Before we begin, being authentic isn’t reflective of today’s self-absorbed – me-centric – cancel culture looking to punish anyone not living up to some preconceived virtue of right and wrong or culturally inappropriate decision of one’s past. Being authentic means being who you are without denigrating those who don’t live up to your ideals. It’s about getting along with others we disagree with, even while striving to be true to our values, beliefs, and what we hold true. In a sense, living the good life is easier when our authenticity accepts others. Living the good life by being authentic helps not only us but may free us up to help others live authentically as well.
So, what is Authenticity?
The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy defines Authenticity as – the strong sense of being “of undisputed origin or authorship”, or in a weaker sense of being “faithful to an original” or a “reliable, accurate representation”. To say that something is authentic is to say that it is what it professes to be, or what it is reputed to be, in origin or authorship….
A person who acts in accordance with desires, motives, ideals, or beliefs that are not only hers (as opposed to someone else’s), but that also express who she really is. Bernard Williams captures this when he specifies authenticity as “the idea that some things are in some sense really you, or express what you are, and others aren’t”… we are sometimes inclined to say that some of the thoughts, decisions, and actions that we undertake are not really one’s own and are therefore not genuinely expressive of who one is…
Authenticity is the ability to both internalize (be at peace with who we are) and externalize (controlling our actions to conform to our beliefs). It’s about being true to oneself with little conflict between who we are and what we do.
chris rither
Researching Authenticity – A short introduction to statistical analysis
In a statistical analysis, we want to see how closely variables relate to one another. One way is called the R -factor (correlation coefficient) which is a formula for estimating errors in a data set. It basically measures the strength and direction of a linear relationship between two variables which always falls in a range of +1 and –1.
- A value of r greater than 0.7 is generally considered a strong correlation.
- A value between 0.5 and 0.7 is moderate.
- Anything less than 0.4 is considered weaker or of no correlation between data.
A Compilation of 75 studies on Living The Good Life and Being Authentic
In the scientific journal Elseiver, There was a metanalysis study looking into the relationships between authenticity and well-being. The quotes below are from this study and can be downloaded by clicking here – Living the good life: A meta-analysis of authenticity, well-being and engagement. The researchers performed a systematic analysis by identifying 75 studies with samples of 36,533 participants. Investigating the impact of age, gender, sample type, conceptual measure, individualism, and collectivism. The review… indicated significant medium to large positive relationships between authenticity and well-being…
living the good life by being authentic – 5 Key Findings
1. People are more engaged (and happier) in work when it’s in line with their values.
In one of the Elseiver studies they list research by De Carvalho Chinelato, Ferreira, Valentini, & Van Den Bosch (2015). A strong R-Factor of .72 was found between “the flourishing measure of well-being and work engagement, which as both measures include items related to finding meaning in life and work, is more reflective of conceptual overlap than a strong relationship between distinct concepts. Given that there is sometimes conceptual overlap between engagement and well-being, care is taken in this metaanalysis to select distinct measures of the concepts. Exploring the extent to which the choice of measure moderates the relationships with authenticity will provide guidance to researchers in terms of choosing the most appropriate measure for their study as well as contribute to the ongoing discussion over conceptual definition.”
2. People tend to seek out authentic experiences and avoid the unauthentic.
This was discovered from an article found in the British Psychological Society which quotes – Roger’s description of the fully-functioning person was largely synonymous with Maslow’s description of the self-actualised person, but importantly both were describing states that they believed were the default settings for human beings, a universal urge. We were, in their view, hardwired to be authentic. The ideas find echoes in modern research: studies led by the University of Edinburgh’s Alison Lenton have found that people seem motivated to deliberately seek out experiences in which they feel authentic, and to avoid situations in which they feel inauthentic.
3. Authenticity can be both subjective (a sense of coherence between beliefs) and objective (a behavioral consistency with one’s beliefs).
The Authenticity Scale (Wood, Linley, Maltby, Baliousis, & Joseph, 2008) is based on the person-centred model of Carl Rogers, defining authenticity as congruence between one’s internal states, awareness, and expression. It is a tripartite measure consisting of self-alienation (feeling out of touch with the true self, authentic living (behaving in a way consistent with one’s inner experiences) and acceptance of external influence (conforming to others’ expectations) …
They propose a four-component model, consisting of awareness of and trust in one’s inner states and personality traits, unbiased processing of self-relevant information, self-determined behaviour and a relational orientation which values openness and truthfulness. This definition specifically includes the possibility of inconsistency or contradiction in the self-concept and, as Boucher (2011) notes, is less reliant on consistency across situations than other measures. It is therefore particularly appropriate for measuring authenticity as a subjective sense of coherence rather than behavioral consistency.
4. Authenticity is positively related to well-being, especially at work.
There is evidence that the specific pressures of work can impact on employees’ ability to be authentic (van den Bosch & Taris, 2014b). For example, research has shown that managers who accepted external influence (often used as a marker of inauthenticity) had higher job satisfaction (F. G. Lopez & Ramos, 2016).
Furthermore, Roberts, Cha, Hewlin, & Settles (2009) suggest that people have reduced authenticity in the workplace because they often put on masks to increase status, protect their image or avoid conflict.
In a cross-cultural study of authenticity in different relationships Robinson et al. (2013) found that people reported being least authentic with their work colleagues. On the other hand, it has been suggested that authenticity is a personal resource which can be drawn on to meet work demands and improve engagement and well-being (Metin et al., 2016; van den Bosch & Taris, 2014a).
And while it is certainly plausible that at times, work demands might decrease authenticity, at other times work can enhance authenticity by allowing expression of valued aspects of the self (Sutton, 2018). Clearly there is a complex interplay between authenticity and organisational pressures and this leads us to consider the relationship of authenticity to a major outcome of interest in the workplace, namely engagement.
5. Living authentically can increase well-being in work and beyond.
There is good evidence that authenticity is directly associated with greater well-being across a range of contexts (Ariza-Montes et al., 2017; Kernis & Goldman, 2006; Wood et al., 2008). Besides enhancing wellbeing directly, authenticity can also be a key mechanism contributing to well-being in relationships (Brunell et al., 2010; Le & Impett, 2013). Knoll, Meyer, Kroemer, & Schroder-Abe (2015) suggest that there is a trend for authenticity to reduce strain and increase well-being at work. Authenticity is associated with higher performance and job satisfaction (van den Bosch & Taris, 2014a) and has a range of positive effects, including commitment, performance and lower turnover (Cable et al., 2013).
The beneficial effects of authenticity have been demonstrated in online contexts as well, with authenticity positively associated with self-esteem and social support and negatively with anxiety and narcissism (Twomey & O’Reilly, 2017). A longitudinal study demonstrated that more authentic online self-presentation had a positive impact on well-being over six months (Reinecke & Trepte, 2014).
A slightly different perspective on engagement is provided by Maslach and Jackson (1981) who define it as the opposite of burnout, characterised by energy, involvement and efficacy, and resulting from a match between the individual and organisational aspects of work…. Although both of these approaches attempt to establish engagement and burnout as distinct constructs, the evidence from meta-analyses is unclear on this and measures of the two constructs overlap (Saks & Gruman, 2014)…
Living the good life by being authentic
The above-mentioned studies found other evidence of how living authentically can increase well-being, happiness, job satisfaction, strengthen interpersonal relationships, and the ability to increase our chance of living the good life we all dream of.
So, if you feel conflicted or just uneasy about your life, maybe it’s time to line up your lifestyle with your beliefs…