Self-Esteem Research, Theory, and Practice Toward a Positive ...

72 SELF-ESTEEM RESEARCH, THEORY, AND PRACTICEidea that women suffer low self-esteem in general, largely because of discrimination,a lack of “voice,” and other factors (American Associationof University Women, 1991; Sanford & Donovan, 1984). However,Harter’s work made the point that it is a particular subset of women whoexperience these difficulties, not women in general. Those women wholive a traditional type of femininity, one that may foster greater dependenceon social approval and could put limits on the ability to be assertive,are the ones who seem to be vulnerable to this condition. The result ofsuch a position may be increased difficulty in terms of achieving a healthydegree of success or sense of competence, thereby creating a real selfesteemdilemma if both factors are needed for genuine self-esteem. Similardynamics may be at work in the findings that suggest that teen pregnancymay be associated with low self-esteem (Emler, 2001).In terms of the general structure, then, we can say that women in ourand most societies seem to gravitate toward the worthiness component ofself-esteem (being valued by others in terms of acceptance or rejection),and that men tend to be pulled slightly more by the competence dimension(success or failure). However, it seems just as important to rememberthat such a distinction applies to some groups much more than toothers. It should also be noted that insofar as a society is “sexist” in theseways, it prevents or discourages women from pursuing competence,thereby making them more dependent on worthiness. However, pushingmen toward competence is just as negative because it limits one’s accessto worthiness. Being too “macho” or ignoring one’s need to be connectedto others also carries great cost. For example, some work indicates thatmales who are unemployed may suffer some damage to their self-esteem(2001). Fortunately, other work suggests that the gender difference seemsto be much less prominent today than was reported in the research of theearly 1980s (O’Brien, Leitzel & Mensky, 1996), perhaps reflecting somecultural shifts in this area, at least in America.RACIAL, ETHNIC, AND ECONOMIC FACTORSAFFECTING SELF-ESTEEMThe questions of whether and how racial, ethnic, and economic forcesaffect self-esteem have been a part of self-esteem work for some time. Thebasic issue seemed resolved by Rosenberg and Simmons (1971), who dida large research project involving 1917 students in urban schools, manyof whom were African-Americans. They reported that, contrary to popularassumptions at the time, African-American children do not havelower self-esteem than Caucasian children. Indeed, they examined 12other studies done on this topic from 1963 to 1970 and found that