Theory

Self-verification theory asserts that people want to be known and understood by others according to their firmly held beliefs and feelings about themselves, their self-views, and is one of the motives that drive self-evaluation alongside self-enhancement and self-assessment. Because chronic self-concepts and self-esteem play an important role in understanding the world and guiding action, people become motivated to maintain them through self-verification, strivings that provide stability and make experience more coherent and predictable to others. Developed by William Swann in 1981, the theory grew out of earlier writing holding that people form self-views so they can understand and predict others' responses and know how to act toward them. This description is adapted from Wikipedia contributors under CC BY-SA 4.0; changes were made. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/