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This is an old revision of this page, as edited by Fwb44 (talk | contribs) at 16:05, 4 August 2007 (→Danniboy's content moved here). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

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Narcissistic

The narcissistic article states that people who are narcissistic have low self-esteem, although this article implies that they have high self-esteem. --John Bracegirdle 21:33, 2 Dec 2004 (UTC)

written into Californian law as something to oppose, low self-esteem rapidly became a universal explanation for any personal failing...

In what way was this written into California law? If a more specific reference can't be produced, I'm deleting this part.

-Ryguasu 08:11 Nov 24, 2002 (UTC)

I will give this page a disputed warning because the first sentence says that it applies to animals but from the rest of the article it seems that it applies to humans. Andries 21:28, 23 May 2004 (UTC)

"Some see low self-esteem as a major predisposing factor for crime; others point out that high self-esteem equates with the risk-taking behaviour of criminals."

Are you certain low self-esteem is known to be a predisposing factor for crime? Bullies and criminals are more likely to suffer from 'High Self Esteem Disorder' than others, where they suffer from unrealistically high self esteem and impulse control problems. (This is not disguised low-esteem as commonly thought)

See the first external link used in article

-JanZ Dec 28 2004

You are correct. The idea that criminals suffer from low self-esteem has zero basis in fact. It simply was an assumption among some social progressives from the 1960s to early 1990s, which they never even bothered to test with peer-reviewed, controlled tests. All studies on this subject show the exact opposite. Those prone to violence and criminal behavior have high self-esteem. RK 17:40, Mar 5, 2005 (UTC)

Danniboy's content moved here

The following text was recently added to the article by User:Danniboy, but I've moved it here because I find it to be a cross between an opinionated essay and an advice column. Perhaps some of it is useable, but it'd require a lot of adaptive editing. -- Hadal 19:21, 31 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Good move. What you moved here was essentially a commercial advertisement, and did not constitute researched or scholarly encyclopedia quality material. RK 17:40, Mar 5, 2005 (UTC)

Why is your self-esteem so low?

(contributed by NLP Weekly Magazine's Editor)

Most of us are children of dysfunctional families. It doesn’t mean that your parents were alcoholic, physically abused you or worse. Dysfunctional can be considered as “normal” modern interactions. Most of us grew up in families that nurtured conflicting signals (dad says “yes", mom says “no"), de­nials of reality, parental lying, and lack of mutual respect. And these are the characteristics of the AVERAGE family.

We fight with our parents, who are total control freaks. Our siblings are trying to get more attention from the family than we get. We hear our parents say things like “why can’t you be more like A or B?", or find out that they listen to our phone conversations, or get “compliments” like “you’re clumsy, you’ll never make it in sport", “why can’t you be more of a man?” or “forget about college with these grades, you’re not that smart". One of my clients even said that her mother said to her once “I hate you". And that’s normal.

Dysfunctions are not presented only by language. How about the “we don’t talk” game or silence treatment or avoidance or not listening to what you’re really saying or looking upset every time you speak or many other body language patterns and behaviors that basically give you the impression that: you're worthless.

Can you make a list of what your parents or brothers/sisters told you when you were a child, that today you find it horrible to believe you took so seriously? Make that list now. Please note: even if your family was the most dysfunctional anti-supportive family of all, it has played only a part in constructing your low self esteem. Not all of it is your parents’ fault.

Self Esteem Reinforcement Exercise

In order to complete this exercise you will need a piece of paper, a pencil or pen, and a timer or clock. It is better if you take writing instruments that are comfortable for you. Set your timer for 10 minutes or simply write down the time on your watch or clock. Write your first name across the top of the paper.

Now start to write anything you can think of about yourself, in a positive and nurturing way. It sounds simple to complete but it isn’t necessarily, especially if your self-esteem suffered some major hits during the last few years. As you write, make sure to write about special skills, talents, and achievements you have and had. You can write it down by using single words ("Tennis", “Poems", “Loving") or you can write complete sentences ("I play Tennis well", “I write inspiring poems"). As ideas and thoughts come to your mind, it is a matter of getting them down to the paper, and not constructing a grammar book.

You may write the same things over and over if you would want to emphasize certain positive items about you. Don’t worry about writing with the right spelling or grammar. Your ideas don’t have to be organized in any special order. Simply write down on paper whatever comes into your mind. You are the only one who will read this paper.

