Gender Differences in Adolescent Self-Esteem: An Exploration of Domains

• Published in: The Journal of genetic psychology 2001-03, Vol.162 (1), p.93-117
• Main Authors: Quatman, Teri, Watson, Cary M.
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: adolescence; Adolescent; Adolescents; Analysis of Variance; Biological and medical sciences; Child; Children & youth; Developmental psychology; Educational Environment; Female; Fundamental and applied biological sciences. Psychology; Gender; Gender Differences; Humans; Individualized Instruction; Longitudinal Studies; Male; Psychology, Adolescent; Psychology. Psychoanalysis. Psychiatry; Psychology. Psychophysiology; San Francisco; Self Concept; Self esteem; Self image; Sex Factors
• ISSN: 0022-1325; 1940-0896
• DOI: 10.1080/00221320109597883

The relationship between gender and global self-esteem in adolescence, while modest, has been well established, with boys consistently scoring higher than girls. In the present study, we sought to understand gender differences in adolescent self-esteem in terms of its component parts. With a relatively large (n = 545) sample of adolescents, drawn from Grades 8, 10. and 12, we specified 8 domains of adolescent self-esteem (personal security, home/parents, peer popularity, academic competence, attractiveness, personal mastery, psychological permeability, and athletic competence) across a number of different instruments and brought them together into a common assessment superstructure. Gender differences as well as the relative contributions of the different domains to overall self-esteem scores were measured. As predicted, boys attained slightly higher global self-esteem scores than girls did, by a difference of .22 standard deviation units. Contrary to our expectation of more balanced domain effects, boys significantly outperformed girls in 6 of 8 domains, whereas the 2 remaining domains exhibited no significant gender differences. There were no main or interaction effects for grade level. In terms of relative contribution of these domains to global self-esteem for the 2 genders, global self-esteem in boys and girls is predicted in very similar strengths and in the same order of magnitude by identical domains of self-esteem: home/parents, personal security, academic competence, attractiveness, and personal mastery-yielding multiple R 2 s from .88 to .91.