Self-esteem and subjective well-being revisited: The roles of personal, relational, and collective self-esteem

In the paper

“As shown in Step 1, the T1 variables predicted T2 life satisfaction, although only T1 life satisfaction was a significant predictor.”

In the paper

“As can be seen in Table 6, PSE was positively associated with both life satisfaction and happiness, and these effects were still significant when RSE and CSE were introduced in the regression model.”

In the paper

“Specifically, when controlling for PSE, RSE was positively associated with life satisfaction (Studies 1, 3 and 4), positive affect (Studies 1 and 4), meaning in life (Studies 1 and 2), and happiness (Study 3).”

In the paper

“PSE was still a significant predictor after RSE and CSE were introduced in the regression.”

In the paper

“As can be seen in Table 6, PSE was positively associated with both life satisfaction and happiness, and these effects were still significant when RSE and CSE were introduced in the regression model.”

In the paper

“Interestingly, in our study, PSE was not associated with life satisfaction when controlling for RSE and CSE; instead, RSE emerged as a stronger predictor (Studies 1, 2, and 5).”

In the paper

“In contrast to PSE and RSE, CSE was not associated with subjective well-being across the four studies (perhaps an exception is that CSE was marginally associated with meaning in life in Study 2).”

In the paper

“According to social identity theory [28], the collective is an essential aspect of the self, and therefore evaluation of the collective self would contribute to subjective well-being.”

What the sources say

• Not checked yetcites [28] H Tajfel, 2010, I6. Instrumentality, identity and social comparisons, Social identity and intergroup relations

In the paper

“Numerous studies have also shown that individuals who have a secure attachment with their parents had higher levels of psychological well-being [36, 37].”

What the sources say

• Not checked yetcites [36] S Madigan, 2013, Attachment and internalizing behavior in early childhood: A meta-analysis, Developmental Psychology source
• Not checked yetcites [37] S Pallini, 2014, Early child–parent attachment and peer relations: A meta-analysis of recent research, Journal of Family Psychology source

In the paper

“According to social identity theory, self-esteem can be derived from both the personal self and the social self [16].”

What the sources say

• Not checked yetcites [16] H Tajfel, 1982, Social psychology of intergroup relations, Annu Rev Psychol source

In the paper

“RSE pertains to self-worth derived from one's relationships with significant others such as family and friends [19, 20].”

What the sources say

• Not checked yetcites [19] S Harter, 1998, Relational self-worth: Differences in perceived worth as a person across interpersonal contexts among adolescents, Child Development source
• Not checked yetcites [20] H Du, 2012, The development and validation of the Relational Self-esteem Scale, Scandinavian Journal of Psychology source

In the paper

“Self-esteem was also found to be associated with other indicators of subjective well-being, such as positive and negative affect [13], meaning in life [14], and subjective vitality [15].”

What the sources say

• Not checked yetcites [14] MF Steger, 2006, The meaning in life questionnaire: Assessing the presence of and search for meaning in life, Journal of Counseling Psychology source

In the paper

“Self-esteem was also found to be associated with other indicators of subjective well-being, such as positive and negative affect [13], meaning in life [14], and subjective vitality [15].”

What the sources say

• Not checked yetcites [15] RM Ryan, 1997, On energy, personality, and health: Subjective vitality as a dynamic reflection of well‐being, Journal of personality source

In the paper

“Bettencourt and Dorr [29] showed that CSE mediated the relation between allocentrism (defined as individual differences in collectivism) and subjective well-being among U.S. college students.”

What the sources say

• Not checked yetcites [29] BA Bettencourt, 1997, Collective self-esteem as a mediator of the relationship between allocentrism and subjective well-being, Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin source

In the paper

“Based on social identity theory [28], if the relational self is an important aspect of one’s selfhood, then one’s evaluation of therelational self should be related to subjective well-being.”

What the sources say

• Not checked yetcites [28] H Tajfel, 2010, I6. Instrumentality, identity and social comparisons, Social identity and intergroup relations

In the paper

“PSE is implicated when people derive their sense of self worth from their personal attributes such as their abilities and talents [1].”

What the sources say

• Not checked yetcites [1] M Rosenberg, 1965

In the paper

“Researchers have found that self-esteem—defined as a person's sense of self-worth—is closely associated with well-being and a number of other adaptive outcomes.”

