Self-Esteem Stability and Early Adolescent Adjustment An Exploratory Study

Abstract

The relation of self-esteem stability to early adolescent adjustment was investigated among 53 eighth- and ninth-grade junior high school students. Youth reported domain specific self-evaluations and global feelings of self-worth on 9 separate days over a 3-week period. Measures of adjustment assessed symptoms of depression and aggressive behavior Instability in self-evaluations of peer relationships and physical appearance predicted greater depression independent of ratings of trait-oriented self-evaluations and daily hassles for those same domains. Relatively less stable evaluations of physical appearance also were associated significantly with reports of aggressive behavior, although not when controlling for trait-oriented self-evaluations and daily hassles. Further findings indicated interactions between self-esteem stability and corresponding aspects of trait self-esteem and daily hassles in the prediction of adjustment measures. The need for a complex, multifaceted conceptualization of self-esteem during early adolescence is discussed.