The DOI matches its Crossref record; 78 of the 79 references it cites were found in a registry or an index.
Development and validation of a scale for measuring state self-esteem.
Abstract
This article examines the measurement of short-lived (i.e., state) changes in self-esteem. A new scale is introduced that is sensitive to manipulations designed to temporarily alter self-esteem, and 5 studies are presented that support the scale's validity. The State Self-Esteem Scale (SSES) consists of 20 items modified from the widely used Janis-Field Feelings of Inadequacy Scale (Janis & Field, 1959). Psychometric analyses revealed that the SSES has 3 correlated factors: performance, social, and appearance self-esteem. Effects of naturally occurring and laboratory failure and of clinical treatment on SSES scores were examined; it was concluded that the SSES is sensitive to these sorts of manipulations. The scale has many potential uses, which include serving as a valid manipulation check index, measuring clinical change in self-esteem, and untangling the confounded relation between mood and self-esteem. There has been a resurgence of interest in examining whether aspects of the self-concept are stable or malleable (Markus & Kunda, 1986). On the one hand, there is considerable evidence that the self-concept is persistent and stable and that people will actively seek information that confirms their self-concept and reject information that threatens their general view of self
Overview
Integrity signals
Registry
Cites
Statistics
Verification
Claims the paper makes
Claims other papers make about this one
Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?
In the citing paper
“In this study, the internal consistency (Cronbach α at baseline) was 0.85 for the overall scale.”
From Schema-Informed Digital Mental Health Intervention for Maladaptive Cognitive-Emotional Patterns: Randomized Controlled Trial (2025) · cites this paper as [20]
Citations
Cites
An inventory for measuring depression
BECK, A. T. (1961) · Archives of General Psychiatry · doi:10.1001/archpsyc.1961.01710120031004 · Cited by 38,032
Society and the Adolescent Self-Image
Rosenberg, M. (1965) · doi:10.1515/9781400876136 · Cited by 30,126
James, W. (1891) · Personality Culture Society · doi:10.1037/11059-000 · Cited by 25,876
An Index of Factorial Simplicity
Kaiser, H. F. (1974) · Psychometrika · doi:10.1007/bf02291575 · Cited by 14,898
A new scale of social desirability independent of psychopathology.
Crowne, D. P., & Marlowe, D. (1960) · Journal of Consulting Psychology · doi:10.1037/h0047358 · Cited by 8,686
Illusion and well‐being: A social psychological perspective on mental health
Taylor, S. E., & Brown, J. D. (1988) · Psychological Bulletin · doi:10.1037/0033-2909.103.2.193 · Cited by 7,814
Learned helplessness in humans: Critique and reformulation.
Abramson, L. Y., Seligman, M. E., & Teasdale, J. D. (1978) · Journal of Abnormal Psychology · doi:10.1037//0021-843x.87.1.49 · Cited by 7,121
(1979) · Medical Entomology and Zoology · Cited by 5,872
Depression. Clinical, Experimental, and Theoretical Aspects.
(1968) · Annals of Internal Medicine · doi:10.7326/0003-4819-68-2-502 · Cited by 5,233
Negative affectivity: the disposition to experience aversive emotional states
Watson, D., & Clark, L. A. (1984) · Psychological Bulletin · doi:10.1037/0033-2909.96.3.465 · Cited by 4,636
Self-schemata and processing information about the self.
Markus, H. R. (1977) · Journal of Personality and Social Psychology · doi:10.1037/0022-3514.35.2.63 · Cited by 3,911
Public and private self-consciousness: Assessment and theory.
Fenigstein, A., Scheier, M. F., & Buss, A. H. (1975) · Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology · doi:10.1037/h0076760 · Cited by 3,728
Review of personality and social psychology
Wheeler, L. S., & Shaver, P. R. (1980) · UMI Books on Demand · Cited by 3,593
Social stigma and self-esteem: The self-protective properties of stigma.
