Abstract

The purpose of the present research was to investigate the conceptual structures of ‘we (a group of people that a person think he feel weness with)’, ‘the others(the opposite concept of we)’, ‘the- same-team’, and ‘the-other-team’ by examining the conditions required for establishment of those concepts in interpersonal situations. Furthermore, we suggested social categorizations of qualitatively- divergent subgroups beyond ingroup/outgroup categorization. The concept of ‘we’ was found to be composed with 5 factors: Sharing time and activities, credibility, similarity, potential benefit, and intimacy. However, to the concept of ‘the-same-team’, all items related with credibility and potential beneficial factors were integrated into one factor. In addition, the factor of sharing time and activities was listed as the most frequent reason for which they thought certain people were included in their own ‘we’. Also, it was perceived as a sufficient condition (the condition itself can make an event happen). However, the factor of potential benefit was the most frequent reason for which they thought certain people were included in their own ‘the same team’. These findings were discussed in extension of theory of social categorization and uniqueness of the concept ‘weness’.