Self Esteem Shop by Dave Hogg from Royal Oak, MI, USA – http://www.flickr.com/photos/96223849@N00/80044383. Licensed under CC BY 2.0 via Wikimedia Commons
Annotated Links
Admiring celebrities can boost self-esteem Science Daily reports on a study by Jaye L. Derrick and Shira Gabriel of the University at Buffalo published in Personal Relationships which shows how ‘connections’ to celebrities can help people with low-self esteem to view themselves more positively by allowing them to feel closer to the ideals they hold for themselves.
Better than sex! US college students value self-esteem boosts more than bodily pleasures [N]ot only do US college students have higher self-esteem than previous generations, they now value self-esteem boosts more than sex, food, receiving a salary payment, seeing a friend or having an alcoholic drink according to new research by Brad Bushman and his co-workers published in The Journal of Personality and summarized in the British Psychological Society Research Digest, December 23, 2010.
Consumer Self-Esteem While Shopping People who don’t feel positive about their appearance are less likely to buy an item they’re trying on if they see a good-looking shopper or salesperson wearing the same thingaccording to research by Darren Dahl, Jennifer Argo, and Andrea Morales, published in the Journal of Consumer Research and summarized here in Science Daily, August 20, 2011.
Does Facebook Affect Our Self-Esteem, Sense of Belonging? From the page: With 1.11 billion users per month on average, Facebook has become a global phenomenon offering continual and direct communication with friends and family. Research into how social media websites define us socially, and the influence that social media has on our personal welfare, suggests that a lack of social participation on Facebook leads to people feeling less meaningful. From Science Daily, May 8, 2014.
Egotistical Youth? Using the Narcissistic Personality Inventory Jean Twenge and her colleagues at San Diego State University, have analyzed published and unpublished data on self-reported undergraduate narcissism, dating from the late 1970s to the present day. The data showed today’s youth really are more egotistical than in previous eras. Published in the Journal of Personality.
Facebook is Not Such a Good Thing for Those With Low Self-Esteem In theory, the social networking website Facebook could be great for people with low self-esteem. Sharing is important for improving friendships. But in practice, people with low self-esteem seem to behave counterproductively, bombarding their friends with negative tidbits about their lives and making themselves less likeable, according to a new study inPsychological Science and summarized here in ScienceDaily, February 1, 2012.
Group Memberships Boost Self-Esteem More Than Friends Alone Belonging to multiple groups that are important to you boosts self-esteem much more than having friends alone according to research published in PLOS ONE and summarized here for ScienceDaily, June, 2015.
High Self-esteem Is Not Always What It’s Cracked Up To Be This article from Science Digest summarizes research by Michael Kernis discussing fragile self-esteem. Kernis’ research suggests that in addition to level of self-esteem — as high or low — we need to consider variability of self-esteem.
Increasing Your Self-Esteem An overview of recent findings on Self-Esteem and how to increase your self-esteem. Written for kids, but applicable to everybody.
Is Self-Esteem the Key to Success? Self-esteem is more likely to influence success than vice versa according to research by Ulrich Orth and colleagues, published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology and summarized here, October 2011.
Materialism and Low Self-Esteem Research by Lan Nguyen Chaplin (University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign) and Deborah Roedder John (University of Minnesota) suggests that low self-esteem causes increased materialism and raising self-esteem decreases materialism in adolescents, according to this summary in Science Daily, November 16, 2007.
More TV, Less Self-Esteem, Except for White Boys According to research published in the journal Communications Research white boys may be the exception to the usual finding that children’s self-esteem generally goes down as TV watching goes up. From ABC news, May 30, 2012.
National Association for Self-Esteem presents this review of Self-Esteem Research by Robert W. Reasoner. This overview, including references, a summarizes the research on self-esteem and school achievement, crime and violence, teenage pregnancy, school dropout rates, and suicide.
Overview The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Research Network on Socioeconomic Status and Health sponsor this summary of self-esteem by Nancy Adler and Judith Stewart in collaboration with the Psychosocial Working Group.
Psychologists Discover A Gene’s Link to Optimism, Self-Esteem According to research by Shelley E. Taylor and colleagues, and summarized here, researchers have identified a gene linked to optimism, self-esteem, and mastery. From Science Daily, September 14, 2011.
Self-Esteem and Flirting. The Science of Relationships website presents this two part series on self-esteem and flirting. Click here to read about how self-esteem affects how people flirt; click here to find out how self-esteem affects when people flirt.
Student Success Strategies Skip Downing, author and expert on faculty development and student success strategies maintains this site where you’ll find a gold mine of resources to support your efforts for improving student academic success and retention including web sites, books, online workshops, live workshops, newsletters, exercises, activities and more. Topics include self-responsibility, self-motivation, self-management, interdependence, self-awareness, life-long learning, emotional intelligence, and self-esteem.
Assignments, Exercises, and Activities
Self-Esteem Games Mark Baldwin and his colleagues at McGill University have developed games to help people increase their self-esteem based on psychological research. Visit this site to play one of three self-esteem games, to participate in their online research or to learn more about what they do.
Electronic Texts
Examples and Illustrations
Lecture Notes
Slide Presentations
Tests, Measures, and Scales
Body Esteem Scale Ron Okada, at York University, Toronto maintains this collection of tests that students can use in research including the Authoritarianism-Rebellion Scale, Survey of Recent Life Experiences, The Body Esteem Scale, The Body Awareness Scale, Personal Attribute Questionnaire, Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale, Current Thoughts Scale, Trust Scale and much, much more.
Collective Self-Esteem Scale From Luhtanen, R., & Crocker, J. (1992). A collective self-esteem scale: Self-evaluation of one’s social identity. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 18, 302-318. (Opens in PDF format).
Contingencies of Self-Worth Scale From Crocker, J., Luhtanen, R. K., Cooper, M. L., & Bouvrette, A. (2003). Contingencies of self-worth in college students: Theory and measurement. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 85, 894-908. Includes background information, limitations, scale validity, scoring instructions and links to the scale in English, Japanese, Spanish, German, Dutch, French, and Turkish.
Janis Self-Esteem Scale From Jannis, I. L., & Field, P. B. (1959). The Jannis and Field personality questionnaire. In C. I. Hovland & I. L. Jannis (Eds), Personality and Persuasibility (pp. 300). New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.
Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale From Rosenberg, M. (1989). Society and the Adolescent Self-Image. Revised edition. Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press. An overview, background, references, questions and scoring for the Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale are provided by the Department of Sociology at the University of Maryland, College Park.
Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale Ron Okada, at York University, Toronto maintains this collection of tests that students can use in research including the Authoritarianism-Rebellion Scale, Survey of Recent Life Experiences, The Body Esteem Scale, The Body Awareness Scale, Personal Attribute Questionnaire, Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale, Current Thoughts Scale, Trust Scale and much, much more.
Multimedia Resources
The Incredibles vs. American Idol Michael Brit, former professor of psychology, has a podcast about psychology called The Psych Files. In an earlier episode (Episode 9) he asked the question: How Do You Really Raise Self-Esteem? He contrasts the messages of The Incredibles, where everybody is special to American Idol, where some people are talented and others are not, and uses psychological research to sort out which method is better for increasing self-esteem.
Extreme Photo Retouching Images in the media can have a powerful effect on how self-concept and self-esteem on young people. Many are unaware of just how doctored up media images ares. This movie shows the photo retouching process in detail reinforcing the idea that images we see are often idealized and unrealistic (runs 2 minutes, 29 seconds).