The paper argues that Kant'sdistinction between pure and empirical apperception cannot be interpreted as distinguishing two self-standing types of self-knowledge. For Kant, empirical and pure apperception need to co-operate to yield substantive self-knowledge. What makes Kant'saccount interesting is his acknowledgment that there is a deep tension between the way I become conscious of myself as subject through pure apperception and the way I am given to myself as an object of inner sense. This tension remains problematic in the realm of theoretical cognition but can be put to work and made productive in terms of practical self-knowledge.

Self-objectification is a pervasive process in contemporary Western societies and psychological literature has largely shown its negative consequences in terms of body shame, appearance anxiety, mental health and performance. Mass media play a key role in promoting such process through the extensive sexualization of individuals’ body and the separation of sexualized body parts from the rest of the body. The purpose of the present study was to extend past research by examining the effects of self-objectification in the context of social relationships among young adults. Participants were 235 undergraduates (55.7% females). A three-step model was successfully tested: results showed that internalization of media standards is related to increased self-objectification (β = .33, SE = .08, p = .01), which in turn is associated with authenticity, being high self-objectifiers less devoted to authentic living (β = –.21, SE = .09, p = .01) and more self-alienated (β = .14, SE = .08, p = .04) and dependent on others’ influence (β = .50, SE = .01, p = .01). The pattern of these relationships did not significantly vary across gender (χ2 = 6.29; p = .18). Implications concerning the impact of self-objectification in the domain of social relationships are discussed.