Self esteem
Self-esteem is confidence in one's own worth, abilities, or morals. Self-esteem encompasses beliefs about oneself (for example, "I am loved", "I am worthy") as well as emotional states, such as triumph, despair, pride, and shame. Smith and Mackie define it by saying, "The self-concept is what we think about the self; self-esteem, is the positive or negative evaluations of the self, as in how we feel about it (see self)."
The construct of self-esteem is desirable in psychology, as it is associated with various positive outcomes, such as academic achievement, relationship satisfaction, happiness, and lower rates of criminal behavior. The benefits of high self-esteem are thought to include improved mental and physical health, and less anti-social behavior. In contrast, the drawbacks of low self-esteem have been found to be anxiety, loneliness, and increased vulnerability to substance abuse.
Self-esteem can relate to a specific attribute or a more general context. Psychologists typically view self-esteem as a stable personality trait (trait self-esteem), although normal, short-term fluctuations (state self-esteem) are also present. Synonyms or near-synonyms for self-esteem include: self-worth, self-regard, self-respect, and self-integrity.
History
The concept of self-esteem has its origins in the 18th century, first expressed in the writings of the Scottish enlightenment thinker David Hume. Hume posits that it is essential to value and think well of oneself because it serves a motivational function that enables people to explore their full potential.
The identification of self-esteem as a distinct psychological construct has its origins in the work of philosopher and psychologist, William James. James identified multiple dimensions of the self, with two levels of hierarchy: processes of knowing (called the "I-self") and the resulting knowledge about the self (the "Me-self"). The observation about the self and storage of those observations by the I-self creates three types of knowledge, which collectively account for the Me-self, according to James. These are the material self, social self, and spiritual self. The social self comes closest to self-esteem, comprising all characteristics recognized by others. The material self consists of representations of the body and possessions and the spiritual self of descriptive representations and evaluative dispositions regarding the self. This view of self-esteem as the collection of an individual's attitudes toward itself remains today.
In the mid-1960s, social psychologist Morris Rosenberg defined self-esteem as a feeling of self-worth and developed the Rosenberg self-esteem scale (RSES), which became the most widely used scale for measuring self-esteem in the social sciences.
In the early 20th century, the behaviorist movement rejected the introspective study of mental processes, emotions, and feelings, opting instead for an objective approach through experiments focused on observable behaviors in relation to the environment. Behaviorism regarded human beings as organisms subject to reinforcements and advocated for psychology to be treated as an experimental science, akin to chemistry or biology. As a result, clinical trials on self-esteem were neglected, since behaviorists viewed the concept as less suitable for rigorous measurement.
In the mid-20th century, the rise of phenomenology and humanistic psychology sparked a renewed interest in self-esteem as a treatment for psychological disorders such as depression, anxiety, and personality disorders. Psychologists began to explore the relationship between psychotherapy and the personal satisfaction of individuals with high self-esteem, which proved beneficial to the field. This exploration introduced new elements to the concept of self-esteem, including the reasons why people may feel less worthy and why they become discouraged or struggle to meet challenges independently.
In 1992, the political scientist Francis Fukuyama associated self-esteem with what Plato called thymos—the "spiritedness" part of the Platonic soul.
Since 1997, the core self-evaluations approach has included self-esteem as one of four dimensions that comprise an individual's fundamental appraisal of themselves—along with locus of control, neuroticism, and self-efficacy. The concept of core self-evaluations has shown the ability to predict job satisfaction and job performance. Self-esteem may be crucial to self-evaluation.
In public policy
The importance of self-esteem has gained endorsement from various government and non-government groups since the 1970s, leading to the emergence of a self-esteem movement. This movement demonstrates that psychological research can influence public policy. It has continued to evolve in recent years, including in 2023, when psychologists are planning to reinvent research, treatments, and therapy. The new approach emphasizes population health, where psychological researchers prioritize one-on-one therapy in analyzing social-emotional conflicts like low self-esteem. The fundamental idea of the movement is that low self-esteem is the root of personal problems, which in turn leads to societal issues and dysfunctions. A leading figure of the movement, psychologist Nathaniel Branden, stated: "cannot think of a single psychological problem (from anxiety and depression to fear of intimacy or of success, to spouse battery or child molestation) that is not traced back to the problem of low self-esteem."
