Be prepared to sign up for a presentation date (April 10, 15, 17, 22, 24) too (depending on teams and total number).
 

The period of adolescence essentially spans the beginning of puberty (can be as early as age 10 in girls and 13 in boys) to about age 20.
(Knowing what we now do about the "teenage brain", I'd actually put the end of adolescence in the early 20s.)

Is adolescence "sturm und drang"? Well yes, sort of.

• We'll examine physical, cognitive, personality and social development.
• We'll revisit issues in gender.
• We'll take a look at the "self-esteem" controversy too.

*Includes notes on teenage childbearing.

Freud is famous for saying that the two major challenges we all face in life center around "love" and "work". We can paraphrase here to generic meanings: "love" can mean romantic love for another, the generation of a family--which can mean a "surrogate family" composed of friends, or step and half siblings, and even giving back to one's community. "Work" for the child and adolescent typically means academic achievement, although for those in the middle and late teens a job is often included. Working class adolescents often enter the labor force at this time, given a reasonably good econhomy. But work can often mean establishing and nurturing a family and domestic labor (especially for the daily lives of women), volunteer work, or even extensive immersion in a hobby.

Adolescence represents the first time that these twin challenges come to the forefront. An individual enters as a child and leaves on the threshhold of adulthood. In between, he or she wrestles with creating an identity, tentatively taking steps toward career planning, falling in (and out of) love, establishing strong friendships, and more development. Although these are now generally a minority of American adolescents, pregnancy, marriage, or leaving high school before graduation loom as major events for some, while entering post-secondary education occurs for many.

STURM UND DRANG

Storm and stress--no, I don't mean a teenager is in constant battle with authority figures! In fact, in surveys most adolescents describe their parents as their heroes. But it does refer to the tremendous physical, psychological, and social growth and change that occurs during the adolescent years. In addition, the tasks and challenges facing adolescents are different in both kind and quantity from those faced earlier and, to some extent, even those coming later. These changes create their own sets of stressors, and adolescents frequently do feel as though they were "tossed upon stormy seas".

Technically, we can date the beginning of adolescence from the onset of the late physical puberty period, typically marked by the beginning of menstruation in girls (menarche) and at least as difficult, by height spurts, nocturnal emissions, and secondary sex characteristics in boys. Because puberty is emerging at earlier ages than it did even 50 years ago, it is difficult to fix an approximate lower bound in age. Many girls experience menarche at the age of 10 or 11, while they are still in elementary school. Many boys (especially those retained in grade, see "Held Back" below) also experience beginning to middle puberty by 5th or 6th grade. As you might already guess, the congruence or its lack between one's physical development and one's placement in the school system can be grounds for psychological and social growth--or a cause of potential problems.

Adolescents can easily grow four or more inches in a year during growth spurts. Both sexes grow pubic and underarm hair. Girls develop breasts and their body shape changes dramatically. Girls' concentration of body fat also increases, which can signal further puberty development.  In boys, the genitals increase in size, the shoulders broaden, muscle tissue increases, and boys begin to experience nocturnal emissions. In both sexes, voice pitch lowers.

The onset of menstruation can be a source of pride, of confusion, or even shame, depending on one's cultural heritage and family educational levels. In some cultures, menstruation has been called "the curse". Sometimes the girl is slapped to "celebrate her womanhood." In other families, parents may tell the girl the bare minimum about her physical changes, except to warn her that now she can get pregnant and had better be chaste (or careful). Some parents initiate a crackdown on girls' independent activities at this stage. Some girls have difficult periods, with considerable cramps--they may or may not receive helpful medical care. Other girls, who are developing later, either because of genetic factors, or because their participation in sport or dance (or even eating disorders) precludes their developing enough fatty tissue to physically mature completely, worry about their lack of development. Visible puberty may also imply a more adult status for both sexes and can be treated as a cause for celebration.

Further, the adolescent will not necessarily feel the same either. Estrogen, progesterone and testosterone are powerful hormones. Boys may find they have more energy and strength. Girls may find changes in their appetite and feel different at different phases of the menstrual cycles. Both sexes may find themselves struck by yearnings toward the other sex that feel totally new.