Remember to avoid any negative statements or using any negative words — use only positive ones. Saying “I am a great Tennis player, unless I’m playing against George” is a negative phrase. Simply say that you are a good Tennis player, no comparisons, no “but” and no “unless". Positive. You must keep writing. Do not stop to think it over or criticize if what you are writing is the “truth". There is no real truth in life besides the laws of nature, and your self-esteem is ever changing. Truth is at the eyes of the beholder, anyhow. Keep writing, do not move the pen away from the paper, move your hand without stopping (I know, it hurts a bit - stop whining!). The key here is to write even if you don’t really have words.

One your 10 minutes of writing positive statements about yourself are up, put down the pen and read the paper over to yourself. It is better if you read it aloud; however, if there are people around they might think you’re an ego-maniac. If you’re alone, go ahead and say it with a strong and persuasive tone of voice. This may happen: you feel sad when you read what you have written because these words are a new, different, and positive point of view of thinking about yourself – this is a way that contradicts some of the most powerful negative thoughts you may have had about yourself as a person.

But don’t worry. Those feelings will diminish once you read this paper again. So the next step would be to read the paper over again several times. After you are done, place this paper in a private but easy to access place – your pocket, your drawer, your wallet, or under the table beside your bed.

You should read it over to yourself at least several times a day to keep reminding yourself of how many talents you really have. If it is possible, read it aloud to a good friend or even to your therapist if you have one.

I know that it sounds simplistic, but as simple as it sounds, it is also very powerful. I suggest to all of my clients to try this quick but powerful exercise. It doesn’t require any special preparation, simply arrange a few minutes and you boost your self esteem higher.

Self Esteem and Attention Seeking Behavior

I think it would be safe to state that low self-esteem causes many people, especially children to resort to attention seeking behavior. What do others think?

That seemingly reasonable assumption has been shown by the last 10 years of research to be very wrong. People with over high self-esteem feel that they can do whatever they like; it is these people who act in ways that we used to label "attention seeking." See the article in Scientific American, Exploding the Self-Esteem Myth. RK 17:00, Mar 5, 2005 (UTC)

Well certainly the article has its points with children who resort to substance use and other things, however there is no direct findings reported in the article related to self esteem. I don't think all behavior related to substance abuse and other things is related to attention seeking behavior. However in terms of social relationships, which is the area of attention seeking behavior there was no link saying that low self esteem had an effect on the ability of social relationships, only in the ability to reach out and make new friendships.

People who regard themselves highly generally state that they are popular and rate their friendships as being of superior quality to those described by people with low self-esteem, who report more negative interactions and less social support. But as Julia Bishop and Heidi M. Inderbitzen-Nolan of the University of Nebraska–Lincoln showed in 1995, these assertions do not reflect reality. The investigators asked 542 ninth-grade students to nominate their most-liked and least-liked peers, and the resulting rankings displayed no correlation whatsoever with self-esteem scores. SA: Scientific American - Exploding the Self Esteem Myth

All I can say is that in most cases I have seen, people who are constantly negative (People with low self-esteem are not merely down on themselves; they are negative about everything. - SA Article) have a tendancy to resort to attention seeking behavior, because they feel they need support with things, and often dramatise and create a negative image to try and get attention.

What do you think about that? --Kintaro 04:01, 4 May 2005 (UTC)

Link removed

Someone removed a link in this revision, I see no reason for it and it was also an anonymous edit. I put it back. --Kintaro 03:06, 4 May 2005 (UTC)

assertiveness

As a communication style and strategy, Assertiveness is distinguished from Aggression and Passivity. How people deal with personal boundaries; their own and those of other people, helps to distinguish between these three concepts. Passive communicators do not defend their own personal boundaries and thus allow aggressive people to harm or otherwise unduly influence them. They are also typically not likely to risk trying to influence anyone else. Aggressive people do not respect the personal boundaries of others and thus are liable to harm others while trying to influence them. A person communicates assertively by not being afraid to speak his or her mind or trying to influence others, but doing so in a way that respects the personal boundaries of others. They are also willing to defend themselves against aggressive incursions.

commercial

should this person really be allowed to link to a commercial site like that? it seems like hes using wikipedia for commercial purposes to promote this book.

Six Pillars of Self-Esteem

If the commercial site provides information regarding self-esteem I do not see why he shouldn't be able to link to it.--Kintaro 8 July 2005 11:55 (UTC)

===> Yes of course, however advertising texts are not about the same thing as encyclopaedia texts. They are commercial presentations, and they aim to make you want the book, because you will then want to pay money for it. That is why it is not providing information on self-esteem, but it is positive, one-sided information about the book.