Crocker, J., & Major, B. (1989) · Psychological Review · doi:10.1037/0033-295x.96.4.608 · Cited by 3,426
Validity and reliability of the Experience-Sampling Method
CSIKSZENTMIHALYI, M., & LARSON, R. (1987) · The Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease · doi:10.1097/00005053-198709000-00004 · Cited by 2,544
The role of factor analysis in the development and evaluation of personality scales
Briggs, S. R., & Cheek, J. M. (1986) · Journal of Personality · doi:10.1111/j.1467-6494.1986.tb00391.x · Cited by 2,365
Basking in reflected glory: Three (football) field studies.
Cialdini, R. B., Borden, R. J., Thorne, A., Walker, M. R., Freeman, S., & Sloan, L. R. (1976) · Journal of Personality and Social Psychology · doi:10.1037/0022-3514.34.3.366 · Cited by 2,361
Manual for the state-trait anxiety inventory (form Y) : "self-evaluation questionnaire"
Spielberger, C. D., Gorsuch, R. L., & Lushene, R. E. (1970) · Consulting Psychologists Press eBooks · Cited by 2,352
Psychological perspectives on the self
Suls, J. M., & Greenwald, A. G. (1982) · Lawrence Erlbaum Associates eBooks · Cited by 2,300
The totalitarian ego: Fabrication and revision of personal history.
Greenwald, A. G. (1980) · American Psychologist · doi:10.1037/0003-066x.35.7.603 · Cited by 1,942
Toward a self‐evaluation maintenance model of social behavior
Tesser, A. (1988) · Advances in Experimental Social Psychology · doi:10.1016/s0065-2601(08)60227-0 · Cited by 1,878
Measures of Social Psychological Attitudes.
Archer, D., Kimes, D. D., Robinson, J. P., & Shaver, P. R. (1976) · Contemporary Sociology A Journal of Reviews · doi:10.2307/2063857 · Cited by 1,830
Blaney, P. H. (1986) · Psychological Bulletin · doi:10.1037/0033-2909.99.2.229 · Cited by 1,739
A self-presentational view of social phenomena.
Baumeister, R. F. (1982) · Psychological Bulletin · doi:10.1037/0033-2909.91.1.3 · Cited by 1,529
Theory and Research on Anxiety
Spielberger, C. D. (1966) · Elsevier eBooks · doi:10.1016/b978-1-4832-3131-0.50006-8 · Cited by 1,353
Identity negotiation: Where two roads meet.
Swann, W. B. (1987) · Journal of Personality and Social Psychology · doi:10.1037/0022-3514.53.6.1038 · Cited by 1,270
Stability and malleability of the self-concept.
Markus, H. R., & Kunda, Z. (1986) · Journal of Personality and Social Psychology · doi:10.1037//0022-3514.51.4.858 · Cited by 1,032
Measurement Theory for the Behavioral Sciences.
Elliott, G. C., Ghiselli, E. Ε., Campbell, J. P., & Zedeck, S. (1982) · Contemporary Sociology A Journal of Reviews · doi:10.2307/2067145 · Cited by 1,011
Sex differences in perceptions of desirable body shape.
Fallon, A. E., & Rozin, P. (1985) · Journal of Abnormal Psychology · doi:10.1037//0021-843x.94.1.102 · Cited by 981
The dimensionality of self-esteem: II. Hierarchical facet model for revised measurement scales.
Fleming, J. S., & Courtney, B. E. (1984) · Journal of Personality and Social Psychology · doi:10.1037/0022-3514.46.2.404 · Cited by 938
(1966) · Elsevier eBooks · doi:10.1016/c2013-0-12378-1 · Cited by 861
Pyszczynski, T., & Greenberg, J. (1987) · Psychological Bulletin · doi:10.1037/0033-2909.102.1.122 · Cited by 825
Positive illusions: creative self-deception and the healthy mind
(1990) · Choice Reviews Online · doi:10.5860/choice.27-4168 · Cited by 790
Social comparison, self-consistency, and the concept of self.