Thus, physical development alone can be sufficient to catapult an adolescent into an "identity crisis". She or he no longer looks the same, sounds the same, feels the same, or even smells the same (hormonal changes lead to changes in underarm and other bodily odors). Rather than the continuity that characterized middle childhood, the adolescent undergoes quantum and qualitative leaps in physical appearance and functioning. Since a relatively stable--even recognizable--physical appearance helps stabilize our sense of self, it is easy to see the havoc these changes can cause. Adolescence is a fervent case of "social role disjuncture" with the anxiety and crises about identity that role disjuncture implies.

It's no surprise why Erikson labelled the "crisis stage" for adolescence as "Identity versus Role Confusion" (also see work on identity formation, unthinking acceptance, and closure by Marcia). In the midst of all these changes, the adolescent is trying to establish his or her independence, give serious thought to careers, achieve academically, daydream about romance, and carve out a unique sense of self (see the symbolic interactionist perspective on the self in earlier guides).

Actually contrary to some of the Boyd and Bee citations, some research indicates that early puberty can damage both sexes, not just girls. As BB point out, early puberty for girls is associated with lower educational attainment, higher early pregnancy rates, and depression. On the other hand, Jeylan Mortimer's work at the University of Minnesota indicates that early puberty also predicts lower academic achievement for boys. Because pubescent boys are taller and look "more mature", they are subject to more attention from adolescent girls. Although the boys generally enjoy this attention (unlike the early puberty girls), they tend at the same time to neglect their schoolwork. (See more of Mortimer's work cited in Boyd and Bee, on teens and outside employment; most of Mortimer's thorough research has centered around the adolescent years.)

Retention in grade easily can create what appears to be "early puberty" for either sex. Actions that may appear harmless or even beneficial during the elementary school years ("she or he will be more socially mature next year") create problems that elementary school teachers and administrators may not anticipate at the time being "held back" occurs or even see in the child during elementary school. For boys in particular, "early" puberty in grade with its growth spurts and development of facial hair almosts serves as an "advertisement" that the boy has flunked at least one grade thereby possibly leading to stigma and a self-fulfilling prophecy. And boys are more likely to be retained in grade during the elementary years than girls. In some counties in Florida, in fact, nearly half the boys in public school have been held back at least once. (See Kyle Freedman's master's thesis on this with its review of the literature in 2007 HERE.)

Because "early puberty" in grade due to grade retention may be associated with initial lower academic achievement or socio-emotional immaturity, or even parental education or social class levels (since lower SES children are more likely to be retained), the later deleterious effects of early puberty on academic and social "success" are unclear. We don't know whether early puberty, the effects of being "held back," or student characteristics associated with low early achievement cause the problems that researchers observe. Most research that I have seen fails to consider earlier potential causal factors (e.g., elementary reading or math achievement) in studying puberty effects, and neglects controlling confounding and correlated independent variables in multivariate analyses. As a result, I urge professionals to tread cautiously through the confounded mire of early puberty, grade retention, and student characteristics in assessing student performance.

But it's not just the physical alterations that can be a source of stress. For most students, the onset of puberty corresponds to entry into middle school, or even high school. Many changes occur in the transition from elementary school:

The typical middle school or high school is much larger than the typical elementary school. Very often, school districts are created so that at least two elementary schools "feed" into a middle school, and at least two middle schools "feed" into a high school. An urban high school might have thousands of students. Building sizes are obviously often larger too. There's just a lot more for the adolescent to navigate and get used to in school. This may be especially disconcerting for shy students.

Class sizes in middle and high school are also larger than elementary school classes. The average student may have a tougher time getting individual attention from the teacher. And fidgety or ADHD-type behavior may be seen as even more disruptive than it was in the elementary grades in part due to the greater teacher-student coordination required in larger classes.

Exposure to diversity in students is greater than it was in elementary school, too. A single high school often serves several areas; it may include rural, suburban, and urban students. Many students may need to take public or school transportation to reach their school, and this, too, is new for many.