What the sources say

• Not checked yetcites [1] M Rosenberg, 1965
• Not checked yetcites [2] MR Leary, 2000, Advances in Experimental Social Psychology
• Not checked yetcites [3] T Pyszczynski, 2004, Why do people need self-esteem: A theoretical and empirical review, Psychological Bulletin source
• Not checked yetcites [4] J Crocker, 2004, The Costly Pursuit of Self-Esteem, Psychological Bulletin source
• Not checked yetcites [5] AG Greenwald, 1995, Implicit social cognition: Attitudes, self-esteem, and stereotypes, Psychol Rev source

In the paper

“Indeed, they found that CSE was positively associated with well-being among White, Black, and Asian college students in the United States; however, when controlling for PSE, the relationship of CSE with well-being became nonsignificant for Whites, small for Blacks, and moderate to strong for Asians [27].”

What the sources say

• Not checked yetcites [27] J Crocker, 1994, Collective self-esteem and psychological well-being among White, Black, and Asian college students, Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin source

In the paper

“Under the social self, we can further differentiate between the relational and the collective self [17, 18].”

What the sources say

• Not checked yetcites [17] MB Brewer, 1996, Who is this" We"? Levels of collective identity and self representations, J Pers Soc Psychol source
• Not checked yetcites [18] C Sedikides, 2001, Individual Self, Relational Self and Collective Self

In the paper

“Indeed, they found that CSE was positively associated with well-being among White, Black, and Asian college students in the United States; however, when controlling for PSE, the relationship of CSE with well-being became nonsignificant for Whites, small for Blacks, and moderate to strong for Asians [27].”

What the sources say

• Not checked yetcites [27] J Crocker, 1994, Collective self-esteem and psychological well-being among White, Black, and Asian college students, Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin source

In the paper

“Numerous studies have shown that these three types of self-concept are empirically distinguishable from each other and have distinct effects on a wide range of psychological phenomena [8, 18].”

What the sources say

• Not checked yetcites [8] C Sedikides, 2013, A three-tier hierarchy of self-potency: Individual self, relational self, collective self, Advances in experimental social psychology source
• Not checked yetcites [18] C Sedikides, 2001, Individual Self, Relational Self and Collective Self

In the paper

“CSE pertains to self-worth derived from membership in larger social groups [21, 22].”

What the sources say

• Not checked yetcites [21] J Crocker, 1990, Collective self-esteem and ingroup bias, J Pers Soc Psychol source
• Not checked yetcites [22] R Luhtanen, 1992, A collective self-esteem scale: Self-evaluation of one's social identity, Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin source

In the paper

“These findings suggest that CSE is predictive of subjective well-being, but the prediction is rather weak when controlling for PSE among both Westerners and Asians.”

In the paper

“To minimize the impact of identification on the relationship between CSE and subjective well-being, we excluded 6 participants with low identification (i.e., participants who indicated that they didn’t identify themselves as Macau residents; identification values < 3).”

In the paper

“Therefore, in this study we also controlled for the effects of Time 1 well-being on Time 2 well-being.”

In the paper

“One of the few studies that directly examined RSE found that RSE was correlated with multiple indicators of well-being (e.g., positive affect, meaning in life, depression) and these associations held even when controlling for PSE [39].”

What the sources say

• Not checked yetcites [39] H Du, 2014, Relational self-esteem, psychological well-being, and social support in children affected by HIV, Journal of Health Psychology

In the paper

“Nationality is one of the most common group identities identified in previous research [21].”

What the sources say

• Not checked yetcites [21] J Crocker, 1990, Collective self-esteem and ingroup bias, J Pers Soc Psychol source

In the paper

“The positive association of PSE with subjective well-being is in line with previous findings [9, 13–15, 54] showing that people high in self-esteem tend to report stronger life satisfaction, positive affect, meaning in life, and subjective vitality.”

What the sources say

• Not checked yetcites [9] E Diener, 1995, Cross-Cultural Correlates of Life Satisfaction and Self-Esteem, J Pers Soc Psychol source
• Not checked yetcites [13] RW Robins, 2001, Measuring global self-esteem: Construct validation of a single-item measure and the Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale, Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin source
• Not checked yetcites [14] MF Steger, 2006, The meaning in life questionnaire: Assessing the presence of and search for meaning in life, Journal of Counseling Psychology source
• Not checked yetcites [15] RM Ryan, 1997, On energy, personality, and health: Subjective vitality as a dynamic reflection of well‐being, Journal of personality source
• Not checked yetcites [54] H Cai, 2009, Is self-esteem a universal need? Evidence from The People's Republic of China, Asian Journal of Social Psychology source

In the paper

“RSE was found to be positively associated with different aspects of subjective well-being, suggesting that the pursuit of self-worth through one's relationships with significant others might make people feel more positive and happy and be more satisfied with their lives.”