I agree with the reader here above. I have removed the link to the book, and I believe the book itself is not a renowned piece of writing. If the book is of such a contribution to mankind, the link might be restored here later. But not to merchant's page, but to special page which would comment on the book at first. Paul 8/7/05 London

Parhaps a link to a wikipedia page on the book? --Kintaro 07:07, 27 July 2005 (UTC)

I'm concerned that all the reports on "self esteem myth" seem to come from Roy F. Baumeister. Is this article NPOV? We need to write about what is accepted in the field. Secretlondon 07:02, 17 August 2005 (UTC)

I think Baumeister's work in general is okay to treat NPOV - the presentation here is simply skewed to the negative. His more popular work leans negative as well, but that is to counteract the popular work that leans positive. The Baumeister, Campbell, Krueger, & Vohs paper essentially argues that self-esteem is too heterogeneous for one to state that high self-esteem is always a good thing. For example, high self-esteem can lead to greater initiative, but that encompasses prosocial and antisocial behavior. Their take-home point is that noncontingent (unconditional) high self-esteem seems to do more harm than good, but contingent (conditional) high self-esteem seems to have more benefits than drawbacks. They also use the word "floccinaucinihilipilification", which is cool in and of itself.Solitary refinement 23:19, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

Self-Respect

Searching for 'self-respect' redirects to this page. I'm not a psychiatry expert, so perhaps in that context they are synonymous, but it seems to me that although related these are different concepts.--Andymussell 01:13, 3 September 2005 (UTC)

They are definately not the same. Self-respect should redirect to respect. Ziiv 22:24, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

Deficit in the reported research

I think that this article cannot be an accurate representation of all the leading research on this topic since what appears here is structurally flawed, and the grounds for viewing it as structurally flawed have already been adequately discussed by major 20th century figures in the field of depth psychology. I am referring to the fact that the studies of self esteem (why does it have to have a hyphen, anyway) are represented as only evaluating the self reports of the bullies, the people doing poorly in school, etc., etc. The question that apparently has not been resolved (or even looked at) is whether these high self-evaluations derive from the action of compensatory mechanisms. One response to receiving an unfavorable evaluation from others is to accept the evaluation and then make one's best efforts to merit a better evaluation at some later time; the other response to disfavor is to raise a contrary claim and to vigorously defend the real-world social strength of that claim. If you tell the king that he is a lousy saxophone player he may get a better sax teacher and practice twice as long as before, or he may throw selected loud mouths in jail or have them tortured.

If the studies reported in this article are correct, then one of the recommendations for repairative social action to deal with bullies ought to be to subject them to merciless and objective studies that would demonstrate to them without a shadow of doubt that they are not as deserving of esteem as they currently believe. Any studies that have reached this conclusion ought to be noted in the article. P0M 00:51, 9 October 2005 (UTC)

Development of Self-esteem

My self-esteem comes about primarily as a result of a moral code that values life and personallity among other things. My self-esteem is highly resistant to the presence or absence of success or praise or criticism. The article doesn't seem to address this source of self-esteem. Hackwrench 00:56, 22 October 2005 (UTC)

Anecdotal reports such as the one above can supply material to researchers, but are not kind of basis upon which article content can be written. If the general point is that an individual can be conditioned to have value judgments that include assigning a high value to oneself, then it may be possible to find studies that assess the impact of such conditioning, the resiliance of such conditioning in the face of real-world evidence that denies the propositions that one has been conditioned to believe, etc. P0M 03:18, 23 October 2005 (UTC)

The part of the article that mentions the programs for increasing self esteem is a little light on what those programs did to increase self esteem. There is no source cited for the statement: "The results indicate that a healthy self-esteem should develop from what one has achieved, and not the converse." Hackwrench 19:30, 4 November 2005 (UTC)

The whole article is heavily weighted towards the report of one team Hackwrench 19:42, 4 November 2005 (UTC)

Not necessarily the "same team" - it is just that most of what is cited here is more general sources, of which Baumeister has contributed the most. Baumeister, Krueger, and Vohs each approach the issue of self-esteem in relatively distinct ways. There are other researchers (e.g., Brad Bushman, Nicholas Emler, Jennifer Crocker) who come to similar conclusions on the potential negatives of high self-esteem - it is just that their work is not discussed here. Solitary refinement 18:19, 24 March 2006 (UTC)

suicide

no mention of suicide? 129.62.113.183 04:17, 15 January 2006 (UTC)

Excellent point! Many people explain suicide as being one possible outcome of self-assessments such as, "I have nothing left to live for," but ignore the more potent judgment, "I am a bad person, a bad job, deserving of destruction, etc." Durkheim was one early writer on the subject of suicide. I read his works a long time ago, and, frankly, did not get much out of what he had to say. Of much more value were the works of Karl Menninger. I think he has one book entitled Life Against Death or something like that, and that book might be the place to look for material to incorporate into this article. Good hunting! P0M 04:50, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

Too many wikipedia articles in this realm?