Morse, S., & Gergen, K. J. (1970) · Journal of Personality and Social Psychology · doi:10.1037/h0029862 · Cited by 671
Personality and Persuasibility
Burton, N. G., Janis, I. L., & Hovland, C. I. (1960) · The American Journal of Psychology · doi:10.2307/1419147 · Cited by 607
Stability and level of self-esteem as predictors of anger arousal and hostility.
Kernis, M. H., Grannemann, B. D., & Barclay, L. C. (1989) · Journal of Personality and Social Psychology · doi:10.1037//0022-3514.56.6.1013 · Cited by 555
Dictionary of behavioral assessment techniques
(1989) · Choice Reviews Online · doi:10.5860/choice.26-3618 · Cited by 550
Gender Differences in Concern with Body Weight and Physical Appearance Over the Life Span
Pliner, P. P., Chaiken, S., & Flett, G. L. (1990) · Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin · doi:10.1177/0146167290162007 · Cited by 533
Self-esteem : its conceptualization and measurement
Wells, L. E., & Marwell, G. (1976) · Sage eBooks · Cited by 532
Appraisal of the self-schema construct in cognitive models of depression.
Segal, Z. (1988) · Psychological bulletin · doi:10.1037/0033-2909.103.2.147 · Cited by 483
Self-concept from middle childhood through adolescence
Rosenberg, M. (1986) · Medical Entomology and Zoology · Cited by 436
Metalsky, G. I., Halberstadt, L. J., & Abramson, L. Y. (1987) · Journal of Personality and Social Psychology · doi:10.1037/0022-3514.52.2.386 · Cited by 352
Impact of causal attributions on affective reactions to success and failure.
McFarland, C., & Ross, M. (1982) · Journal of Personality and Social Psychology · doi:10.1037/0022-3514.43.5.937 · Cited by 352
A method for determining types of self-esteem.
Coopersmith, S. (1959) · The Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology · doi:10.1037/h0048001 · Cited by 332
Depressed and nondepressed content self-reference in mild depressives
Kuiper, N. A., & Derry, P. A. (1982) · Journal of Personality · doi:10.1111/j.1467-6494.1982.tb00746.x · Cited by 326
Effects of self-esteem, perceived performance, and choice on causal attributions.
Fitch, G. (1970) · Journal of Personality and Social Psychology · doi:10.1037/h0029847 · Cited by 314
Constraints on the effects of mood on memory.
Clark, D. M., & Teasdale, J. D. (1985) · Journal of Personality and Social Psychology · doi:10.1037/0022-3514.48.6.1595 · Cited by 291
Effects of strategic self-presentation on subsequent self-esteem.
JONES, E. E., Rhodewalt, F. T., Berglas, S., & Skelton, J. A. (1981) · Journal of Personality and Social Psychology · doi:10.1037/0022-3514.41.3.407 · Cited by 264
McFarlin, D. B., & Blascovich, J. (1981) · Journal of Personality and Social Psychology · doi:10.1037/0022-3514.40.3.521 · Cited by 253
Depression, self-esteem, and the absence of self-protective attributional biases.
Tennen, H. A., & Herzberger, S. D. (1987) · Journal of Personality and Social Psychology · doi:10.1037//0022-3514.52.1.72 · Cited by 245
Poor performance following unsolvable problems: Learned helplessness or egotism?
Frankel, A. S., & Snyder, M. L. (1978) · Journal of Personality and Social Psychology · doi:10.1037/0022-3514.36.12.1415 · Cited by 243
Self‐esteem and responses to success and failure: Subsequent performance and intrinsic motivation
Baumeister, R. F., & Tice, D. M. (1985) · Journal of Personality · doi:10.1111/j.1467-6494.1985.tb00376.x · Cited by 242
(1984) · Research publications - Association for Research in Nervous and Mental Disease · doi:10.7326/0003-4819-100-5-776_4 · Cited by 232
Self-esteem and reactions to failure: The mediating role of overgeneralization.
Kernis, M. H., Brockner, J., & Frankel, B. S. (1989) · Journal of Personality and Social Psychology · doi:10.1037/0022-3514.57.4.707 · Cited by 219
Campbell, J. D., & Fairey, P. J. (1985) · Journal of Personality and Social Psychology · doi:10.1037/0022-3514.48.5.1097 · Cited by 217
Involvement as a derterminant of response to favorable and unfavorable information.
