The Collective Construction of Self Esteem

Abstract

The general feeling of self-respect and self-worth — what is typically called self-esteem, is the focus of many current theories of personality and social psychology. Although limited largely to Western, middle-class, secular populations, a huge body of literature exists on the structure, content, and intra- and inter-personal functions of self-esteem. One clear generalization that emerges from this literature concerns a robust and pervasive tendency to maintain and enhance self-esteem (e.g., Gilovich, 1983; Greenwald, 1980; Solomon, Greenberg, & Pyszczynski, 1992; Taylor & Brown, 1988; Tesser, 1986 for reviews). First noted by William James (James, 1980), this tendency has been implicated in a wide variety of domains including self-referential judgment, decision making, interpersonal relation, and social comparison. Self-enhancement is one of most reliable findings in the current social and personality psychology.