We have Self-esteem, Self-confidence, Confidence and Trust (sociology) - shouldn't we merge those 4 articles into 2, they seem to talk about the same things? Peter S. 13:15, 16 February 2006 (UTC)

They are all in a similar realm but there is a slight distinction between them. Unfortunately when discussing anything to do with The Self people invariably get muddled up and just end up discussing Self-Esteem.Phil Kavanagh 21:56, 30 November 2006 (UTC)

History?

There needs to be an article about the development of self-esteem as an educational concept, with a timeline

Christ Esteem + related?

Should this article contain some reference to Christ-Esteem (http://www.google.com.au/search?&q=%22christ-esteem%22) and similar religious concepts, since they are essentially criticisms of Self-Esteem? My (admittedly simple) understanding of Christ-Esteem is that Self-esteem is essentially faith in yourself, but that you are fallible so your esteem rises and falls. If instead you have faith that Jesus always loves you, you don't need to love yourself. Personally, I don't buy it, but should it be mentioned as a counter-position to Self-Esteem?

Eastern ideas such as "Harmony with the Tao" might similarly be viewed as obviating the need for Self-Esteem. Irrevenant 06:03, 9 April 2006 (UTC)

In general articles should describe what something is and/or does, not the (potentially gazillions of) positions that are critical, dismissive, etc., of it.

I suppose there could be a broader article called self-evaluation, and an even broader article called axiological evaluations of individuals. "Christ-Esteem" would seem pretty clearly to be not self-evaluation but evaluation by others, so it would appear as a sub-category not of "self-evaluation" or of "other-evaluation." P0M 05:54, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

Many of the other articles have a "Controversy and criticisms" section (eg. Scientology). That is where I would see "Christ-esteem" or "God-esteem" sitting. Irrevenant 10:27, 14 April 2006 (UTC)

And over a year later, that's where I added it. :) --Irrevenant 11:43, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

Need to Verify Sources

For the following:

(see narcissism). Many bullies manifest the properties of narcissism and often also those of psychopathy. It appears bullies have unusually high but extremely fragile self-esteem, which they reinforce by denigrating the others; they maintain their position in the pecking order by subjugating the others.

Looking into similar stuff at the moment and this would seem to be unverifiable --Zeraeph 09:43, 4 May 2006 (UTC)

Problem with Baumeister Material

Many of the conflicts or disputes arise out of differences in the definition of self-esteem. For example, Baumeister's article "Exploding the Self-Esteem Myth" early on admits that self-reporting as a means of measuring self-esteem doesn't work, stating that self-ratings are often way off. But after listing several studies that demonstrate how flawed self-ratings are, he go goes on to use studies based upon self-rating as a measure of self-esteem so he can 'Explode the Self-Esteem Myth'.

Through out the article you see phrases like "self-esteem scores" but no description of how the scores were obtained - or what did the instrument looked like. There are clues, like where he says, "...think highly of themselves..." that tell us that he or the studies he has chosen are using some sort of self-rating tool and claiming to be measuring self-esteem. He states, "For decades, psychologists believed that low self-esteem was an important cause of aggression. One of us (Baumeister) challenged that notion in 1996, when he reviewed assorted studies and concluded that perpetrators of aggression generally hold favorable and perhaps even inflated views of themselves." Here is a bald assertion that self-esteem is about holding a favorable opinion of oneself (or that one answered questions as if that were the case).

Through out the article there is no definition of self-esteem, no description of the measuring tools, just conclusions purporting to be the product of sensible research. I suggest we toss all references to this material.

Take a look for yourself if you want - here is a link to that article http://scientificamerican.com/print_version.cfm?articleID=000CB565-F330-11BE-AD0683414B7F0000 SteveWolfer 19:10, 10 September 2006 (UTC)

The article that you are referring to seems very similar to a rather comprehension version published by the same authors in 2003 titled Does high self-esteem cause better performance, interpersonal success, happiness, or healthier lifestyles?, in Psychological Science in the Interest of Public Interest. It is a major review of the current research to-date (well at that date) on the area of self-esteem.