In many elementary schools, the student may have had the same teacher for nearly all classes and remain in the same classroom, or at least, wing of the school, for nearly an entire school day. However, by middle school, and certainly by high school, teachers are more specialized in a particular discipline so the student with six different classes probably has six different instructors. Since each instructor may have different pedagogical styles and different types of demands, the student must become accustomed to a wider range of courses. And of course, the student must learn to navigate the new, larger school because classes may be scattered all over the building and class changes, too, may be new.

The student will probably have a greater choice of courses, too, than was the case in elementary school. Now she or he may need to make decisions about which courses to elect each semester. Educated choices mean that the student should have some idea about their post high school life: will they continue to college or to vocational training? Will they enter the labor force immediately upon (or even before) high school graduation?

The pressure to make early career commitments may be increasing. Because there are so many occupations (the Dictionary of Occupational Titles lists over 40,000) and many require specialized training, most high school students--and often their instructors--may only know about several dozen or even several hundred different jobs. Obviously this can affect the degree of informedness about career choices at that age. Furthermore, most students, and, research indicates, especially girls, have limited knowledge about what they might expect to earn in a particular occupation and how well that income can meet their financial needs.
 

The pressures of standardized tests become greater. In many cases, a student must pass a series of standardized tests for promotion in middle or high school, or to officially graduate high school (those who do not may receive only a "certificate of attendance" instead).

Middle and high schools (in particular) may offer opportunities, and to some, pressures, for heterosexual relationships. School dances and especially proms can place a premium on a student's heterosexual popularity. In some schools, pressures from peers may almost "force" premature dating before a student feels comfortable with such social development.

Finally, we should remember that, compared with 50 years ago, public schools have become the center of many political battles. There are continuing arguments over textbook coverage, especially with respect to inclusion of literature and history from diverse ethnic and national groups, and portraying both sexes. The portrayal of different ethnicities, of girls and boys, and of "traditional versus modern" families have all been sources of controversy. Whether public school science courses teach some version of evolution, "intelligent design" or a mixture can shift dramatically from year to year, depending on the composition of elected local or state school boards, or the outcome of legal cases. The same has become true for teaching "climate change". Many textbook companies actually have at least two different versions of each textbook (or two separate texts for each topic) unofficially labelled the "California version" (more politically liberal, including healthy nutrition emphases!) and the "Texas version" (more politically conservative). It would be naive to believe that students are totally unaware of these political shifts and debates and one result is that students are often unsure what are facts and what the term "theory" means. Other studetns may use school as a platform for political activism. Yet others may be at least partially home-schooled. 

Adolescence historically is a relatively new developmental stage. Only a little over a hundred years ago, American children even as young as six years old toiled in manufacturing factories, jumping from child to adult in one step. When America was agrarian, children contributed to farm labor. During the 1930s Depression, many children quit school to take jobs to assist their families, one reason why median educational attainment for those brought up during the depression years was roughly equivalent to middle school graduation. Child labor is still an issue in many countries today. In all of these cases, children did not--or don't--have the leisure to experience adolescence. Certainly the physical developments were comparable (if somewhat later in time) but adolescence was not seen as a separate stage. It took the post-World War Two prosperity of the United States and several other countries to allow most students to graduate high school and for about half to continue on to college for us to begin to distinguish adolescence from childhood and early adulthood.

Interestingly enough, people married relatively late about 100 years ago--median age at first marriage was about 24 for women and 26 for men, just a bit lower than it is now. However, in between, in the 1950s and 1960s, age at first marriage dropped to 20 for women and 22 for men, only to return to earlier levels by the 1980s. The changes in marriage postponement tell us something about adolescence. In the late 19th and early 20th century, many couples postponed marriage until the male was "able to support a family". This typically meant taking over the family farm or acquiring some kind of marketable skill. Remember that few went on to higher education and married women with children had few occupational options (women did not even win the right to vote until 1920). In the 1950s and 1960s, there was a golden economic period where families could achieve middle class status with only one earner, a fact that probably contributed to the lower age at first marriage during those decades, in many cases corresponding in age to late adolescence.