It was once believed that self-esteem was mainly a characteristic of Western individualistic societies, as it was not recognized in collectivist cultures like Japan. Concern over low self-esteem and its many presumed negative impacts prompted California assemblyman John Vasconcellos to establish and fund the Task Force on Self-Esteem and Personal and Social Responsibility in California in 1986. Vasconcellos argued that this task force could address many of the state's issues – from crime and teen pregnancy to school underachievement and pollution. He likened increasing self-esteem to administering a vaccine for a disease: it could help shield people from being overwhelmed by life's challenges.
The task force formed committees across numerous California counties and created a committee of scholars to review the existing literature on self-esteem. This committee discovered very minimal associations between low self-esteem and its supposed consequences, ultimately demonstrating that low self-esteem was not the root cause of all societal problems and not as significant as the committee had initially believed. However, the authors of the paper summarizing the literature review still maintained that self-esteem is an independent variable that influences major social issues. The task force disbanded in 1995, giving rise to the National Council for Self-Esteem, and later the National Association for Self-Esteem (NASE), which adopted the mission of the task force. In 2003, Vasconcellos and Jack Canfield served on its advisory board, while the masters' coalition included members such as Anthony Robbins, Bernie Siegel, and Gloria Steinem.
Theories
Many early theories suggested that self-esteem is a fundamental human need or motivation. American psychologist Abraham Maslow included self-esteem in his hierarchy of human needs. He described two different forms of "esteem": the need for respect from others in the form of recognition, success, and admiration, and the need for self-respect in the form of self-love, self-confidence, skill, or aptitude. Respect from others is believed to be more fragile and easily lost than inner self-esteem. According to Maslow, without fulfilling the self-esteem need, individuals are driven to seek it and are unable to grow and achieve self-actualization. Maslow also states that the healthiest expression of self-esteem "is the one which manifests in the respect we deserve for others, more than renown, fame, and flattery". Modern theories of self-esteem explore the reasons humans are motivated to maintain a high regard for themselves. Sociometer theory maintains that self-esteem evolved to assess one's level of status and acceptance in their social group. According to Terror Management Theory, self-esteem serves a protective function and reduces anxiety about life and death.
Carl Rogers (1902–1987), an advocate of humanistic psychology, theorized that many people's problems stem from self-despair and a belief that they are worthless and unlovable. This belief led Rogers to emphasize the importance of providing clients with unconditional acceptance, which could enhance their self-esteem. In his therapy sessions, he offered positive regard regardless of the circumstances. Since then, the concept of self-esteem has been recognized in humanistic psychology as an inalienable right for every individual, encapsulated in the following sentence:
Every human being, with no exception, for the mere fact to be it, is worthy of unconditional respect of everybody else; he deserves to esteem himself and to be esteemed.
Measurement
Self-esteem is usually assessed using self-report inventories.
One of the most widely used instruments, the Rosenberg self-esteem scale (RSES), is a 10-item scale that requires participants to indicate their level of agreement with a series of statements about themselves. An alternative measure, the Coopersmith Inventory, uses a 50-question battery covering various topics and asks participants whether they perceive someone as similar or dissimilar to themselves. If a participant's answers demonstrate solid self-regard, the scale considers them well-adjusted. If those answers reveal some inner shame, it views them as prone to social deviance.
Implicit measures of self-esteem have been used since the 1980s. These rely on indirect measures of cognitive processing thought to be linked to implicit self-esteem, including the name letter task (or initial preference task) and the Implicit Association Task.
Such indirect measures are designed to reduce awareness of the assessment process. When using them to evaluate implicit self-esteem, psychologists present self-relevant stimuli to the participants and then measure how quickly individuals identify positive or negative stimuli. For instance, if a woman is given the self-relevant stimuli of "female" and "mother," psychologists would measure how quickly she identifies the negative word "evil" or the positive word "kind."
