The impact of death awareness on sizes of self-representational objects

Abstract

People seem to have a tendency to increase the relative size of self-representational objects. Prior research suggests that motivational factors may fuel that tendency, so the present research built from terror management theory to examine whether existential motivations—engendered by concerns about death—may have similar implications for self-relevant size biases. Specifically, across two studies (total N = 288) we hypothesized that reminders of death would lead participants to inflate the size of self-representational objects. Both studies suggested that relative to reminders of pain, mortality salience led participants to construct larger clay sculptures of themselves (vs. others; Study 1) and a larger ostensible video-game avatar for the self (vs. others; Study 2).