As for the measurement of self-esteem, most researchers will use something such as the Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale or something similar. That is were the scores come from. There are a few recognised reliable and valid measures of self-esteem, and you find most typically that these are the ones are repeated used in the literature.

I'm only assuming here, but you'll probably find that the reason why there is no definition of self-esteem probably presupposes that most who would be reading the article would already have a definition in mind. The other obvious problem is that although there a basic generic definition of self-esteem, that is the evaluative component of the self there is, as with any theoretical psychological construct differing opinions on the definition itself.Phil Kavanagh 22:12, 30 November 2006 (UTC)

Attempts to nail something down as 'fact' by means of research requires that any ambiguity or confusion over the definition of a key term be addressed. It is unprofessional to put out something that makes the kind of assertions that Baumeister did without addressing the obvious problems in using a self-reporting survey that purports to measure self-esteem without a even a definition of self-esteem. I've seen Rosenberg's scale and the Single-Item Self-Esteem scale and I can't believe that people take the results of studies based upon their use seriously! I think this article is so badly written and so full of strange hostility towards self-esteem that I can't even begin to think where to start to fix it. Phil K, I appreciate what you said about "the evaluative component of the self" as a generic definition, but there are editors contributing to this article that can't distinguish between defined disorders (Narcissism) and self-esteem. In the article, self-esteem is described as if it were no more than a particular kind of belief. You believe you are efficatious and worthy, voila, you instantly have high self-esteem. That is so far from reality! Maybe we need multiple articles - one per major definition - each with links to the others. Steve 04:52, 1 December 2006 (UTC)

Quality and level of self-esteem

I took out this section which was apparently thrown in without basis:

" low but can be raised so that you can see yourself as a person worthy of feeling like you can accomplish anything that will be in front of you in the future for the way you would see yourself and what you think will be in the future of your own success because if you don't think you will have success then no one else will"

Although it may fit in the article, it didn't fit between a description of high but fragile self esteem and low but stable self esteem.

Also, someone might want to add something about exactly what these terms mean. Cheers, CKnapp(talk) 16:19, 1 December 2006 (UTC)

External links

• www.2knowmyself.com

after checking this one i found no refrences, although it seemed good,i guess that what removed it from the page —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 196.205.234.82 (talk) 09:05, 12 December 2006 (UTC).

Link

http://buddhism.kalachakranet.org/images/esteem.jpg —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 88.72.25.80 (talk) 18:54, 12 December 2006 (UTC).

== Self Confidence ==-

This is not the same thing as self-esteem. To be self confident is a matter of the moment generally. ONe can have a high self esteem and yet lack confidence of being able to carry out a particular task. The re-direct of self confidence is incorrect. Dndn1011 21:38, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

Agreed. Self-confidence is different - it should have its own article and not redirect here. There are enough problems with the article - especially the stuff entered by the anti-self-esteem crowd that is NOT self-esteem (bullying, narcissicism, violence, crime, etc.) Steve 22:28, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

Excellent

On a low moment, I typed in "I suck" to the search box. (Yet again, I'm wasting time on Misplaced Pages rather than doing anything of worth or necessity.)

And it redirects here. That's awesome :D I'm all laughy now. Cheers WP. 80.176.4.125 13:08, 16 February 2007 (UTC)

Redirect

I don't think that Self Esteem should direct you to an article about an album by The Offspring. Surely it would make more sense for it to direct you to this article? 81.154.152.225 17:35, 16 April 2007 (UTC)

Agreed. Done. CKnapp 17:45, 16 April 2007 (UTC)

Apologies

Recently something was put on the main Self esteem page saying that wikipedia destroys self esteem (or something close to that). As it turns out, someone in my school saw me type my password and recently confessed to doing this. He also took part in something on a wikipedia page called Frankenbush. I changed my password and this will not happen again.

confused about why my edit was reverted

This article is clearly a mess but I got here by searching for terms used in another article (I guess it is a hang out for arrogant people). The heading of that article (Ideal mental health) said it needed more links from other articles, I placed a sentence in this article which linked to that article (and linked the term I used to this article) why is that reverted? For some reason I cannot log in.

Maslow's approaches to esteem section

I think this section needs to be divided up as it is one big paragraph, therefore hard to read.