Self-esteem

A significant portion of the self is constructed from our actions and the roles
to which they correspond. Although many of our social roles are enacted regularly,
some may lay dormant, yet still influence one's self-concept. We propose that there
are systematic differences in mental representation between these inactive roles and
more active roles. Specifically, inactive roles should be more likely to be construed
in high-level terms, while active roles should be more likely to be construed in lowlevel
terms. Experiment 1 found that for inactive roles, participants displayed an
implicit construal preference for the high-level aspects of the role. Experiment 2
provided evidence that an implicit measure of construal was necessary in order to tap
these unconscious associations. These experiments support the hypothesis that
inactive social roles are mentally represented in a unique manner with respect to more
active roles.

Dynamical systems research has found evidence that global properties of self-system, i.e., self-esteem (SE), self-stability (SS), and self-certainty (SC), emerge from coherence of self-relevant information. Self-certainty may play a role in self-esteem and self-stability. Traits were deconstructed into levels from extremely to not at all. Ss indicated frequencies of trait levels, completed Rosenberg SE, SS; and self-evaluations of traits, roles, certainty, and importance. Entropy H identifies meaningful distributions of deconstructed traits. H may be useful alternative to variance from the mean in identifying individuals for whom a trait is meaningful despite the high variability of endorsements. Low H indicated order. H correlated negatively with SC, SE, SS, ratings of traits, roles, and importance as predicted. SC accounted for some of the variance of the relations; SS, however, was found to play a greater role in the relations of entropy and global properties.

Sports and its effects on children have been researched for the benefits that it may bring. The purpose of this study is to see if sports competency, assessed by both peer reports and self-reports, benefits both boys and girls and whether it protects children who generally are gender-atypical from adjustment difficulties and also to see if there are any interactive influences of cross-gender typing and sports competency on self-esteem, depression, and other adjustment indexes. Our results found that there was a significant interaction between sports competence and cross-gender typing when looking at popularity and also a significant interaction between sports self-efficacy and cross-gender typing when looking at self-esteem. Our data did not provide sufficient support for our buffering hypothesis, but it allowed for us to conclude that self-esteem of low-cross-gender-typed children profit more from high sports self-efficacy and suffer more from low sports self-efficacy than the self-esteem of high-cross-gender-typed children.

Superstitious behavior is still a common occurrence in modern society, seemingly impervious to intellectual progress that humans have made throughout history. While the desire to maintain a sense of control over one's environment has been investigated as one of the key motivations behind superstitious behavior, it has yet to be examined within the context of the self-concept. Threats to one's sense of control can also be construed as general threats to one's global sense of self-worth. Consequently, while superstitious behavior may be triggered by control threats, it may also occur as a result of any general threat to self-integrity. Moreover, if superstitious behavior is motivated by the desire to maintain overall self-integrity, then depriving individuals of a chance to engage in superstitious behavior should elicit subsequent attempts to repair self-integrity via alternative means. Three studies were conducted in order to establish this link between self functioning and superstitious behavior. Studies 1a and 1b did not find any evidence that manipulating the self-concept prior to an event designed to evoke superstition would increase the desire to engage in superstitious behavior. Threatening (or boosting) one's self-esteem prior to a game of chance did not affect participant's desire to use a superstitious strategy (aura color). Study 2 provided evidence that superstitious behavior is motivated by a desire to maintain self-integrity by showing that individuals deprived of their aura color prior to a game of chance were more likely to engage in self-affirmation subsequently. It also showed that the impact of depriving individuals of a superstitious strategy is independent of belief in such strategy.

Self-concept stability was tested in three studies to examine the relationship between stability in one's self-concept and the ability to adapt to changes in the social environment. Much of the literature on the topic of self-stability emphasizes the functional benefits of stability and the negative outcomes associated with instability. Dynamical systems theory purports however that stability in a dynamical system is indicative of a loss of complexity that limits the range of the systems behavior. Accordingly, this series of studies tests the idea that a stable self-system may have a more limited range of behaviors than unstable self-systems and this may have implications for adapting to changes in one's social environment. The overarching hypothesis is that compared to those with less stable self-views, those with stable self-views will demonstrate lower levels of flexibility of behavior in response to changing social demands. Study 1 assessed the dynamics of participants' evaluations by asking them to complete a self-descriptive recording and evaluate their self-descriptions using the mouse paradigm procedure. Participants also completed a series of questionnaires assessing personality factors and behavioral and cognitive flexibility. Study 2 expanded on the first study by adding a well-validated measure of self-esteem stability and a social conceptualization of behavioral flexibility. Study 3 tested participants' willingness to demonstrate behavioral flexibility in an actual social situation and examined the effects of stress on the relationship between stability and flexibility.