A social psychological research on relative importance of self-esteem

2000 Fiscal Year Final Research Report Summary

• Project/Area Number: 10610144
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (C)
• Allocation Type: Single-year Grants
• Section: 一般
• Research Field: 教育・社会系心理学
• Research Institution: Toyo University (2000); Tokyo Woman's Christian University (1998-1999)
• Principal Investigator: ANDO Kiyoshi Toyo University, Department of Sociology, Professor, 社会学部, 教授 (50125978)
• Project Period (FY): 1998 – 2000
• Keywords: self-esteem / self-enhancement

Research Abstract

In Chapter 1, the result of a study which was conducted under the the hypothesis that students would evaluate their own university more positively than rival universities and this tendency would be pronounced among those who are low in self-esteem(LSE) compared to those who are high in self-esteem(HSE). One hundred-one male and 84 female students were asked to complete Rosenberg's(1965) self-esteem scale and other questions which tapped to evaluate their own and rival universities(12 items each), their own relationships with the best friend as well as the relationships of average college students(12 adjectives), etc. It was found, contrary to the prediction, that the respondents generally evaluated their own university less positively than the rival universities, except the female LSE's who evaluated their own university more positively than one of the rival university.
In Chapter 2, social psyhcological studies concerning self-esteem were briefly reviewed with an emphasis on recently developed theories such as socio-meter theory and terror management theoty.
In Chapter 3, the results of a replication study which aimed at the validation of the research reported in Chapter 1 were presented. In this study, self-esteem was not related to the evaluations of in- or out-group, although group-esteem was higly related to both the evaluations of in-group and out-goup.