One of the most common reasons that couples postpone marriage now, in the early 21st century, is because both sexes are completing their education, and that often includes post-secondary, and even graduate, education. After that, again couples are seeking to establish themselves in the work world. Furthermore, open cohabitation is far more socially acceptable than it was 50 years ago (which was basically not at all) and effective birth control is more readily available, so couples feel less pressure to marry early, even though sexual activity appears to take place at somewhat earlier ages.

Development in the adolescent proceeds on all fronts, not just the physical. There is evidence to support Piaget's assertion that the ability to reason shows quantum leaps during this period. Adolescents are more atuned to formal operations and deductive reasoning. They have a larger working memory which allows them to process information more rapidly and place it in long-term memory.

Along with cognitive development comes higher expectations from the academic world. Students are expected to be able to read and understand adult novels and essays. High school math includes advanced algebra, often calculus and probability theory, and physics is often offered at more prosperous high schools. The chart below shows how more recent birth cohorts of Americans have taken more and more science and advanced math courses during high school over the course of the twentieth century:

The data are from the National Science Foundation Surveys of Public Understanding of Science and Technology. Citation: S.C. Losh. 2006 “Generational and educational effects on basic U.S. adult civic science literacy.”  In Proceedings of The Ninth International Conference on Public Communication of Science and Technology (PCST-9): 836-845. Comparable data can be found through the National Center for Educational Statistics.

Lawrence Kohlberg argued (and some research supports) that many adolescents progress to "conventional" stages of moral reasoning, that is, they recognize and incorporate society's strictures on what constitutes moral and ethical actions. Intentionality also plays a larger role in judging moral actions among adolescents. Such moral reasoning contrasts with children in the early part of middle childhood, who tend to judge an act by its consequences, for example, either punishment to the perpetrator or damage to the victim or to physical entities.

Social development, too, changes in level and type. Adolescent friendships are more intense than they were earlier--or than they will tend to be later in life, and loyalties that can last years are formed. Most adolescents begin dating (if they had not already started before) and a majority of both girls and boys now have had sexual relations by their senior year of high school. "Puppy love" during adolescence is extensive and often serves as a set of "trials" prior to engagement or marriage. However, although more and more groupings are heterosexual, boys and girls actually become further apart in skills and interests (see below). Recent research indicates that teens who have vowed to remain virgins until they marry start intercourse at somewhat later ages; however they are equally likely to become adolescent parents as teens who have not made such vows. 

Although much is made of teen pregnancy, it is important to remember that birth rates have fallen steeply since the mid-1960s for all marital, age, and ethnic groups. Right now despite the popularity of "Teen Mom"programs, childbirth rates among teen girls are one-third lower than they were in 1980. These are 2007 and 2008 rates, published in late 2010 (there were 4.3 million births in 2007 alone so you can understand why it takes a while to compile the data.) Ironically, demographic researchers have discovered that many (if not most) teen pregancies occur between a teenage girl and a male who is several years older. Perhaps these girls are flattered by the interest "older men" show in them, and they may expect these fellows, often in their 20s, to be prepared with birth control--a trust that unfortunately can be misplaced.

However, unmarried pregnancies now make up a larger percentage of total pregnancies at nearly any age in part because birth rates fell more for married than unmarried women. The rate increase is actually the steepest among unmarried women over 30, not among teenagers. A majority of births to Black or Hispanic American women are now to single mothers, which is also the case for more than 1 in 4 White [non-Hispanic] mothers and more than 1 in 6 Asian-American mothers. The large increase in single motherhood, especially among women 20-24 years old, dwarfs teenage pregnancy.

However, teenage pregnancy, even if not as prevalent as previously, is serious because of its consequences. Teenage girls more often postpone prenatal care and more often bear low birth weight babies (a major cause of infant mortality). Pregnancy is a major cause of girls dropping out of high school, although many schools have more "mommy friendly" policies than they did several decades ago. Many schools, however, still suspend or expell pregnant girls. With subsidized day care difficult to find, poor educational preparation, and logistical problems in resuming their schooling, many girls become locked into a lifetime of poverty for themselves and their child(ren) as a result. The prognosis is more favorable if schools have inclusionary policies for pregnant girls, the girl's family is supportive, and the father is willing to provide emotional and financial support.