Development Across the Lifespan
Experiences throughout a person's life are a major influence on how self-esteem develops. In the early years of a child's life, parents significantly impact self-esteem and can be considered the primary source of positive and negative experiences a child will encounter. Unconditional love from parents fosters a stable sense of being cared for and respected. These feelings translate into later effects on self-esteem as the child grows. Students in elementary school with high self-esteem often have authoritative parents who are caring, supportive adults that establish clear standards for their child and encourage them to express their opinions in decision-making.
Although studies so far have reported only a correlation between warm, supportive parenting styles (mainly authoritative and permissive) and children with high self-esteem, these parenting styles could easily be perceived as having some causal effect on self-esteem development. Childhood experiences that foster healthy self-esteem include being listened to, spoken to respectfully, receiving appropriate attention and affection, and having accomplishments recognized while mistakes or failures are acknowledged and accepted. Experiences that lead to low self-esteem include being harshly criticized, undergoing physical, sexual, or emotional abuse, being ignored, ridiculed, or teased, or being expected to be "perfect" all the time.
During school-aged years, academic achievement significantly contributes to the development of self-esteem. Consistently achieving success or consistently failing can strongly affect students' self-esteem. However, students may also experience low self-esteem while in school. For example, they might lack academic achievements or live in a troubled environment outside of school. Issues like these can lead adolescents to doubt themselves. Social experiences are another important factor in self-esteem development. As children progress through school, they start to recognize differences between themselves and their classmates. Using social comparisons, children assess whether they perform better or worse than their classmates in various activities. These comparisons play a crucial role in shaping a child's self-esteem and influence their positive or negative feelings about themselves. As children enter adolescence, peer influence grows significantly. Adolescents evaluate themselves based on their relationships with close friends. Successful friendships are vital for the development of high self-esteem in children. Social acceptance fosters confidence and enhances self-esteem, while rejection from peers and feelings of loneliness can lead to self-doubt and lower self-esteem.
Self-esteem tends to increase during adolescence and young adulthood, reaching a peak in middle age. A decrease is observed from middle age to old age, with varying findings on whether this decline is small or large. Reasons for the variability may stem from differences in health, cognitive ability, and socioeconomic status in old age. No differences have been found between males and females regarding their development of self-esteem. Multiple cohort studies indicate that there is no difference in the lifespan trajectory of self-esteem between generations, despite societal changes such as grade inflation in education or the rise of social media.
High levels of mastery, low risk-taking, and better health predict higher self-esteem. In terms of personality, emotionally stable, extroverted, and conscientious individuals tend to experience higher self-esteem. These predictors illustrate that self-esteem has trait-like qualities, remaining stable over time like personality and intelligence. However, this does not mean it cannot be changed. Hispanic adolescents show slightly lower self-esteem than their Black and White peers but achieve slightly higher levels by age 30. African Americans exhibit a sharper increase in self-esteem during adolescence and young adulthood compared to Whites. However, in old age, they experience a more rapid decline in self-esteem.
Influencing factors of self-esteem in adolescence
Self-esteem during adolescence is a dynamic and critical aspect of psychological development, influenced by various biological, psychological, and social factors. This stage of life, marked by rapid physical changes and heightened self-awareness, makes adolescents particularly vulnerable to external influences. Peer relationships, academic performance, and societal beauty standards play pivotal roles in shaping self-esteem. Gender differences also significantly affect how adolescents perceive their self-worth. Recent research highlights how cultural and societal expectations can influence self-esteem, especially concerning self-perceptions of physical appearance. For instance, a 2023 study titled "Exploring Teenagers' Perceptions of Personal Beauty: A Quantitative Survey Analysis" examined how Italian teenagers rated their own appearance. The findings revealed notable gender disparities: male participants typically rated themselves conservatively, while females often assigned themselves higher scores, sometimes a perfect 10. These patterns underscore the impact of societal beauty standards on adolescents' self-perception and their broader self-esteem development. The study emphasizes the crucial interplay between physical self-perception and self-esteem in adolescence, shedding light on how societal norms and personal identity evolve during this pivotal life stage.
