Under the Microscope / Prof William Reville: A man had been feeling down for so long that he finally decided to seek the help of a psychiatrist. He lay on the couch, outlined all his bad feelings and then waited for the pearls of wisdom from the psychiatrist to make him feel better. The psychiatrist asked him a few questions, took some notes and then sat in silence for a few minutes with a puzzled look on his face. Suddenly, he looked up with an expression of delight and said, "I have it, your problem is low self-esteem. It is very common among losers."
There is a veritable industry operating today, particularly in the US, dedicated to the notion that improving peoples' self-esteem will prevent all sorts of undesirable behaviour and boost desirable behaviour. The notion is intuitively plausible but unfortunately research has shown that bolstering self-esteem on its own is of little value in achieving academic results or preventing undesirable behaviour. The research is described in Scientific American (January 2005) by Roy Baumeister and others.
The State of California in particular really took off in the 1980s on the idea that raising self-esteem in young people would reduce crime, teenage pregnancy, academic underachievement, drug abuse and pollution. The supporting data on which this movement based its beliefs was not extensive. Now, however, 20 years later, many studies exist that have evaluated the validity of this idea and the results seem to be clear-cut.
One must remember when carrying out studies that look for correlations between self-esteem and other characteristics that correlation does not imply causation. For example, it might be thought that being physically attractive boosts self-esteem. And, when people are asked to self-rate themselves on physical attractiveness and self-esteem there is a high positive correlation, ie those who think they look good also report high self-esteem and these who think they look bad also report low self-esteem.
However when independent judges are used to rate the physical attractiveness of the subjects the correlation between appearance and self-esteem disappears. In other words, those with high self-esteem tend to be very positive when rating their own appearance, regardless of their objective appearance, and those with low self-esteem tend to be negative regardless of objective appearance.
It was thought that people with low self-esteem are more prejudiced than people with high self-esteem. People with low self-esteem have a poor view of themselves and also tend to view the rest of the world in a negative light. When you compare the difference between their opinions of their own group and their ratings of other groups with the difference registered by people with high self-esteem, it is the people with the high self-esteem who seem to be the most prejudiced.
It might well be thought that high self-esteem would boost academic performance. But large-scale American studies of high-school students in the 10th grade, and followed up in the 12th grade, found that 10th grade self-esteem was only weakly predictive of 12th grade performance. However, 10th grade academic achievement is a good prediction of 12th grade achievement - significantly it is not a good predictor of 12th grade self-esteem. Also, in adult life, the correlation between self-esteem and job performance is not strong.
Indeed attempts to boost academic performance by improving self-esteem can have a negative effect. In one study, a group of students who were getting grades of D and F was randomly divided into two lots. Each student in one group received a weekly email designed to boost self-esteem.
Each in the second group received a weekly email designed to boost a sense of self-responsibility for their grades. At the end of the course the average grade of the students in the first group dropped below 50 per cent to fail level and the average grade in the second group increased to 62 per cent.
But does good self-esteem help you to get along well with others? American studies of 9th grade children show no correlation between popularity and self-esteem. The same results were found in studies of adults, although high self-esteem was found to be helpful in initiating new relationships.
Other studies have shown that low self-esteem does not particularly predispose people to failure in love, to more or earlier sexual activity or to abuse of alcohol. There is some evidence however that low self-esteem contributes to illicit drug use and low self-esteem is a known risk factor for some eating disorders.
It has long been thought that bullies suffer in particular from self-doubt and insecurity. However, a study from the University of Bergen has shown that, among children, bullies report fewer anxieties and are surer of themselves than other children. The same results have been reported for violent adults.
But high self-esteem, although far from being the panacea that many people believed it to be, is undoubtedly a desirable asset. High self-esteem correlates positively with happiness, negatively with depression, encourages persistence in the face of adversity and encourages better performance in group situations. Of course correlation does not imply causation. Thus it is quite possible that people who are innately disposed to feel happy will also display high self-esteem as a by-product of their natural happiness.
Studies carried out around the world show that in countries with high per capita GDP a person's overall satisfaction with life correlates well with high self-esteem and better than it correlates with financial satisfaction. In countries with low per capita GDP however, happiness tends to correlate better with financial satisfaction. But, having significantly more money than required to meet basic necessities will not increase happiness.
William Reville is associate professor of biochemistry and director of microscopy at UCC