Socially, peer groups continue to become more important in the lives of adolescents. Peer group influence may keep a teen in school, or  encourage her or him to drop out, facilitate deviant behavior or the use of drugs--the most prevalent of which is alcohol.* At the same time, it is important to recognize that surveys of teens repeatedly find that they cite their parents, guardians, and other family authority figures as the most important influences on their lives and their greatest "heroes".  The "storms" of adolescence do not necessarily mean increased rancor or conflict with parents.

*Unfortunately heroin use has risen steeply over the past several years, which is highly addictive and more likely to be fatal than many other illicit drugs.
 

Who's a "juvenile delinquent"? Behavior that violates social mores, and even more pointedly, the law, becomes an increasing problem when adolescents are considered. Partly this is because adolescents (especially boys) have more freedom of movement and less supervision than younger children, so they have the opportunity to "get into more trouble." Teen boys often get a driver's license at earlier ages than girls and are more likely to have their own cars. This, too, provides more opportunity for illegal behavior. Teen boys are also more likely than teen girls or younger boys to engage in risky behavior, partly because boys perceive fewer behaviors as "risky" than girls do.  But older, stronger youth can also cause more damage than younger children. And the tendency for teen boys, especially, to bond in larger groups (teen girls are more invested in dyads or triads) means the potential for even more damage.  Crime statistics indicate first that only a small minority of "labeled delinquents" create the majority of adolescent crimes. (It's important to note that some "crimes", such as "running away", ONLY can be committed by youth and not adults.) Those delinquents who come to the attention of and are processed through the legal system in the United States are more often from poorer, less educated families, are more likely to be African American, and more likely to be school dropouts. However, thanks to research by Martin Gold and his associates, we know that actually MOST adolescents have performed behaviors that are illegal, such as shoplifting (especially true for adolescent girls), "borrowing" a friend or relative's car (Martin Anderson, a teen who died in a Florida "boot camp" in early 2006 was underage when he and his cousins borrowed their grandmother's vehicle), or commiting assault (see our external link on lying and cheating among today's teens through Blackboard). However, in part due to ethnic and social class stereotypes and in part due to middle class youth having families who more often have attorneys, White, middle class teens are often less often processed into the juvenile legal system, and less often sentenced when they do come to legal attention. The immediate and delayed consequences can be enormous; they can affect one's occupational opportunities or attempts to enter higher education. Further, a teen who is now recorded in the juvenile justice system is more likely to be remanded again if they are caught committing other potentially delinquent behaviors.

GENDER ISSUES

As noted above, during adolescence interaction between girls and boys increases, and heterosexual groupings become more common. Much of this interaction centers around romantic encounters and dating. This is important to remember, because in many other ways, adolescent society actually becomes much more sex segregated. Gender gaps in values, career choices and academic concentrations diverge, generally not to come together again until middle age.

Research indicates that high school boys are aware of a larger range of occupations than high school girls (although both sets of views are more restricted than the enormous range of existing careers). Boys are also more interested in future careers that they believe will pay well or provide social status, while girls at the same age are more idealistic and more interested in careers they believe will "contribute to society". Given these value differences, it is probably not surprising that high school boys are more aware than their female counterparts that women face more job and income discrimination. It's also probably not surprising that girls and boys also express differences in career choices.

"Math gender gaps" during high school have narrowed considerably, documented in test scores such as the National Assessment for Educational Progress (NAEP), or the SATs or ACTs scores. (See the Condition of Education 2007 online at the National Center for Education Statistics.) This convengence is largely due to gains made by adolescent girls over the past 30 years. On the other hand, girls are more interested in health and life sciences than boys, and take courses accordingly. The reverse happens for boys, who express more interest in the physical sciences and engineering, and who more often take high school courses in physics, chemistry and college-level mathematics. Boys generally score higher on physical science and information technology advanced placement tests as well. Compared with boys, adolescent girls are more interested in jobs where they feel they can "make a difference", such as medicine (especially since more medical or veterinary schools now welcome female applicants) or in teaching or as therapists. Again, to anticipate, due to changes during maturation, during middle age, women's interests in the financial and status benefits of employment increase and men become more interested in jobs such as teaching that they believe "contribute to society."