In the paper

“When the prior level of an outcome (e.g., well-being) is not statistically accounted for, the evidence of prospective effects can be confounded by the concurrent relations between the constructs. Estimates of prospective effects might be somewhat misleading [52].”

What the sources say

• Not checked yetcites [52] SE Finkel, 1995

In the paper

“Overall, the findings of Study 5 replicated what we found in Studies 1–4: participants high in RSE reported greater life satisfaction, whereas CSE was a nonsignificant predictor of life satisfaction.”

In the paper

“All the measures showed acceptable reliabilities with Cronbach’s alphas > .74, as shown in Table 9.”

In the paper

“Hence, the final sample was 74 participants at the Time 2 point.”

In the paper

“Third, Study 5 adopted a longitudinal design, which addressed the methodological limitations of previous cross-sectional studies.”

In the paper

“Kwan and her colleagues [38] found that PSE and relationship harmony had an additive effect on predicting life satisfaction.”

What the sources say

• Not checked yetcites [38] VSY Kwan, 1997, Pancultural explanations for life satisfaction: Adding relationship harmony to self-esteem, J Pers Soc Psychol source

In the paper

“These findings conceptually replicated and extended the findings of Studies 1–3: Participants with high RSE reported greater life satisfaction and more positive affect.”

In the paper

“Both PSE and RSE are positive predictors of subjective well-being, and it seems that RSE is more salient compared to PSE at least in the collectivist Chinese context.”

In the paper

“However, a shortcoming of this study was that it was conducted with a sample of vulnerable children (i.e., children affected by parental HIV) so that the findings may not necessarily be generalizable to other populations.”

In the paper

“In spite of these limitations, the five studies presented here consistently demonstrated that self-esteem at the relational level (but not the collective level) is robustly related to subjective well-being.”

In the paper

“The findings of the current study with regard to the primacy of RSE also corroborate previous experimental research which showed that East Asians mainly relied on RSE (but not PSE) to buffer death-related anxiety, but Westerners mainly counted on PSE (but not RSE) to reduce anxiety [40].”

What the sources say

• Not checked yetcites [40] H Du, 2013, Cultural influences on terror management: Independent and interdependent self-esteem as anxiety buffers, Journal of Experimental Social Psychology source

In the paper

“Recently, researchers have found that both the individual self and the relational self have greater motivational primacy compared to the collective self [7].”

What the sources say

• Not checked yetcites [7] L Gaertner, 2012, A motivational hierarchy within: Primacy of the individual self, relational self, or collective self?, Journal of Experimental Social Psychology source

In the paper

“These findings contribute substantially to current theorizing on self-esteem and may be useful in developing interventions aimed at optimizing individuals' well-being.”

In the paper

“While it is plausible that RSE contributes to subjective well-being, we cannot rule out that subjective well-being leads to better self-esteem.”

In the paper

“These findings were consistent with the cross-cultural literature which shows that among East Asians, interdependent self-construal is more salient compared to the independent self-construal [26] as well as previous research [38] showing that the predictive effect of PSE on well-being among East Asians was not as strong as the effect among Westerners.”

What the sources say

• Not checked yetcites [26] HR Markus, 1991, Culture and the self: Implications for cognition, emotion, and motivation, Psychol Rev source
• Not checked yetcites [38] VSY Kwan, 1997, Pancultural explanations for life satisfaction: Adding relationship harmony to self-esteem, J Pers Soc Psychol source

In the paper

“This result appears surprising because previous findings showed that CSE contributed to subjective well-being, even after controlling for PSE [27, 31].”

What the sources say

• Not checked yetcites [27] J Crocker, 1994, Collective self-esteem and psychological well-being among White, Black, and Asian college students, Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin source
• Not checked yetcites [31] OF Simsek, 2013, Structural Relations of Personal and Collective Self-Esteem to Subjective Well-Being: Attachment as Moderator, Social Indicators Research

In the paper

“Last, multiple indicators of well-being adopted in each study were correlated with each other so that the prediction of self-esteem on one indicator (e.g., life satisfaction) may be partially due to the association of self-esteem with another indicator of well-being (e.g., happiness).”

In the paper

“Although we observed a consistent pattern with RSE across five studies including a longitudinal survey, the conclusions should be interpreted with caution because our data were correlational and do not indicate causal relations.”

In the paper

“In addition, our studies exclusively relied on college students’ self-reports of RSE and CSE.”