Shame
Shame can contribute to issues of low self-esteem. Feelings of shame typically arise from situations where the social self is devalued, such as poor performance evaluated by others. Such poor performance decreases social self-esteem and increases shame, signaling a threat to the social self. This rise in shame can be alleviated through self-compassion.
Real self, ideal self, and dreaded self
There are three levels of self-evaluation development related to the real self, ideal self, and dreaded self. The real, ideal, and dreaded selves develop sequentially in children at cognitive levels.
Moral judgment stages: Individuals describe their real, ideal, and dreaded selves using stereotypical labels, such as "nice" or "bad." They characterize their ideal and real selves in terms of action disposition or behavioral habits. The dreaded self is often depicted as unsuccessful or demonstrating bad habits. Ego development stages: Individuals describe their ideal and real selves based on traits influenced by attitudes and actions. The dreaded self is commonly described as failing to meet social expectations or being self-centered. Self-understanding stages: Individuals present their ideal and real selves as having unified identities or characters. Descriptions of the dreaded self emphasize a failure to live up to one's ideals or role expectations, often due to real-world challenges. This development introduces increasingly complex and comprehensive moral demands. At this level, individuals' self-esteem can suffer because they feel they are not meeting certain expectations. This feeling moderately impacts one's self-esteem, with a more significant effect observed when individuals believe they are becoming their dreaded selves.
Types of self-esteems
High
People with a healthy level of self-esteem: firmly believe in certain values and principles, and are ready to defend them even when finding opposition, feeling secure enough to modify them in light of experience.
- are able to act according to what they think to be the best choice, trusting their own judgment, and not feeling guilty when others do not like their choice.
- do not lose time worrying excessively about what happened in the past, nor about what could happen in the future. They learn from the past and plan for the future, but live in the present intensely.
- fully trust in their capacity to solve problems, not hesitating after failures and difficulties. They ask others for help when they need it.
- consider themselves equal in dignity to others, rather than inferior or superior, while accepting differences in certain talents, personal prestige or financial standing.
- understand how they are an interesting and valuable person for others, at least for those with whom they have a friendship.
- resist manipulation, collaborate with others only if it seems appropriate and convenient.
- admit and accept different internal feelings and drives, either positive or negative, revealing those drives to others only when they choose.
- are able to enjoy a great variety of activities.
- are sensitive to feelings and needs of others; respect generally accepted social rules, and claim no right or desire to prosper at others' expense.
- can work toward finding solutions and voice discontent without belittling themselves or others when challenges arise.
Secure vs. defensive
Some people have secure self-esteem and can confidently maintain positive self-views without relying on external reassurance. However, others possess defensive high self-esteem, and while they also report positive self-views on the Rosenberg Scale, these perspectives are fragile and easily threatened by criticism. Individuals with defensive high self-esteem internalize subconscious self-doubts and insecurities, leading them to react very negatively to any criticism they may receive. These individuals require constant positive feedback from others to sustain their feelings of self-worth. The necessity for repeated praise can be linked to boastful, arrogant behavior or even aggressive and hostile feelings toward anyone who questions their self-worth, exemplifying threatened egotism.
The Journal of Educational Psychology conducted a study in which they used a sample of 383 Malaysian undergraduates participating in work integrated learning (WIL) programs across five public universities to test the relationship between self-esteem and other psychological attributes such as self-efficacy and self-confidence. The results demonstrated that self-esteem has a positive and significant relationship with self-confidence and self-efficacy since students with higher self-esteem had better performances at university than those with lower self-esteem. It was concluded that higher education institutions and employers should emphasize the importance of undergraduates' self-esteem development.