It is important to recognize that even highly talented girls in high school have less confidence in their abilities than boys who are equally--or less--talented. Partly this may be the case because girls still receive mixed messages about academic and marketplace achievement: be bright--but not brighter than your boyfriend. Do well, but be aware that boys' "fragile egos" may not be able to withstand highly accomplished girls or women (given the sex differences in self confidence, one wonders about the evidence for these male "fragile egos"). In addition, research on attribution theory indicates that when boys succeed, both the boys--and girls, and adults--attribute their success to internal high ability and their failures to luck or lack of effort. Conversely, when girls or women succeed, boys (and girls and adults) attribute their success to luck or effort, and female failures to lack of ability. Given these differences in societal attributions, it is not surprising to find lower feelings of academic self-efficacy among high school girls.

Incidentally, apropos to Boyd and Bee, in the 2001 National Science Foundation Surveys of Public Understanding of Science and Technology, 80% of a national sample of adults said that they "would be happy" if a son (or a daughter) became a scientist. There were no differences in "happiness" by the sex of the child. Further, by 2001, there were no differences by the sex of the adult respondent. In 1983, when the questions were first asked, fewer women than men were happy about a daughter becoming a scientist--a sex difference that disappeared by 2001. However, both years men were considerably more likely to have considered becoming a scientist themselves than women had (46% versus 37% in 2001; OPTIONAL: See my 2010 article in Public Understanding of Science for these stats and more HERE--can be accessed from an FSU computer or the FSU Library link. The NSF asked these questions and stereotype questions about scientists again to a national sample in 2012.

When assessing these achievements, however, it is important to recognize that boys are more likely than girls to leave high school before graduation. This was true throughout most of the 20th century, with the exception of the 1970s or 1980s, when high school graduation rates and median educational levels were about the same for both sexes.  In part, more boys may leave high school because boys are more likely to be retained in grade and thus may become discouraged. However, boys also tend to have more difficulties with reading and writing essays than girls do. Perhaps most important, adolescent boys have more early job options that pay better wages without a high school degree than girls do. Working construction is an option for many boys lacking high school graduation; however, construction is a "young man's job." Males who hit their 40s may find themselves no longer possessing the physical endurance to continue these jobs and their lack of an education creates difficulties in changing occupations. On the other hand, jobs for girls who haven't graduated high school offer low wages, heavy work, and relatively less status, such as: waiting tables and other service work; or laundry or dry cleaning and other labor jobs. Clerical or retail sales occupations (also comparatively poorly paid but generally in more pleasant working conditions with some potential for advancement) typically require at least a high  school degree.

Girls are also more likely than boys now to attend college, graduate college, and go on for master's and (as of 2010!) doctoral degrees. The total of these recent sex differences, as you know, has stimulated interest in single sex versus coeducational classrooms, especially at the middle and high school level (see our gender online links in the EXTERNAL LINKS section of Blackboard. The Education Sector report is particularly thorough).  It is important to realize that both sexes are doing better academically than previously but the increases have been particularly marked for girls, perhaps in response to the fruits of the feminist movement of the 1960s through the 1980s which opened many new opportunities for girls. 

One of the more startling sex differences that emerges during adolescent is the gap in death rates. Although boys have somewhat higher death rates during early or middle childhood than girls, during the mid-teens, the death rates for girls and boys sharply diverge; they do not begin to converge again until after menopause, when the death rates for adult women begin to climb. In the mid-teen years, death rates for boys are approximately three times those for girls.Worse yet, most of these deaths are preventable. The gender difference is due to higher suicide, homicide, and accident rates among boys. In part, these differences reflect sex differences in risk-taking and sensation seeking behavior between boys and girls during adolescence.

It is important to put suicide rates for teens in perspective. Contrary to popular knowledge, suicide increases with age and is, in fact, higher among the elderly than it is among the young. However, suicide is one of the top three causes of death among American adolescents. Partly this is because most teenagers are healthy, and rates of chronic illness, which strike middle age and older adults are quite low in adolescence. The fact that suicide rates are relatively low among adolescents does NOT mean that these tragedies can be ignored. Some suicidal teens become involved with murder-suicide (as in the relatively rare but highly publicized school shootings). Many teens in either writing or conversation give hints about their depressed state of mind. Talking with a suicidal teen about death will not increase their chances of attempting suicide and may in fact help bring the adolescent to needed treatment.