Eagly, A. H. (1967) · Journal of Personality and Social Psychology · doi:10.1037/h0025080 · Cited by 216
On the induction of emotion in the laboratory: Discrete moods or multiple affect states?
Polivy, J. (1981) · Journal of Personality and Social Psychology · doi:10.1037//0022-3514.41.4.803 · Cited by 156
Self-citationGreenberg, J., & Pyszczynski, T. (1986) · Journal of Personality and Social Psychology · doi:10.1037//0022-3514.50.5.1039 · Cited by 150
Depression, self-focused attention, and the negative memory bias.
Pyszczynski, T., Hamilton, J. C., Herring, F. H., & Greenberg, J. (1989) · Journal of Personality and Social Psychology · doi:10.1037/0022-3514.57.2.351 · Cited by 141
The dimensionality of self-esteem: Some results of a college sample.
Fleming, J. S., & Watts, W. A. (1980) · Journal of Personality and Social Psychology · doi:10.1037/0022-3514.39.5.921 · Cited by 131
Self-evaluations, initial success and failure, and improvement as determinants of persistence.
Shrauger, J. S., & Sorman, P. B. (1977) · Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology · doi:10.1037/0022-006x.45.5.784 · Cited by 131
Some Specific Effects of Four Affect-Induction Procedures
Isen, A. M., & Gorgoglione, J. M. (1983) · Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin · doi:10.1177/0146167283091019 · Cited by 129
Musical mood induction: An alternative to the Velten technique.
Pignatiello, M. F., Camp, C. J., & Rasar, L. A. (1986) · Journal of Abnormal Psychology · doi:10.1037//0021-843x.95.3.295 · Cited by 120
Effects of self-presentation on the phenomenal self.
Rhodewalt, F. T., & Agustsdottir, S. (1986) · Journal of Personality and Social Psychology · doi:10.1037/0022-3514.50.1.47 · Cited by 117
Situational and transituational determinants of adolescent self-feelings.
Savin‐Williams, R. C., & Demo, D. H. (1983) · Journal of Personality and Social Psychology · doi:10.1037/0022-3514.44.4.824 · Cited by 115
Regulating affect interpersonally: When low esteem leads to greater enhancement.
Baumgardner, A. H., Kaufman, C. M., & Levy, P. E. (1989) · Journal of Personality and Social Psychology · doi:10.1037/0022-3514.56.6.907 · Cited by 108
Depression and preference for self-focusing stimuli after success and failure.
Pyszczynski, T., & Greenberg, J. (1985) · Journal of Personality and Social Psychology · doi:10.1037/0022-3514.49.4.1066 · Cited by 106
Self-esteem and reactions to negative feedback: Toward greater generalizability
Brockner, J., Derr, W. R., & Laing, W. N. (1987) · Journal of Research in Personality · doi:10.1016/0092-6566(87)90014-6 · Cited by 105
The influence of self-esteem on rate of verbal conditioning and social matching behavior.
Gelfand, D. M. (1962) · Journal of Abnormal & Social Psychology · doi:10.1037/h0040979 · Cited by 93
Self-esteem and susceptibility to social influence.
Nisbett, R. E., & Gordon, A. (1967) · Journal of Personality and Social Psychology · doi:10.1037/h0024308 · Cited by 78
Assessment and Modification of Emotional Behavior
Blankstein, K. R., Pliner, P. P., & Polivy, J. (1980) · Springer eBooks · doi:10.1007/978-1-4684-3782-9 · Cited by 67
Self-citationSelf-esteem and reactance: Further evidence of attitudinal and motivational consequences
Brockner, J., & Elkind, M. (1985) · Journal of Experimental Social Psychology · doi:10.1016/0022-1031(85)90035-6 · Cited by 60
Variations in mothers' self-esteem in daily life.
