Self-Esteem

Theory and Definition

Self-esteem levels do not tend to fluctuate drastically over the life course. Yet, some individuals’ self-esteem is impacted more than others’ by new environments and life transitions. Self-esteem is [Page 1932]partly determined by genetics, evidenced by studies that partition variance of twins’ self-esteem scores into genetic, shared environmental, and nonshared environmental effects. Usually, there is no shared environmental effect, meaning that factors, such as twins having the same parents or attending the same school, do not have independent effects. Rather, these kinds of environments may impact self-esteem through nonshared experiences (e.g., each twin’s individual perception of their relationship with parents, feelings of belonging at school).

Theorists have hypothesized why some people have higher self-esteem than others. First, self-esteem could be based on individuals’ achievements relative to their expectations. Second, self-esteem may stem from opinions of significant others such as parents early in life, as expressed through attachment relationships, and perceived acceptance from additional social figures throughout the life span. Peer acceptance and relationships with parents are both related to self-esteem at the same point in time. However, although peers have small prospective effects on self-esteem at least into early adulthood, parents have small effects during childhood in one study but do not seem to play a role in self-esteem change beyond adolescence. Researchers are still examining which significant others are most impactful and at what ages.

There are a few constructs with which self-esteem is often compared and sometimes defined as largely overlapping. Some scholars have claimed self-esteem is part of an affective core set of self-evaluations along with depression, negative affect, and neuroticism (i.e., emotional instability). Others have proposed narcissism, or superiority and grandiosity of the self, is the same as extremely high self-esteem. Although self-esteem is related to depression and narcissism, self-esteem has independent effects on later life outcomes (e.g., health, employment, antisocial behavior) after accounting for the contribution by the other constructs (e.g., depression, narcissism). Furthermore, low self-esteem has been related to questionnaire scores of depression later in life, but the reverse direction is not as prevalent. Therefore, these potentially overlapping constructs seem to act differently than self-esteem with relevant outcomes and with self-esteem across time.

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