Implicit and explicit
Implicit self-esteem refers to a person's disposition to evaluate themselves positively or negatively in a spontaneous, automatic, or unconscious manner. It contrasts with explicit self-esteem, which entails more conscious and reflective self-evaluation. Both explicit self-esteem and implicit self-esteem are theoretically subtypes of self-esteem proper.
However, the validity of implicit self-esteem as a construct is highly questionable, given not only its weak or nonexistent correlation with explicit self-esteem and informant ratings of self-esteem, but also the failure of multiple measures of implicit self-esteem to correlate with each other.
Currently, there is little scientific evidence that self-esteem can be reliably or validly measured through implicit means.
Narcissism and threatened egotism
Narcissism is a disposition that individuals may possess, reflecting an excessive love for oneself. It is characterized by an inflated perception of self-worth. Those who score high on measures of narcissism, such as Robert Raskin's Narcissistic Personality Inventory, would likely respond "true" to prompt statements like "If I ruled the world, it would be a much better place." There is only a moderate correlation between narcissism and self-esteem; in other words, a person can have high self-esteem while exhibiting low narcissism or can be an arrogant, obnoxious individual who scores high in both self-esteem and narcissism. However, when the analysis of correlation focuses on the aspects of superiority or self-admiration within narcissism, the correlations between narcissism and self-esteem become significant. Additionally, self-esteem is positively correlated with a sense of superiority, even when controlling for overall narcissism.
Narcissism is defined not only by inflated self-esteem but also by characteristics such as entitlement, exploitativeness, and dominance. Furthermore, while a positive self-image is a shared trait of both narcissism and self-esteem, narcissistic self-appraisals are exaggerated, whereas in non-narcissistic self-esteem, positive views of the self relative to others are relatively modest. Therefore, although both narcissism and self-esteem share positive self-regard as a main feature and narcissism is characterized by high self-esteem, the two constructs are not interchangeable.
Threatened egotism is a phenomenon where narcissists respond to criticism with hostility and aggression, as it jeopardizes their sense of self-worth.
Low
Low self-esteem can stem from various factors, including genetic influences, physical appearance or weight, mental health issues, socioeconomic status, significant emotional experiences, social stigma, peer pressure, or bullying.
A person with low self-esteem may exhibit some of the following characteristics:
- Heavy self-criticism and dissatisfaction.
- Hypersensitivity to criticism with resentment against critics and feelings of being attacked.
- Chronic indecision and an exaggerated fear of mistakes.
- Excessive will to please and unwillingness to displease any petitioner.
- Perfectionism, which can lead to frustration when perfection is not achieved.
- Neurotic guilt, dwelling on or exaggerating the magnitude of past mistakes.
- Floating hostility and general defensiveness and irritability without any proximate cause.
- Pessimism and a general negative outlook.
- Envy, invidiousness, or general resentment.
- Sees temporary setbacks as permanent, intolerable conditions.
- Individuals with low self-esteem tend to be critical of themselves. Some depend on the approval and praise of others when evaluating self-worth. Others may measure their likability in terms of successes: others will accept themselves if they succeed but will not if they fail. People with chronic low self esteem are at a higher risk for experiencing psychotic disorders; and this behavior is closely linked to forming psychotic symptoms as well.
Treatments
Metacognitive therapy, EMDR technique, mindfulness-based cognitive therapy, rational emotive behavior therapy, cognitive behavioral therapy and trait and construct therapies have been shown to improve the patient's self-esteem.
The three states
This classification proposed by Martin Ross distinguishes three states of self-esteem compared to the "feats" (triumphs, honors, virtues) and the "anti-feats" (defeats, embarrassment, shame, etc.) of the individuals.
Shattered
The individual does not regard themselves as valuable or lovable. They may be overwhelmed by defeat, or shame, or see themselves as such, and they name their "anti-feat". For example, if they consider that being over a certain age is an anti-feat, they define themselves with the name of their anti-feat, and say, "I am old". They express actions and feelings such as pity, insulting themselves, and they may become paralyzed by their sadness.