One reason behind risky behaviors during adolescence lies in physical brain development. Thanks to new technology (CAT-scans, PET-scans) we now know that the prefrontal part of the brain does not generally mature until the mid-20s. Due to other cognitive development, adolescents are much better than middle childhood individuals at making plans and carrying them out. Adolescents also have growing self-regulation skills, so that they can set goals, prioritize goals, set out the steps to achieve their goals, and accomplish these steps one by one (e.g., deciding on an occupation, taking preliminary classes in high school, applying to post-secondary education, etc.).

So what's the problem? The prefrontal parts of the brain, involving judgment and response inhibition are the last to mature, a combination which can result in well-executed but terrible goals and plans.
 

A SIDE NOTE ON SELF ESTEEM

"Self esteem" typically refers to one's overall assessment of self-worth. It is at once global and generic. We can contrast the concept of self esteem with that of self-efficacy (Albert Bandura, 1986), with which it is often confused (see below). Self efficacy refers to one's self-assessment of worth and ability in a specific domain. For example, an adolescent may believe that she is excellent at math but only fair at social studies, or that he is an excellent friend but an indifferent student. Self-efficacy can also relate to one's confidence about achieving particular goals (e.g., attending college).

We see a lot of references to the concept of self esteem in the educational literature. For example, the Boyd and Bee book, otherwise extremely good, cites the self esteem concept as critical . They are in "good company" and Boyd and Bee among many others, reference self esteem as  important in resisting early sexual activities (especially among girls), delinquent behavior (especially among boys), a better body image, and better social relations with others. Unfortunately more thorough research, especially by Roy Baumeister (who is now an FSU Psychology Professor just across the street) strongly suggests that the emphasis on self esteem as opposed to self-efficacy is misplaced.

Baumeister distinguishes between self esteem and self efficacy, both conceptually and in measurement. Measurement is important because many survey questionnaire items for "self esteem" confound this concept with others, such as internal locus of control ("when I make plans, I can nearly always carry them out") or self efficacy ("I am an excellent writer"). Recall that self esteem is a global assessment of self worth. As such, Baumeister generally does NOT find self esteem to be related to school achievement. He also finds a tendency for those scoring high in self esteem to be somewhat more involved in bullying behavior and more involved with aggression or ethnic prejudice, particularly if the individual has been frustrated in some way. In short, self esteem is clearly no "cure-all" and in the words of my own adolescence, Baumeister's research indicates that high self esteem individuals are more akin to what we simply called "conceited" or "full of themselves" way back in the day (these days we call it narcissism).

So what does predict "all the good stuff" such as academic achievement? Almost certainly, self efficacy. Self efficacy has been linked to greater persistance at tasks and more tentatively to lower levels of procrastination. It is one component of general self-confidence. Students higher in self-efficacy also are more likely to be self-regulated learners, able to set goals and priorities and systematically tackle these one by one.

Think of self efficacy as akin to the children's story "The Little Engine that Could". Puffing its way up the slopes of the mountain, the little engine chugs "I think I can, I think I can". Reaching the pinacle and starting down, it now happily chugs "I know I can, I know I can".

The distinction between self efficacy and self esteem also helps us make sense out of other findings about ethnicity and self esteem. Generally, researchers have found few differences among American adolescents in self esteem by ethnicity, although White and Asian teenagers on the average come from homes with higher incomes (and probably more social power) than Hispanic or Black teenagers. However, when researchers ask teens about whether they will be able to achieve goals that they have, such as higher education, which is related directly to self efficacy, more Asian, and especially White teens more often answer affirmatively.

Those of you who plan to work in a school system may find it an uphill battle to convince your new colleagues that self esteem is not only not the answer but may be part of the problem. Teacher educators for a couple of decades have been citing research on self esteem that we now know to be incorrect but sometimes old knowledge can die hard.
 
 

OVERVIEW

SYLLABUS

This page was built with Netscape Composer.
Susan Carol Losh February 9 2013