Wells, A. J. (1988) · Journal of Personality and Social Psychology · doi:10.1037//0022-3514.55.4.661 · Cited by 54
The effects of self-esteem and evaluator demandingness on effort expenditure.
Sigall, H., & Gould, R. (1977) · Journal of Personality and Social Psychology · doi:10.1037//0022-3514.35.1.12 · Cited by 49
Effects of delay, attack, and retaliation on state depression and hostility.
Atkinson, C., & Polivy, J. (1976) · Journal of Abnormal Psychology · doi:10.1037//0021-843x.85.6.570 · Cited by 48
Self-citationEffects of public and private failure on self-evaluation.
Stotland, E., & Zander, A. F. (1958) · Journal of Abnormal & Social Psychology · doi:10.1037/h0045939 · Cited by 33
Ciliska, D. K. (1990) · Cited by 30
Some determinants of self-evaluation.
Gerard, H. B. (1961) · Journal of Abnormal & Social Psychology · doi:10.1037/h0040575 · Cited by 26
Cited by
Sorted by citations
Development and validation of the State Hope Scale.
Snyder, C. R. R., Sympson, S. C., Ybasco, F. C., Borders, T. F., Babyak, M. A., & Higgins, R. L. (1996) · Journal of Personality and Social Psychology · doi:10.1037/0022-3514.70.2.321 · Cited by 3,584
The nature and function of self-esteem: Sociometer theory
Leary, M. R., & Baumeister, R. F. (2000) · Advances in Experimental Social Psychology · doi:10.1016/s0065-2601(00)80003-9 · Cited by 2,521
Self-esteem as an interpersonal monitor: The sociometer hypothesis
Leary, M. R., Tambor, E. S., Terdal, S. K., & Downs, D. L. (1995) · Journal of Personality and Social Psychology · doi:10.1037/0022-3514.68.3.518 · Cited by 2,519
Relation of threatened egotism to violence and aggression: The dark side of high self-esteem.
Baumeister, R. F., Smart, L., & Boden, J. M. (1996) · Psychological Review · doi:10.1037/0033-295x.103.1.5 · Cited by 2,378
“Indeed, although state self-esteem is strongly correlated with trait self-esteem, it does fluctuate around the chronic level (Heatherton & Polivy, 1991; Kernis, 1993).”
BackgroundKraut, R. E., Kiesler, S. B., Boneva, B. S., Cummings, J. N., Helgeson, V. S., & Crawford, A. M. (2002) · Journal of Social Issues · doi:10.1111/1540-4560.00248 · Cited by 2,367
“We added measures of self-esteem (Heatherton & Polivy, 1991), positive and negative affect (Watson, Clark, & Tellegen, 1988), perceived time pressure (adapted from Kraut & Attewell, 1997) and physical health (subscale from the SF-36; Ware, Snow, Kosinski, & Gandek, 1993).”
Method
Metadata
- Authors
- Heatherton, T. F., & Polivy, J.
- Affiliations
- Harvard University (US)
- Venue
- Journal of Personality and Social Psychology
- Published
- 1991-06
- Volume
- 60
- Issue
- 6
- Pages
- 895-910
- ISSN
- 0022-3514 (ISSN-L)
- 1939-1315
- OpenAlex
- W1984877678
- Cited by
- 2,007
- References
- 79
- Citations by year
- 2026: 58 · 2025: 63 · 2024: 66 · 2023: 78 · 2022: 96 · 2021: 92 · 2020: 83 · 2019: 96 · 2018: 101 · 2017: 85 · 2016: 85 · 2015: 90 · 2014: 94 · 2013: 74 · 2012: 82
- FWCI
- 9.15
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Journal of Personality and Social Psychology (publishedVersion)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Clinical Psychology › Personality Traits and Psychology
- Social Sciences › Decision Sciences › Management Science and Operations Research › Psychometric Methodologies and Testing
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Applied Psychology › Psychological Testing and Assessment
- Keywords
- state self-esteem, self-esteem measurement, scale development, performance self-esteem, social self-esteem, appearance self-esteem, manipulation checks, self-concept stability
About these checks
Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.
Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.
Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.
What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›
Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review