Vulnerable
The individual generally maintains a positive self-image. However, their self-esteem remains vulnerable to the perceived risk of an impending anti-feat (such as defeat, embarrassment, shame, or discredit). Consequently, they often feel nervous and frequently rely on defense mechanisms. A common protective mechanism for individuals with vulnerable self-esteem may involve avoiding decision-making. While these individuals may outwardly display significant self-confidence, the underlying reality can be quite the opposite: this apparent self-confidence often reflects their heightened fear of anti-feats and the fragility of their self-esteem. They might also attempt to blame others to shield their self-image from threatening situations. Additionally, they may employ defense mechanisms such as intentionally losing in games and competitions to protect their self-image by publicly dissociating from a need to win and asserting their independence from the social acceptance they may deeply desire. In this profound fear of being unaccepted by their peers, they often make poor life choices driven by risky decisions.
Strong
People with strong self-esteem possess a positive self-image and enough resilience so that setbacks do not undermine their self-esteem. They have less fear of failure. These individuals appear humble and cheerful, which reflects a certain strength in not boasting about achievements and in not fearing setbacks. They are capable of fighting with all their might to achieve their goals because, if things go awry, their self-esteem remains intact. They can acknowledge their own mistakes precisely because their self-image is strong, and this acknowledgment does not impair or diminish their self-image. They live with less fear of losing social prestige and enjoy greater happiness and overall well-being. However, no type of self-esteem is indestructible; due to certain life situations or circumstances, one can fall from this level to a different state of self-esteem.
Contingent vs. non-contingent
A distinction is made between contingent (or conditional) and non-contingent (or unconditional) self-esteem.
Contingent self-esteem derives from external sources, such as what others say, personal success or failure, one's competence, or relationship-contingent self-esteem.
Therefore, contingent self-esteem is characterized by instability, unreliability, and vulnerability. Individuals lacking non-contingent self-esteem are "predisposed to an incessant pursuit of self-value." However, since the pursuit of contingent self-esteem relies on receiving approval, it is doomed to fail, as no one receives constant approval, and disapproval often leads to depression. Furthermore, fear of disapproval constrains participation in activities where failure is possible.
"The courage to be is the courage to accept oneself, in spite of being unacceptable.... This is the Pauline-Lutheran doctrine of 'justification by faith.'"
– Paul Tillich
Non-contingent self-esteem is described as true, stable, and solid. It springs from a belief that one is "acceptable period, acceptable before life itself, ontologically acceptable." To believe that one is "ontologically acceptable" is to accept that one's acceptability is "the way things are without contingency." In this belief, as explained by theologian Paul Tillich, acceptability is not based on a person's virtue. It is an acceptance given "in spite of our guilt, not because we have no guilt."
Psychiatrist Thomas A Harris drew on Tillich for his classic I'm OK – You're OK, which addresses non-contingent self-esteem. Harris translated Tillich's "acceptable" into the vernacular OK, a term that means "acceptable." The Christian message, according to Harris, is not "YOU CAN BE OK, IF"; it is "YOU ARE ACCEPTED, unconditionally."
A secure non-contingent self-esteem springs from the belief that one is ontologically acceptable and accepted.
Domain-specific self-esteem
Whereas global self-esteem pertains to how individuals evaluate themselves as a whole, domain-specific self-esteem aspects refer to how they assess themselves across various relevant areas of life. These distinct aspects of self-esteem may include self-evaluations in social, emotional, body-image, academic performance, and creative domains.
They have been shown to predict outcomes related to psychological functioning, health, education, and employment. Low self-esteem in the social domain (i.e., self-perceived social competence), for instance, has consistently been identified as a risk factor for bullying victimization.
Importance
Abraham Maslow states that psychological health is not possible unless the essential core of the person is fundamentally accepted, loved, and respected by both others and oneself. Self-esteem allows individuals to face life with greater confidence, benevolence, and optimism, thereby enabling them to easily achieve their goals and self-actualize.
