Teen-Age Girls and Self-Esteem

One of the most popular recent books about the lives of teen-age girls, Reviving Ophelia, dealt with the problem of self-esteem. The author of that book, Mary Pipher, traced many of the problems that teen-age girls have to a lack of self-esteem, noting that suicide, eating disorders, depression, teen pregnancy, and other problems have their origins in self-image. The intent in this paper is to explore that issue of self-esteem, learning how low self-esteem develops and how it impacts the individual.

Before we start looking at how self-esteem develops and what it does, it would be helpful to define self-esteem. What is it? Gloria Steinem looked at the concept in some detail, noting that it is not a new concept nor a specifically Western concept either. She noted that there are words for it in many different languages, including Arabic, Hebrew, Russian, Swahili, and Chinese. The Chinese used the combined pictographs for self and esteem or respect (Steinem 31).

Steinem herself started with the definition in the Oxford English Dictionary, noting that the dictionary cites uses of "self-esteem" from the 1600s. She indicated that there are actually references to the concept which extend much further back to the Greek philosophers. For them, oikeiosis, or self-love and self-acceptance, was the greatest goal, while self-alienation was the greatest evil (Steinem 31).

In thinking about self-esteem, then, the most importa

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period (Mendelson & White 90). In looking at these results, it is apparent that self-image or body-image has an important impact on self-esteem. Self-image or self-concept is the adolescent's perception of their self, and self-esteem is the positive feeling that they have for that perceived self. Obviously, self-image or self-concept can become skewed and the adolescent may be proceeding with a false sense of self, judging that misperceived self harshly. This is particularly the case with adolescent girls who tend to more depressed than adolescent boys (Roberts and Sobhan 640). Young girls can become convinced of their worthlessness, when looking at a misperceived self. This is the kind of situation the Greeks were talking about when decrying self-alienation. Instead of developing appropriate self-esteem, these young girls become self-critical and despairing, unable to see their true value. Another problem for both girls and boys in terms of self-esteem is the way in which that impacts their development of gender identity. Boys with high self-esteem are able to hold on to more of their true selves, without feeling compelled to represent every aspect of gender stereotypes of masculinity in order to feel acceptable. Likewi

Category: Psychology - T