Self-esteem can help individuals believe they deserve happiness. The ability to understand and cultivate positive self-esteem is crucial for building healthy relationships with others. When people maintain a positive self-image, they are more likely to treat others with respect, compassion, and kindness. This sets the stage for strong, positive relationships grounded in mutual respect and understanding. For Erich Fromm, the love of others and the love of ourselves are not alternatives. On the contrary, self-love is evident in all those who are capable of loving others. Self-esteem encourages creativity in the workplace and is particularly important in teaching professions.
José-Vicente Bonet asserts that the significance of self-esteem is clear; a lack of self-esteem is, he says, not a loss of esteem from others, but self-rejection. Bonet argues that this relates to major depressive disorder. Freud also claimed that the depressive has suffered "an extraordinary diminution in his self-regard, an impoverishment of his ego on a grand scale... He has lost his self-respect."
The Yogyakarta Principles, a document on international human rights law, addresses the discriminatory attitudes toward LGBT people that can harm their self-esteem and expose them to human rights violations, including human trafficking.[104] The World Health Organization recommends in "Preventing Suicide",[105] published in 2000, that strengthening students' self-esteem is important for protecting children and adolescents against mental distress and despondency, enabling them to cope effectively with difficult and stressful life situations.
Higher self-esteem not only increases happiness but is also linked to better stress coping and a greater willingness to tackle challenging tasks. In contrast, a study examined the effects of boosting self-esteem. It found that high self-esteem does provide some benefits, but these are limited. It is often a result rather than a cause of success. The researchers also discovered that efforts to enhance self-esteem may not consistently lead to improved performance and that self-esteem's impact on life outcomes is modest, except for a temporary increase in positive self-image awareness.
Correlations
From the late 1970s to the early 1990s, many Americans assumed as a matter of course that students' self-esteem acted as a critical factor in the grades they earned in school, their relationships with peers, and their later success in life. Under this assumption, some American groups created programs aimed at increasing students' self-esteem. Until the 1990s, little peer-reviewed and controlled research was conducted on this topic.
Peer-reviewed research undertaken since then has not validated previous assumptions. Recent studies indicate that inflating students' self-esteem does not positively impact grades. Roy Baumeister has shown that inflating self-esteem can actually decrease grades. The relationship between self-esteem and academic results does not suggest that high self-esteem contributes to high academic performance. It simply means that high self-esteem may result from high academic success, influenced by other variables such as social interactions and life events affecting this performance.
Efforts by pro-esteem advocates to foster self-pride in students based solely on their uniqueness as human beings will fail if feelings of well-being are not paired with well-doing. Self-confidence only develops when students participate in personally meaningful activities that they can be justifiably proud of, and this growing self-assurance subsequently triggers further achievement.
Research has identified a strong correlation between high self-esteem and self-reported happiness, but it remains unclear whether this relationship is causal. This implies that while individuals with high self-esteem often report greater happiness, it is uncertain whether possessing high self-esteem directly causes an increase in happiness. The connection between self-esteem and life satisfaction is stronger in individualistic cultures.
Additionally, individuals with high self-esteem tend to be more forgiving than those with low self-esteem. This occurs because people with high self-esteem generally possess greater self-acceptance and are more inclined to view conflict positively, seeing it as an opportunity for growth and improvement. In contrast, individuals with low self-esteem often struggle to forgive others, stemming from feelings of insecurity and self-doubt.
High self-esteem does not prevent children from smoking, drinking, using drugs, or engaging in early sexual activity.
Mental health
Self-esteem is linked to several mental health conditions, including depression, anxiety, and eating disorders. For example, low self-esteem may increase the likelihood that individuals with dysfunctional thoughts will develop symptoms of depression. Consequently, cognitive treatment for depression assists with low self-esteem, and vice versa; addressing low self-esteem can improve depressive symptoms. In contrast, high self-esteem might protect against the onset of mental health conditions, with research indicating that high self-esteem lowers the chances of bulimia and anxiety.
External links
Chat rooms • What links here • Copyright info • Contact information • Category:Root